How a mom got ADH to confirm Lyme disease

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On May 26, 2016, Alarie and Josh Bowerman of Springdale dropped their three daughters off for a Girl Scout camp out for the weekend. Little were they to know how that would change their lives forever as all three girls came down with Lyme disease and other tick-borne diseases from a total of 23 tick bites among them. But since at that time the Arkansas Department of Health (ADH) denied that Lyme disease was found in Arkansas, it was difficult getting their daughters the correct treatment in time to prevent permanent disabilities.

After their youngest daughter, Emory, has a positive blood test for Lyme, the Bowermans took the two older girls in to be tested, as well.

“That is when things got really weird, really fast,” Alarie Bowerman said. “The on-call pediatrician said he just got off phone with an infectious disease specialist at Arkansas Children’s Hospital who informed him that Emory’s test results were a false positive and that we shouldn’t give her the antibiotic his colleague prescribed the night before, as it would cause teeth staining.”

All three girls had babesiosis and cat scratch fever (Bartonella) in addition to Lyme. The oldest, Anais, had Raynaud’s disease, as well.

Bowerman learned co infections are common. “It is almost a given,” she said. “If you see one, you see others, too. The other co-infections are bad, as well.”

But the pediatric clinic didn’t want to treat them for a disease that ADH said didn’t occur in Arkansas.

After being denied the right treatment in Arkansas for two of their daughters and denied any treatment for Anais, the Bowermans traveled to Kansas to see a Lyme literate physician. But they had to wait two months for an appointment. During that time, Anais (an artist) developed hand tremors, and had neurological symptoms and joint pain.

Most Lyme literate physicians don’t take insurance because insurance companies won’t pay for the longer treatments necessary.

“At one point, my husband and I looked at each other and said, ‘Which child will be treated first?’ That was knowing the others would deteriorate,” she said. “Then we received a grant from the Lymelight Foundation for children with Lyme. It has been a godsend for us.”

        Nearly a year later, Bowerman finally got the ADH and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to confirm that two of her daughters met all the testing criteria, proving Lyme disease is in Arkansas. The third daughter also had Lyme, but didn’t meet all the testing criteria.

Bowerman said that the test standards used by the ADH and CDC only catch about a third of people infected with early stage Lyme.

“The first test is not very sensitive,” Bowerman said. “CDC has said it is pretty unreliable as a test. It will give you a straight negative or positive. If you get a positive on that, they will run the Western blot automatically, which will show which bands/antibodies you are making, if any antibodies are strong enough to be detectable at the time of testing. But that still doesn’t catch all cases, especially those people with chronic Lyme.”

By the time they got in to see a specialist, the girls who were previously healthy and active were very sick.

“They all ended up with mycoplasma pneumonia, which is antibiotic resistant,” Bowerman said. “Lyme passes the blood brain barrier and can cause a lot of problems. It was unsettling as a parent to see how dangerously it was building up in their bodies.”

Bowerman didn’t want to see that same thing happen to other people that happened to her family. So, in August 2016, she called the ADH to find out the status on their Lyme testing being reported.

“They had nothing on anybody being reported for Lyme in Arkansas,” Bowerman said. “I asked, ‘Whose job is it to know?’ The point of contact for all tick-borne illnesses was the state veterinarian. She reports human cases of tick-borne illnesses.

“The pediatrician did her job originally, and even faxed the ADH about the ‘bruise’ that ended up being an Erythema-Migrans rash of Lyme and reported the positive blood work test for Emory, but somebody spooked her along the way,” Bowerman said. “It has to be political. That is the only thing I can think of. The CDC said if left untreated, it can result in chronic illnesses that are nearly impossible to deal with. In the early stage, it is treatable.”

For years ADH said Lyme wasn’t here because the tick that causes Lyme prefers lizards to the white-foot mouse that is the vector for the disease.

“Are you telling me ticks are picky eaters?” Bowerman asks. “That a dog or bird with Lyme disease can’t cross state lines? This is nonsense. You can’t tell me there is a force field around Arkansas that has made it impossible to get Lyme here. It is very frustrating.”

After getting the right treatments, the Bowerman’s three daughters have had a 90 percent decrease in symptoms.

“They are doing wonderful,” she said. “There is a night and day difference from what we experienced before. These girls have been true warriors throughout all of this.”

Bowerman, with Amy Rose of Bryant, founded the Arkansas Lyme Foundation (www.arklf.com) in March 2017.

2 COMMENTS

  1. My heart goes out to the Bowerman family for all they’ve been through to get their girls tested, diagnosed, and treated by online literate doctor.

    Is also deplorable that when you have a positive for LYME DISEASE diagnosis, that somebody does not turn it in promptly to the CDC noting a positive for each state.

    I’m so glad this family was able to get help I am Kansas LL MD and the girls are 90% Better.

    Also happy they got grant from the llyme org to cover their expenses on appointments and treatments.

    Thank you for doing a good job I’m writing this article and having it accurate.

    Between my late husband and me, we’ve had chronic Lyme disease for 83.5 years of our lives.

    Each of us was misdiagnosed or not diagnosed for 35 years each.

    I had a brain biopsy done on my husband and his brain made world wide history having 2 diseases never found together before in an autopsy.

    LYME DISEASE and Lewy body dementia causing visual and violent hallucinations like robin Williams had.

    His case is to be written and published in scientific medical journal in the future with me, a bob-medical person as the first co-authorover three medical folks.

    He was never diagnosed for his Lyme disease know her for the Lewy body dementia

    Finally I have scientific proof what he had verses but the doctor said he did not have!!

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