Aa
Producing Antibodies for Infections I DON'T Have.
Hi
Im posting this in the immune dysfunction forum because it seems logical to me that there must be some immune dysfunction going on with me.
Last week I had some blood tests done b/c I will be volunteering at a hospital and they needed to make sure I have had all the proper immunizations.
My doc called to tell me that something odd turned up in my bloodwork-I tested positive for having an active case of chicken pox. It was to be expected that I tested positive for IgG antibodies for chicken pox, because IgG antibodies are the antibodies your body continues to make throughout your life after having a particular infection, and these are the antibodies which give you immunity to chicken pox for the rest of your life.
However, I had a very strong positive result for my IgM antibodies for chicken pox, which are the antibodies you produce when your body is fighting an active infection. (Its important to note that I had a bad case of chicken pox as a kid, and should therefore be immune, and I currently have NO symptoms of chicken pox or shingles).
My docs first thought was that it must have been a mistake with the bloodwork, so we repeated it. It came back strongly positive for IgM again.
So.....why is my body producing IgM antibodies for an infection that I dont have?
One last detail I should add. For several years now, I have had a sort of low level, chronic feeling of fatigue and malaise. It came on suddenly years ago, and has never let up. I had every test imaginable, but everything came back negative.
However, 6 weeks ago, I went to an infectious disease specialist who tested me for lyme and the other tick born illnesses. I tested negative for lyme, but was positive for both babesia and ehrlichia. Now whether these infections are what have been causing my chronic symtoms all these years, I cannot say, but the tests were repeated 3 times and all 3 showed positive antibodies for babesia and ehrlichia.
Im posting this in the immune dysfunction forum because it seems logical to me that there must be some immune dysfunction going on with me.
Last week I had some blood tests done b/c I will be volunteering at a hospital and they needed to make sure I have had all the proper immunizations.
My doc called to tell me that something odd turned up in my bloodwork-I tested positive for having an active case of chicken pox. It was to be expected that I tested positive for IgG antibodies for chicken pox, because IgG antibodies are the antibodies your body continues to make throughout your life after having a particular infection, and these are the antibodies which give you immunity to chicken pox for the rest of your life.
However, I had a very strong positive result for my IgM antibodies for chicken pox, which are the antibodies you produce when your body is fighting an active infection. (Its important to note that I had a bad case of chicken pox as a kid, and should therefore be immune, and I currently have NO symptoms of chicken pox or shingles).
My docs first thought was that it must have been a mistake with the bloodwork, so we repeated it. It came back strongly positive for IgM again.
So.....why is my body producing IgM antibodies for an infection that I dont have?
One last detail I should add. For several years now, I have had a sort of low level, chronic feeling of fatigue and malaise. It came on suddenly years ago, and has never let up. I had every test imaginable, but everything came back negative.
However, 6 weeks ago, I went to an infectious disease specialist who tested me for lyme and the other tick born illnesses. I tested negative for lyme, but was positive for both babesia and ehrlichia. Now whether these infections are what have been causing my chronic symtoms all these years, I cannot say, but the tests were repeated 3 times and all 3 showed positive antibodies for babesia and ehrlichia.
MEDICAL PROFESSIONAL
The Lyme infections could have reactivated dormant vericella virus, and this is why you are showing high IgM titers. This can happen when co-infections of Borrelia, Mycoplasma, Bartonella, etc. are expressed—they also cause reactivation of dormant viruses that were in your system but not being expressed.
One last thing to add to my post
What Im wondering is: Considering that Im producing antibodies for chicken pox which I clearly dont have, is it possible that the same thing is going on with ehrlichia/babesia? Meaning- that I dont actually have those infections, but my body is just creating antibodies for these infections for some reason?
Are there any known disorders which would cause someone to produce antibodies for infections which the dont have? Thanks so much-Josh
What Im wondering is: Considering that Im producing antibodies for chicken pox which I clearly dont have, is it possible that the same thing is going on with ehrlichia/babesia? Meaning- that I dont actually have those infections, but my body is just creating antibodies for these infections for some reason?
Are there any known disorders which would cause someone to produce antibodies for infections which the dont have? Thanks so much-Josh
MEDICAL PROFESSIONAL
It is extremely unlikely that you would be producing antibodies to infections that you have never been exposed to. It is more likely that in the past you have had certain infections that became dormant, but can be re-expressed by immune suppression or other events. These historic infections might not have even produced noticeable symptoms or very benign symptoms. Thus you may not have realized that you were ever infected.
Thanks for the response doc...makes sense to me. Im actually a med school student so Im learning about alot of this stuff, but still have a long way to go.
I was wondering if u could help me with a related problem.
