Lyme Disease: Flea Bites that Can Have Long Impacts

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Lyme disease may not be a familiar disease in Indonesian ears. Disease caused by bacteria Borrelia burgdorferi which is transmitted through the bite of a flea is indeed not much in the public spotlight in Indonesia. However, this disease does not mean it is not "popular". in other parts of the world, precisely in Europe and North America, black foot lice infection this has become commonplace in society (Wormser, et al., 2006). For those of you who are always following the development of fashion, you must know one or two things about Lyme disease suffered by the family of the Gigi Hadid model.

What are the symptoms of lyme disease that occurs after being bitten by lice?

Once you have been bitten by fleas, immediately check if there is a possibility that the lice are nesting. If yes, immediately check for symptoms that appear within 3-30 days after you have been bitten by fleas. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the following are the initial symptoms that appear if you are bitten by fleas infected by bacteria Borrelia burgdorferi:

Fever
A cold sweat
Headache
Fatigue
Pain in the joints
Swelling of the lymph nodes
Rash migrains erythema (with characteristics: (1) this rash appears in about 70-80% of people infected, (2) rashes appear after between 3-30 days, with an average of 7 days, (3) rashes up to 30 cm in diameter, (4 ) usually not itchy or painful when the rash is held, but it will feel warm, (5) the rash is shaped like a bull's eye, and (6) the rash can appear in areas of the body that are not infected)

After symptoms appear on you, immediately contact the nearest medical person to get antibiotics; usually doxycycline, amoxicillin, or cefuroxime axetil. In some patients who experience neurological disorders, inserting ceftriaxone or penicillin fluids in infusion can be one way of medical treatment performed. Good and right treatment can immediately eliminate Lyme disease and its symptoms.

Lyme disease can become chronic and continue until the following years

Patients who have been treated with antibiotics in the early symptoms of Lyme disease can usually recover completely. But, there are some of them who have completed treatment but still feel symptoms such as extreme fatigue, difficulty concentrating, and pain in the joints; this condition is called Post-Treatment of Lyme Disease Syndrome or PTLDS, according to Brian Fallon, MD, MPH.

Actually, this condition still holds a mystery even to experts in the medical world. This is due to the still ambiguous causes of PTLDS. Some argue that PTLDS is caused by residual infection from Lyme, some also argue that these symptoms are caused by other bacterial infections.

Although not yet found a bright spot regarding the causes of PTLDS, long-term treatment with antibiotics was considered to be able to provide a glimmer of hope in people with Lyme disease. The use of these drugs is considered to have a slow effect, it can even take months / years, but certainly.

More than seventy percent of PTLDS sufferers consider that they have a low quality of life, even lower than diabetics and depression (Cameron, 2008). Not only physical effects (fatigue, muscle and joint pain, headaches, heart problems) arising from this disease, sleep disorders, depression, and cognitive process imbalances also "haunt" people who suffer from this disease, according to a survey conducted by lymedisease.org. This effect that interferes with the normal functioning of the sufferer causes around 40% of PTLDS sufferers cannot work anymore.

It turns out that the dangers of small insects are even less than 1 cm in size. Be grateful because this disease does not become endemic in Indonesia. However, that does not mean we must be careless. Maintain the condition of the house to always be clean so that the lice are not able to develop the culprit. Do not forget to continue to pay attention to the condition of the body because the initial symptoms that appear in this disease are usually ignored by many people.

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