Negative test results, antibiotics yes or no?

Hi Patti, thanks for your reply. Yeah, it makes sense. I do not know if I had one positive band or not, I will find out though, but I had a bulls eye rash and all the typical symptoms of early lyme.
I also read the following in another forum:

When the Lyme borrelia are alive, they are geniuses at avoiding the immune system. They may do things like go inside your white blood cells, and come out enclosed by the cell membrane of your own white blood cells! This may partly explain why antibodies against Borrelia burgdorferi are often not found when patients are tested.
What may happen when patients are given 4 weeks of tetracycline (or other antibiotics) is that some of the bacteria die. When Borrelia burgdorferi dies, it is less efficient at avoiding the immune system. That's when antibodies may be formed against Borrelia burgdorferi, converting the negative or equivocal Western blot to positive.

Maybe my doc wants to test me again when I go back to see him.

Hi ineisa.......I too am from the UK, are you certain you had a WB or was it an ELISA, usually they will not give you a WB without a positive ELISA test. If the EM rash was diagnosed as the first indication of LD then definitely take the meds and see what happens. If the the treatment is administered early you may just clear any Bb that has already dissenimated though your blood stream and clear it, the longer you leave it the higher the possibility the bacteria will successfully evade the ABX.

Hi ineisa...........yes I've a LLMD, they are very good too. If you want to know who and where they are I will gladly send you the information to your personal e-mail, as names and addresses are not something to publish.

I would be surprised if the NHS gave you anymore meds other than the first couple of weeks as the treatment procedures they have to follow will only allow a couple of weeks as this is supposed to clear up the infection. Unfortunately in my case too the initial first course was insufficient to rid me of LD and now I have chronic Neuroborreliosis or late stage LD. If you see an LLMD and depending on your clinical history and symptoms now you could be looking at a long term course of ABX but that is for an LLMD to decide what stage you may be at. I have currently been taking many different ABX for around 11 months and am looking at poss 2 years of them, unfortunately all the meds have to be bought via a private presciption which is not cheap, they will also recommend lots of suppliments to aid your recovery and help protect your body systems, sadly these all add to the cost on top of the consultaion fees and phone call fees.

You've been very lucky to have the ABX prescribed by your GP, I hope it lasts for you. As for the flu like symptoms I only had 1 bout, right at the beginning of the onset of my major symptoms, I think some get bouts of the flu feeling through out this illness though. I have so many times questioned my symptoms or blamed some other reason for my differing symptoms but LD can mimic lots of different things so I'd follow your LLMD's recomendations and take the ABX to see if they help you. It's doesn't help either, with the confusion, if you are suffering any "brain fog" or mental issues, I suffered quite alot in the head that really didn't do me many favours - it's sometimes so difficult to reason things out.

As for the WB, testing for LD is renoundly difficult and you'll know there is lots of threads on here discusing that issue, LD is diagnosed clinically (I know a positive test would confirm your worries) but I'd still follow your LLMD's advice, you never know they make you feel better.

Yeah, you are right. I will start taking them tomorrow and see what the doc says on the 3rd. I feel exactly how you explain it, this a very difficult sickness, apart of the physical symptoms we also have to deal with the unknown, confusion, anxiety... that all this controversy over lyme brings.
Anyway, thanks very much for your input. And if anything let me know!