What has the CDC determined to be the proper testing procedure for confirming that a patient does or does not have Lyme disease?
TRICK question- The CDC states emphatically that Lyme tests are NOT to be used to exclude a diagnosis of Lyme disease. A negative test is NOT to be considered absolute by any means, nor is it to be used to indicate a cure. As the CDC states, Lyme disease is a “clinical diagnosis”. No test has been developed that can confirm if a patient is cured. A negative test does NOT indicate a cure.
Related Questions
- What is the two tier testing procedure set up by the IDSA/CDC for testing patients suspected of having Lyme disease and what are the most common problems with this procedure?
- How many disease and procedure codes are coded in the Medical SAS® Datasets? Are all the procedures provided to a patient captured by the ICD-9-CM codes?
- If a patient previously had Lyme disease and is bitten by another infected tick, are they immune to Lyme disease?
