'I was one sick puppy': woman with Lyme Disease

Lindsay This Week - Peterborough,Ontario,Canada
In the span of a decade, Jane Davidson went from a strong, healthy woman who could portage a canoe to a severely ill woman that could hardly walk a straight line.

"I was really scared," she says.

"I just knew something was wrong."

Roughly 15 years ago, Ms Davidson began experiencing what she describes as fireworks traveling up her spine and a sensation of fireworks going off in her brain. She was tired, had muscle spasms, headaches and dizziness.

"I had no idea what it was," she says.

Ms Davidson's mysterious symptoms were initially diagnosed as a thyroid problem and she took medication for that. However, the debilitating symptoms continued to come and go.

Her body and mind continued to be assaulted by vision, speech and balance problems that began to take over her life.

But her symptoms continued to go from bad to worse.
Three years ago Ms Davidson took her illness into her own hands and began searching for a diagnosis that made sense. She began chatting online with people experiencing similar symptoms. It was these conversations that led her to believe a tiny tick bite was the cause of her illness.

"I had never even heard of Lyme Disease," she says.

Lyme Disease is an infection caused by the corkscrew-shaped bacteria Borrelia burgdorferi. The bacteria are spread by the bite of deer ticks and western black-legged ticks that are found throughout the province.

Ticks are tiny bugs roughly the size of a sesame seed that feed on blood. Ticks cannot fly, so they move slowly along the ground or settle on tall grasses and bushes until they cling to an animal or person passing by.

Ms Davidson suspects a tick bit her 15 years ago. At that time she and her former partner would spend almost every weekend hiking and camping at Jack Lake.

"We use to walk through the woods all the time, for hours," she says.

As of 2003, there were 423 human cases of Lyme Disease reported. According to the Ministry of Health and Long-term Care, not all ticks carry the disease and even if an infected tick bites a person, there is only small chance of getting the disease.

Dr. Humphreys, local medical officer of health, says Lyme Disease seems to be "relatively uncommon disease" in the Peterborough area.

"We're not seeing it and we're not getting it reported here," he says.

Dr. Humphreys notes that in 2004 there were no reported cases of Lyme Disease in the area and only one suspected case in 2005 - Ms Davidson.

"We depend upon physicians, when they see a patient, to report those cases to us," he says.
"On the whole I think doctors are aware of Lyme Disease. If it was occurring here I think we would know about it."

Ms Davidson and others Lyme Disease advocates are not convinced the disease is being properly recognized, diagnosed or reported by those in the medical profession.

"The doctors are missing it because they don't know enough," explains Ms Davidson.

"I can see how a doctor would be really challenged. It's a very sneaky illness. It can be hard."

John Scott, president of the Lyme Disease Association of Ontario, says the disease can be difficult to diagnose because the symptoms mimic other diseases.

According to the Canadian Lyme Disease Foundation, many patients with Lyme were initially diagnosed as having other illnesses including Rheumatoid Arthritis, Fibromyalgia, Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, Multiple Sclerosis, Lupus, and early Alzheimer Disease.

The Ministry web site states that symptoms of the disease usually occur within one to two weeks after a tick bite. Symptoms include fever, headache, muscle and joint pain, fatigue, and a skin rash that looks like a red "bull's eye."

Yet the Canadian Lyme Disease Association states that the "bull's eye" rash occurs in roughly 30 per cent of cases, and is often missed or goes unrecognized.

Ms Davidson says after years of searching for an answer to her illness she finally diagnosed it herself, and then proved her suspicion with a blood test.

A previous blood test in 2002 came back negative.
Dave Jensen, Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care spokesperson, says there are two blood tests used in Ontario to test for Lyme Disease, the ELISA test and the Western Blot test. But both Ms Davidson and Mr. Scott argue that the ELISA test, her first test, is not very reliable.

Mr. Jensen states the ELISA test is used to screen for the disease. If the results from that test are either positive, or indeterminate, then the patient will be sent for the Western Blot test to confirm the presence of the disease.

Mr. Jensen says the Centre recommended this approach of testing for Lyme for Disease Control in Atlanta.

Frustrated with the process of testing in Canada, Ms Davidson enlisted the help of a doctor in Lakefield and mailed her own blood to California, on her own nickel, where the Western Blot test was done first. This time her results came back positive.

"It was more than positive," she says.

"I was one sick puppy."

Today Ms Davidson is on antibiotics and is feeling "a whole lot better."

She has made it her mission to see that other people do not have to go through the same experience.

"It's still an uphill climb, but I think we're turning the corner," she says.

"I'll fight this to the day I die."