As I may have mentioned in my first post, I have had a mid level, chronic illness that began 8 years ago. I had been perfectly healthy my whole life, and then one morning, I woke up feeling like I hadnt slept on minute. On top of this, I had a very odd sensation that Id never had before. The best way I can describe it is that i literally felt stoned, or perhaps drug. Though this description is vague, I can assure you that the sensation was very profound and obvious. I had never felt anything like it. I assumed I had just come down with something and decided to get some rest. Well 2 weeks went by and things actually were getting worse. I had not fever, pain, or other symptoms. However, I would sleep 10 hours, wake up feeling as though Id not slept a wink, try to get out of bed, and end up falling asleep 2 hours later for another 5 hours. I was literally sleeping 16+ hours a day, and had this profound sensation of being "stoned". It was a true mystery. I was in college at the time, and my parents decided I needed to come home to get some thorough testing. I was tested for every possible illness, in a myriad of fields: neurological, infectious disease, autoimmune, etc etc. All tests came up perfect.
To summarize, the severity of these symptoms have waxed and waned the past 8 years, but have never vanished. I will sometimes go weeks or perhaps a month or two feeling "not myself" but able to get through the day, but with much more effort then should be required by someone my age (30). I will then have periods of several days or weeks where I am literally bed-ridden. I am literally unable to do anything but stay in bed, despite my intense desire to get out there and continue along with my life. I must insists that I have NO history of depression, anxiety, or other pyschological problems which might account for these symptoms.
So, ive never given up looking for the source of my chronic illness, and about 2 months ago, I read some articles about the lack of reliability of most lyme tests, and though I had been tested for lyme, I thought it made sense to see a lyme specialist to have some state of the art tests performed, since many of my symptoms fit lyme very well.
The results I obtained were confusing to say the least. I tested neg. for lyme, but tested positive for IgG antibodies for babesia (but neg. for IgM) and highly positive for ehrlichia IgM (but negative for IgG).
I was elated that I finally received positive tests for infections which could account for the chronic symptoms Ive had all these years. But when you look at the story the tests tell, things just dont add up. Testing pos. for IgG but neg for IgM for babesia suggests that I was infected with babesia a fairly long time ago (anywhere from months to many years ago) but due to lack of IgM, it suggests I dont have a current babesia infection.
On the other hand, my pos. IgM and neg. IgG for ehrlichia suggest that I have a recent or current infection for ehrlichia. This just seems so unlikely to me, despite what the tests suggest. A strict interpretation of those test results indicate that I was bitten by a tick and infected with babesia sometime months or years ago. Then, sometime much more recently, I was bitten and infected by a tick with ehrlichia (due to the IgM antibodies and lack of IgG). Im sorry but this just seems soooo odd. These are both rare infections (esp. ehrlichia). The idea that I was infected by 2 different ticks, carrying 2 different rare infections, at 2 different times, strains credibility.
To complicate matters, I found out that I was tested for ehrlichia and babesia about 4 years ago and tested negative, which suggests that despite the fact that I had been ill for years prior to the test, I must have contracted both of these infections AFTER the tests which were performed 4 years ago. This is both hard to imagine, and hard to swallow, since if true, would mean that my chronic health issues existed long before my exposure to either of these infections, and thus babesia and ehrlichia cannot be responsible, and are just incidental infections I picked up sometime in the last few years.
If one can dismiss some of the test results, or call into question their accuracy in relation to the timeline, then it becomes very possible and even likely that I in fact picked up these 2 infections 8 years ago, and they have been causing my chronic symptoms all these years. The symptoms of babesia and ehrlichia fit perfectly with the symptoms Ive experienced.
So do you see the conundrum? Ive tested positive for 2 infections which cause the exact symptoms Ive had all these years, but the tests suggest that I was infected with them at 2 different times, and since I tested neg for both 4 years ago, it seems that I must have become infected after that test, thus making it impossible for these infections to be responsible for my illness.
So what do u think? Are these tests almost certainly providing an accurate timeline due to the details of the IgG IgM antibodies, or is it still possible that regardless of the tests, I did indeed contract these infections 8 years ago. Thanks so much-J
I was wondering if u could help me with a related problem.
As I may have mentioned in my first post, I have had a mid level, chronic illness that began 8 years ago. I had been perfectly healthy my whole life, and then one morning, I woke up feeling like I hadnt slept on minute. On top of this, I had a very odd sensation that Id never had before. The best way I can describe it is that i literally felt stoned, or perhaps drug. Though this description is vague, I can assure you that the sensation was very profound and obvious. I had never felt anything like it. I assumed I had just come down with something and decided to get some rest. Well 2 weeks went by and things actually were getting worse. I had not fever, pain, or other symptoms. However, I would sleep 10 hours, wake up feeling as though Id not slept a wink, try to get out of bed, and end up falling asleep 2 hours later for another 5 hours. I was literally sleeping 16+ hours a day, and had this profound sensation of being "stoned". It was a true mystery. I was in college at the time, and my parents decided I needed to come home to get some thorough testing. I was tested for every possible illness, in a myriad of fields: neurological, infectious disease, autoimmune, etc etc. All tests came up perfect.
