When should people diagnosed with CFIDS be tested for chronic Lyme?
A. When the NIH finally took Lyme disease seriously, they developed criteria and we had a symptom complex we could follow. At that time patients either had Lyme disease or they didn’t. However, the three major symptom categories of chronic Lyme that overlap with CFIDS – cognitive dysfunction, central nervous system irritability and fatigue – make it hard to tell he difference between the two illnesses especially if there’s no tick-associated rash. But if PWCs have any neurological symptoms that are otherwise unexplained, they should be tested for Lyme bacteria without question. Q. Aside from lab tests, how can you screen a CFIDS patient for chronic Lyme? A. Since there aren’t any particular signs of chronic Lyme, we sit down and talk to the patient. During that conversation we might find that a PWC had a tic or tremor or shooting pain that he or she didn’t tell anybody about before, indicating an unexplainable neurological symptom. At that point we’d test for Lyme bacteria. If the test
