Global 06/01/15 medicalexpress.com:
Excerpts –
“Northeastern University researchers have found that the bacterium
that causes Lyme disease forms dormant persister cells, which are known to
evade antibiotics. This significant finding, they said, could help explain why
it’s so difficult to treat the infection in some patients.”
“In addition to identifying the presence of
these persister cells, Lewis’ team also presented two methods for wiping out
the infection—both of which were successful in lab tests. One involved an
anti-cancer agent called Mitomycin C, which completely eradicated all cultures
of the bacterium in one fell swoop. However, Lewis stressed that, given
Mitomycin C’s toxicity, it isn’t a recommended option for treating Lyme
disease, though his team’s findings are useful to helping to better understand
the disease.
“The second approach, which Lewis noted is
much more practical, involved pulse-dosing an antibiotic to eliminate
persisters. The researchers introduced the antibiotic a first time, which
killed the growing cells but not the dormant persisters. But once the
antibiotic washed away, the persisters woke up, and before they had time to
restore their population the researchers hit them with the antibiotic again.
Four rounds of antibiotic treatments completely eradicated the persisters in a
test tube.”
"Lewis and his
colleagues presented their findings in a paper published online last week in
the journal Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy.” –
For complete
article see http://medicalxpress.com/news/2015-06-discovery-difficulty-lyme-disease.html
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