To summarize, the severity of these symptoms have waxed and waned the past 8 years, but have never vanished. I will sometimes go weeks or perhaps a month or two feeling "not myself" but able to get through the day, but with much more effort then should be required by someone my age (30). I will then have periods of several days or weeks where I am literally bed-ridden. I am literally unable to do anything but stay in bed, despite my intense desire to get out there and continue along with my life. I must insists that I have NO history of depression, anxiety, or other pyschological problems which might account for these symptoms.
So, ive never given up looking for the source of my chronic illness, and about 2 months ago, I read some articles about the lack of reliability of most lyme tests, and though I had been tested for lyme, I thought it made sense to see a lyme specialist to have some state of the art tests performed, since many of my symptoms fit lyme very well.
The results I obtained were confusing to say the least. I tested neg. for lyme, but tested positive for IgG antibodies for babesia (but neg. for IgM) and highly positive for ehrlichia IgM (but negative for IgG).
I was elated that I finally received positive tests for infections which could account for the chronic symptoms Ive had all these years. But when you look at the story the tests tell, things just dont add up. Testing pos. for IgG but neg for IgM for babesia suggests that I was infected with babesia a fairly long time ago (anywhere from months to many years ago) but due to lack of IgM, it suggests I dont have a current babesia infection.
On the other hand, my pos. IgM and neg. IgG for ehrlichia suggest that I have a recent or current infection for ehrlichia. This just seems so unlikely to me, despite what the tests suggest. A strict interpretation of those test results indicate that I was bitten by a tick and infected with babesia sometime months or years ago. Then, sometime much more recently, I was bitten and infected by a tick with ehrlichia (due to the IgM antibodies and lack of IgG). Im sorry but this just seems soooo odd. These are both rare infections (esp. ehrlichia). The idea that I was infected by 2 different ticks, carrying 2 different rare infections, at 2 different times, strains credibility.
To complicate matters, I found out that I was tested for ehrlichia and babesia about 4 years ago and tested negative, which suggests that despite the fact that I had been ill for years prior to the test, I must have contracted both of these infections AFTER the tests which were performed 4 years ago. This is both hard to imagine, and hard to swallow, since if true, would mean that my chronic health issues existed long before my exposure to either of these infections, and thus babesia and ehrlichia cannot be responsible, and are just incidental infections I picked up sometime in the last few years.
If one can dismiss some of the test results, or call into question their accuracy in relation to the timeline, then it becomes very possible and even likely that I in fact picked up these 2 infections 8 years ago, and they have been causing my chronic symptoms all these years. The symptoms of babesia and ehrlichia fit perfectly with the symptoms Ive experienced.
So do you see the conundrum? Ive tested positive for 2 infections which cause the exact symptoms Ive had all these years, but the tests suggest that I was infected with them at 2 different times, and since I tested neg for both 4 years ago, it seems that I must have become infected after that test, thus making it impossible for these infections to be responsible for my illness.
So what do u think? Are these tests almost certainly providing an accurate timeline due to the details of the IgG IgM antibodies, or is it still possible that regardless of the tests, I did indeed contract these infections 8 years ago. Thanks so much-J
MEDICAL PROFESSIONAL
Actually, it is not uncommon for people to have multiple tick bites, and usually these ticks--if they are carrying one of the following infections: Borrelia, Mycoplasma, Bartonella, Babesia, Ehrlichia--can produce multiple infections over the time they feed. Not everyone will come down with all of these infections or even some of them, but many will come down with one or more of them at the same time and not realize it for some time after being bitten.
Testing is a problem, because most labs are not very good at testing, and some infections are notoriously bad at stimulating IgM antibody responses (ie, Mycoplasma species). These are all intracellular infections, and they don't stimulate antibody responses unless they are released by cells and can actually be seen by the immune system.
Unless you had Borrelia b. testing done by a sensitive Western blot method such as done by Igenex, I would not assume that you are not a Lyme patient. In addition, you could have one or more of the Borrelia co-infections and technically not be a Lyme patient, even though you might have many of the clinical symptoms of Lyme.
CFS patients in SE Asia quite often have Ehrlichia species or Mycoplasma species infections with no evidence of Lyme Borrelia b. These are common insect-borne infections and can be transmitted by a variety of biting insects. Travelers to the wet areas of SE Asia are also at risk for these types of infections, unless they take adequate precautions against being bitten by insects.
Testing is a problem, because most labs are not very good at testing, and some infections are notoriously bad at stimulating IgM antibody responses (ie, Mycoplasma species). These are all intracellular infections, and they don't stimulate antibody responses unless they are released by cells and can actually be seen by the immune system.
Unless you had Borrelia b. testing done by a sensitive Western blot method such as done by Igenex, I would not assume that you are not a Lyme patient. In addition, you could have one or more of the Borrelia co-infections and technically not be a Lyme patient, even though you might have many of the clinical symptoms of Lyme.
CFS patients in SE Asia quite often have Ehrlichia species or Mycoplasma species infections with no evidence of Lyme Borrelia b. These are common insect-borne infections and can be transmitted by a variety of biting insects. Travelers to the wet areas of SE Asia are also at risk for these types of infections, unless they take adequate precautions against being bitten by insects.
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