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thedrifter
05-23-09, 06:41 AM
Lejeune Marines at risk for Lyme disease
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May 22, 2009 - 6:29 PM
AMANDA HICKEY

It took seven years for retired Lt. Col. Dave Tierney to find out what was wrong with him.

The fatigue, brain fogs, vision problems and insomnia that plagued him after being stationed at Cherry Point went undiagnosed by more than 30 doctors he said.

Then in 2007, he was told he had Multiple Sclerosis (MS).

The diagnosis, however, was wrong.

"I was on MS medicine for two months, and when I was on the Internet and typed in my symptoms Lyme disease kept coming up," Tierney said by phone from his home in Cary.

Tierney then spoke to a doctor who specialized in Lyme disease and was treated in less than three months.

"It's really scary if you think about it. My doctor told me I should never fly an airplane again (and) I'm a pilot," Tierney said. "I've been back at work for 14 months and if he'd had his way, I would be out of work right now and my career would be over."

Tierney never saw the tick that carried the disease, though he suspects the tick found him while he was training at the Bogue Air Field.

Lt. Cmdr. Chad Sparks, an internal medicine physician at Naval Hospital Camp Lejeune, said it's not uncommon for people not to notice a small tick attached to their skin.

"The deer tick is usually where they'll get (Lyme disease), usually if they're out hiking or fishing or something like that," Sparks said. "The problem is when deer ticks are young, they're very small so usually it's the young ones that get people because they're so small. Usually they're only at risk for the disease if they've had the tick on them for 36 hours."

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), North Carolina had 53 confirmed cases of Lyme disease in 2007. Statistics for 2008 are not yet available.

Onslow County had four in 2007 and none in 2008, Onslow County Public Health Director George O'Daniel said.

Sparks is unsure how many were from Camp Lejeune.

"We see it a little bit. I sort of expect that we would see it more than people in the community since we have people training in the woods," he said. "Usually we tell them to take certain precautions, like with their boots, usually they have something that holds their camis really close to their boots so infections can't get in their boots."

A Navy Environmental Health Center report indicates active-duty troops at Camp Lejeune can be at risk - 51, or 44 percent, of the cases of Lyme disease reported from 1996 to 2007 in active-duty Marines and sailors were from Camp Lejeune. The next closest installations were Groton, which had nine cases, or 8 percent, and Quantico, which had eight cases, or 7 percent.

Once diagnosed, Lyme disease is treatable, Sparks said.

"Usually you'll get antibiotics for two to three weeks and most people if they're treated early enough that'll be sufficient. But some people won't be treated in the early stages so it will progress to a later term disease where it spreads to other parts of the body," he said.

While there is "controversy" about whether or not to treat Lyme disease patients at that point, Sparks said, "often times we'll try it."

According to the CDC, Lyme disease is caused by a bacteria, Borrelia burgdorferi, that is transmitted to humans by the bite of infected blacklegged ticks. Symptoms include fever, headache, fatigue and a skin rash.

For more information on Lyme disease, visit the CDC Web site at www.cdc.gov.



Contact military reporter Amanda Hickey at 910-219-8461 or ahickey@freedomenc.com. Visit the Lejeune Deployed blog at http://lejeunedeployed.freedomblogging.com

Ellie