It was not too long ago that patients who visited their doctor claiming numbness , changing pain and exhaustion and insisted to their doctor that they were suffering from an illness that they had heard about on the media or read in the Reader’s Digest magazine in the doctor’s waiting room – that disease being Lyme Disease spread by insect ticks , were relegated by most medical practitioner’s to the nutcase or malingerer classification in the doctor’s personal notes and records. At the best Lyme Disease patients could get referred to a Psychiatrist for psychiatric assessment. At the worst they and their various neurological symptoms were just plain ignored. Not so today in 2009 /2010. Lyme Disease is a disease well recognized by the Center for Disease Control in Atlanta and the Mayo Clinic. There are titers ( specific tests) available. On top of that the focus on the treatment of Lyme Disease is early detection and relatively simple pharmacological treatment with simple and standard antibiotics. Enter Morgellons , Morgellons Disease or Morgelons Syndrome our current mystery “Lyme Disease” of 2009 / 2010.
Symptoms of Morgellons Disease When one has this disease, skin rashes and wounds will appear. When those wounds appear, strange fibers shoot out of the skin. Often times, the one suffering from this problem feels as if they have bugs crawling on their skin. On other cases, they just feel the bugs creeping occasionally stopping in to bite and nip their skin. Quite often, the sufferer is hurt from these symptoms.
Imagine being exhausted from all the pain , lack of sleep and basically having your medical and health symptoms ignored. It is no accident that many who do have the syndrome are confused , exhausted and unkempt in appearance and manner.
Dermatologists themselves are often confused by the appearance of the rash. Most Dermatologists as a whole are up to date on their science. The skin is essentially the largest organ of the body and is actually quite a consistent apparatus. For rashes the basic rule of dermatology and the science of dermatology is if it is wet – dry it , if it is dry – wet or moisten it , and if none of the previous apply – then use a steroid cream ,salve or tablet. Yet the rashes apparent from this disorder seem entirely resistant to all standard medical and pharmacological therapy and therapies.
Many of those who are tormented by this ailment and potential infirmity find that after either being ignored or being treated in what might be considered either a sub-maximal or substandard way go on to seek help and therapy in the less conventional , though innovative arena of “Alternative Medicine”. Then again they may be easy pickings for those who prey on the apparent and real sufferings of others less fortunate than themselves. It can be said that although Western Trained Medicine and its practitioners are somewhat conservative and claim to be fact based , at least they are self policing within their own communities and keep oddballs and incompetent members of their apparent communities in check.
The most common treatment that is prescribed for delusional parasitosis is known as pimozide. Pimozide acts as an antipsychotic, but at the same time, it also prevents the itchiness of skin wounds and rashes. Before this is prescribed, the physician will take a number of examinations to make sure there are no organic causes behind it. One of the main problems here is the fact that folks refuse that the ailment is in their heads. For those reasons, they decline treatment and go off in an even worse condition than what they were originally in. They may also be told that they are suffering from an infectious disease. Folks are more likely to accept that this is their problem and allow treatment to go further.