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Totally OT - Lyme Disease and PSA Levels

Posted: Mon Aug 15, 2011 2:52 pm
by BrownBagger
My dad, who has prostate cancer, was also recently dx with Lyme disease, for which he's being treated with antibiotics and responding well. Perhaps coincidentally, his most recent PSA was off the charts (I think he said it was 150).

Neither of us can find anything with Google that's much help. Dad says that infections can have an impact on PSA readings, so he suspects that's what's up.

Anybody else know anything about this?

Re: Totally OT - Lyme Disease and PSA Levels

Posted: Mon Aug 15, 2011 4:54 pm
by PGLGreg
I don't think I do. I had high PSA readings (over 7) shortly after my chemoradiation, and my oncologist thought it was due to inflammation caused by the radiation. I continued to have PSA tests every 3 months, and the readings slowly went down to less than 4 over the next year. (In the last year, they've started to rise again -- now around 5.)

Re: Totally OT - Lyme Disease and PSA Levels

Posted: Mon Aug 15, 2011 6:53 pm
by Nickmark59
I had Lyme disease in 70's when they did not know what it was and Onc thinks it could have contributed to my cancer

Re: Totally OT - Lyme Disease and PSA Levels

Posted: Mon Aug 15, 2011 7:03 pm
by BrownBagger
Interesting. Thanks to you both.

So far, he's been responding well to hormone shots. They give him hot flashes and he says that on Superbowl Sunday (he's a diehard Packer fan) he finds he'd rather go shopping than watch some stupid football game, but other than that, no negative side effects. They want him to do a bone scan. Guess we all know how that feels.

He's had Lyme before and the antibiotics have taken care of it. And they're working this time. But it really laid him low for awhile (guy's 79 and still works in the woods every day). I'll be back in Wisconsin in early September to eyeball him and hopefully finish off that bottle of JW Black that we left pretty much untouched last time I was there.

Re: Totally OT - Lyme Disease and PSA Levels

Posted: Mon Aug 15, 2011 7:12 pm
by so-scared
I can't speak directly to the PSA levels. What I can say is that 5 of the six of us in my immediate family have tested positive for Lyme's. We are all affected to different degrees. Some are debilitated by the symptoms and others are just bothered by them. One thing I can say is that Lyme's disease and the coinfections can really reek havoc on the immune system!! With the immune system suppressed it can leave us vulnerable to many different chronic infections (as I see in my children) and of course with your natural killers cells down it leaves us open to cancer. The doctor is really worried about this with one of my sons just because his immune system is sooo out of whack!! Now add chemo to the mix and you could have a nightmare on your hands if you have an underlying undiagnosed infection. I have learned that the tick borne illnesses are not to be taken lightly.

So-s

Re: Totally OT - Lyme Disease and PSA Levels

Posted: Mon Aug 15, 2011 7:20 pm
by so-scared
I live in Wisconsin and we are riddled with these darn ticks! I hate them!!

So-s

Re: Totally OT - Lyme Disease and PSA Levels

Posted: Tue Aug 16, 2011 9:15 am
by babs249
What an interesting question Eric! My husband's PSA levels just jumped this year, although they are still thought to be well below any cause for concern. The doctor decided to treat him with antibiotics because he said sometimes an undetectable urinary infection can cause the numbers to go up. Next month they'll check his numbers again and they'll decide what's needed next. An interesting thought though that maybe an infection somewhere else in the body could make the PSA numbers go up. I think I'll suggest he ask the doctor about that.
By the way, my husband also had Lyme disease, about six years ago. He's a house painter, and we think he got bitten at a customer's house where their whole family had previously gotten the disease. Heads up here people on Lyme disease: the rash is not always the typical "bull's eye" rash. In my husband's case, it presented as the big red blotches, but with no bull's eye in the middle.

Re: Totally OT - Lyme Disease and PSA Levels

Posted: Wed Aug 17, 2011 3:07 pm
by Terry
Everything I read on the internet was vague or said they didn't "think" so. As you know I live in NE Wisconsin, it's all forest and with that comes those pesky deer ticks. I never thought about this until your thread but a couple of years ago my dad was up here and got a tick that he didn't know about until it became infected. Some time after that he had a high PSA test. They retested it after some time and it came down. Now I wonder if it wasn't because of that tick. It makes sense. I hate ticks, not so much the big ones that you can see but those little ones that carry the lyme virus are so small you may never know you've been bitten. My husbands a deer hunter too and I hate it when he brings them home. I had a patient once that committed suicide because they were always so sick from lyme. I'm glad the treatment is working for your dad!

Re: Totally OT - Lyme Disease and PSA Levels

Posted: Wed Aug 17, 2011 4:43 pm
by cinnamongirl56
I just got bit about by one of those teenee tiny deer ticks and didn't realize until about two wks later I "may" have lyme's as I ended up with a big round rash right around my tailbone area :oops: where it bit me and didn't realize what it was but was able to get on antibiotics immediately an am hoping that took care of it as the rash disappeared. Hope it doesn't cause a problem with my body but I guess time will tell but the antibiotics has caused me to have a yeast infection that I am trying to get rid of naturally.............