I had CPn 10 years ago and it took about 5 yrs of the triple antibiotic protocol to clear it. unfortunately, while attending my second to last nurse practitioner clinical, I contracted it again. I'm currently trying to locate a doctor that can prescribe IV antibiotics because I don't believe I am absorbing the ABX properly due to my hEDS / MCAS. And living in Louisiana is making this an incredibly hard task. Thank you SO MUCH for speaking about this infection. It truly is devastating.

Loved this, thank you so much. I have been sick for 21 years with 5 tick-borne infections...You give me hope!

Great work, Nikki! As Ed said, these slow-growing, low-abundance pathogens defy conventional detection methods. The gold standard of direct detection by plate culture is low yield after 6-8 weeks. PCR is better, but is hampered by inhibitors and no/low presence of target organisms. That leave antibody detection as the only means of confirming infections characterized by no or low antibody response. It's a big problem. At Galaxy Diagnostics and NCSU, we are advancing direct detection by focusing on sample prep methods, including BAPGM enrichment, Nanotrap capture, and digital PCR. These novel approaches work, but there is a lot more work to do for clinical translation and scale. One day at a time.