Guest guest Posted October 17, 2005 Report Share Posted October 17, 2005 > http://jcm.asm.org/cgi/content/full/36/9/2658 " B. burgdorferi was cultured from 79% of the erythema migrans specimens but not from any of the ACA lesions. " Can it not be cultured from ACA by anyone, or did only this group fail? If the former, this is important, because ACA is an accepted borreliosis lesion, and Steere has cited the failure to consistently culture Bb from chronic lyme. But I seem to recall ACA being culture- positive sometimes? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted October 17, 2005 Report Share Posted October 17, 2005 If I remember correctly - ACA will test PCR positive but not culture- which makes sense if you think about it. With an EM rash - the spirochetes have just been deposited in the tissues, and are on the move in their classical form to the great beyond. They just landed! Almost all the good articles on ACA are European, and on older country-side people who have had late stage Lyme untreated for decades. ACA is beleived to have 2 stages- early (inflammatory) and late - where the elastin is destroyed- skin is very thin, purplish and no longer is protective of the veins beneath it. ACA is a 30 + year manifestation of a pathogen/host adapted environment. One theory is that the form of Lyme in ACA is an unknown variant... and I don't see ANY research on ACA biopsies to see if there are other proteins expressed beyond what we know Lyme espresses now. The ACA pool of people is VERY small.... and they are cases of long stand untreated Lyme. AFter they are treated, the skin does not test PCR positive anymore - they are improved up to a point, but once the elastin is digested away- the skin will really never be the same. And there are no cases like these that I know of in North America, as burdorferi isn't know to produce ACA (it's azfelii that does)... But I wouldn't be surprised if there isn't some condition out there (in N America) that's being dx incorrectly.. as I think there is som condition (which I can't think of the name right now) which is thinning of the skin on the extremities, which then causes problems with the veins beneath. I have some good papers on ACA printed out at home- I'll check them to see if there were cases of culture positive ACA. Barb > > > > http://jcm.asm.org/cgi/content/full/36/9/2658 > > " B. burgdorferi was cultured from 79% of the erythema migrans > specimens but not from any of the ACA lesions. " > > Can it not be cultured from ACA by anyone, or did only this group > fail? If the former, this is important, because ACA is an accepted > borreliosis lesion, and Steere has cited the failure to consistently > culture Bb from chronic lyme. But I seem to recall ACA being culture- > positive sometimes? > Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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