Lyme Disease Treatment Strategies

An excellent article by Hillary Thing on Lyme disease treatment strategies provides a good overview of Chinese medicine’s approach to treating this stubborn autoimmune condition. A summary of her piece follows, published on Pacific College’s website (see citation below).

Lyme – The Stealth Infection

Lyme and other autoimmune diseases, which the author calls “devastating stealth infections,” are growing in epidemic proportions worldwide. As a result, Chinese medicine practitioners must rise to the challenge of using this ancient medicine to combat a very stubborn disease.

The keys to successfully treating Lyme disease include:

• Recognizing the underlying causes of chronic multi-system inflammatory disease.
• Navigating the maze of diagnostic and treatment options and working together with Western and other alternative medicine doctors collaboratively.
• Understanding how to utilize the tools of Chinese medicine to create powerful results.

Central to Lyme disease treatment strategies is understanding the characteristics of the Chinese medicine concept of Gu disease. Gu zheng, translated as “possession syndrome,” is a Chinese medical diagnosis describing the engulfment of a person’s body by one or more parasitic-type organisms.

The Rise of Autoimmune Diseases

Some have speculated that our modern sanitary lifestyle and subsequent removal of traditional and benign parasites from our intestinal tract have weakened our immune system, making us susceptible to more aggressive parasitic infections. The result is a dramatic rise in inflammatory autoimmune diseases.

Gu syndrome includes numerous complex chronic infections and inflammatory diseases, giving us a deep understanding of what we’re dealing with when a patient has complex, multi-system health problems, regardless of whether we can identify the exact infection through bloodwork.

Characteristics of Lyme Disease

Gu, as described in the classical Chinese medical texts, is characterized as a complex disease triggered by infection from a parasite. Specifically, Gu presents with digestive, mental, cognitive, and nervous system symptoms, including debilitating fatigue, brain fog, joint and muscle pain, dizziness, depression, anxiety, and insomnia.

Lyme and other autoimmune conditions manifest in dramatic ways, including:

• Feeling like a terrible calamity, the worst thing that has ever happened. For example, Lyme patients often say, “I feel like I’m dying,” or “I can’t take any more.” This feeling is characteristic of Gu syndrome.
• Involves inexplicable symptoms such as seizure-like experiences that don’t show up on an EEG or sensations that patients have difficulty putting into words.
• Typically, medical diagnostic exams turn up nothing. Lyme is the diagnosis left when all else has been proven negative.
• Gu pathogens also act as toxins in the body (Gu du = Gu poison).

Redefining Lyme Disease

Effective Lyme disease treatment strategies must recognize that Lyme is more than a spirochetal infection. Evaluated through the lens of Gu, Lyme consumes the resources of its host, leading to physical and emotional wasting and creating significant mental, physical, and emotional suffering in the patient.

Gu diseases are chronic inflammatory degenerative syndromes, super-infections involving a variety of pathogens, such as funguses, viruses, and spirochetes, that often lead to malnourishment and a weakened, dysfunctional immune system. The treatments developed thousands of years ago to treat Gu disease are still relevant and practicable today. Acupuncturists have many protocols using the Gu approach that are effective for treating Lyme and other autoimmune diseases.

Treating Complex, Chronic Diseases

Successful Lyme disease treatment strategies require a multi-layered, strategic approach. In particular, four crucial strategies are foundational to nearly all cases of chronic Lyme disease.

1. Rebuild and restore the life force energy flow by tonifying and circulating the patient’s qi and blood.
2. Detoxify the body by invigorating stagnant liver qi and blood. Chinese medicine supports detoxification through lifestyle practices, herbs, acupuncture, diet, and exercise.
3. Eliminate the pathogenic factors. Antimicrobial herbs can reduce the total load of parasites, bacteria, protozoa, viruses, and other microbes in the body. Practitioners choose herbs to target specific species or classes of microbes (such as Bartonella and viruses, or Lyme and Babesia).
4. Break down biofilms, which are responsible for antibiotic-resistant strains of bacteria.

Chinese Medicine and Lyme Disease

Acupuncturists can be essential in diagnosing and treating Lyme and other autoimmune diseases. In addition, our holistic diagnostic perspective and non-toxic treatment options focus on eliminating the microbes and generating health and disease resilience.

Next Steps

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Reference

Lyme Treatment Success with Chinese Medicine

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