Triple Antibiotic Therapy

My name is Peter and I am new here. I am badly affected by Lyme disease and it makes life difficult.
I wanted to inquire if anyone here has tried the three antibiotic "Cocktail" studied in mice at Johns Hopkins University. The study found that:

Single antibiotic therapy appears to clear the organism of the normal fast grow form of the bacteria such as a fresh infection from a tick bite.

Under adverse conditions, such as low available nutrients or unsuccessful antibiotic treatment, Borrelia burgdorferi can transform into a slow growing variant that cannot be cleared with standard antibiotic therapy. They call this slow growing form of the bacteria "persister" organisms.

In mice these slow growing variants cause more severe disease.

They found that the triple antibiotic therapy of daptomycin, doxycycline and ceftriaxone effectively eradicated the infection in mice.

The study was published March 28 2024 in the journal Discovery Medicine. A summary of the results can be found at the link below.

Does anybody here know somebody that has tried it? I'm going to try to get prescriptions of these three antibiotics and try it.

Hello and Welcome,

triple or even quadruple antibiotic combinations are common in the treatment of chronic Lyme disease and co-infections

however Daptomycin is a IV only antibiotic - its also not widely used and until recently the price was very high compared to other antibiotics - around $500USD per dose - so its very rarely used in Lyme patients - despite the promising mouse studies.
more info on daptomycin here https://www.drugs.com/dosage/daptomycin.html

also we have to bear in mind that humans are not mice - and so while these results do show efficacy in-vivo - which is certainly encouraging - mice do not get lyme disease as found in humans - and so are not a perfect model for chronic Lyme in humans. in particular the interaction between the host immune system and the bacterium is critical in determining illness or recovery - and mice and humans clearly differ in this regard - so we have to be a little careful of directly applying mouse data to humans.

Paper said...
No strain of inbred mice develops erythema migrans, meningitis or encephalitis, and thus all are imperfect models for human Lyme disease.

source: https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/pmc3313462/

because IV antibiotics have greater risks associated with their use than oral antibiotics - generally only a small proportion of Lyme patients are treated with IV antibiotics - usually only those that are in the most severe condition - or have some life threatening complication - such as endocarditis or severe neuroborreliosis.

most LLMDs treat the majority of patients with oral antibiotic combinations

regarding persister cells - actually all populations of borrelia contain persister cells - and contains normal cells that are able to be triggered to form persister cells - just in different proportions depending on stressors in their environment - these stressors include the innate immune defences of the host as well as things like nutrient availability. even in the absence of overt stressors - there are always some persister cells. The proportion varies depending on the hyperlocal conditions - ie the cellular level.

if you grow a culture of borrelia in in ideal conditions in the lab - you will initially get a large proportion of normally metabolising logarithmically growing cells - but as soon as you introduce a stressor - for instance an antibiotic like doxycycline - a significant proportion will turn into persister cells within 24hrs - so its an inherent property of the bacteria - rather than something that only forms over months or in chronic patients

however, there is a correlation as, in chronic infection, more biofilms are thought to build up in tissues over time (autopsies of human chronic lyme patients have found extensive biofilm colonies in tissues) and as a biological consequence cells deep inside biofilms have less access to nutrients and as a result persister cell proportions are associated with biofilm formation.

actually this property of persister cells is not unique to borrelia - its actually very common in the bacterial world - like biofilms - something like 90% of known bacteria are capable of forming them.

i hope its of some help.

I like to keep things one subject per message.

So this one is about the triple antibiotic therapy. The regular price of daptomycin is indeed $500 per dose. I found coupons that reduce this to a little over $100 a dose. But even at $500 a dose I'm in such bad shape it doesn't matter to me. I'm going to try to find how to do this. The Rocephin is only about $15 per dose with GoodRx.

Any advice? Either of you know of a physician Who might be willing to prescribe this To me? Other ideas?

Peter-Lyme said...
Wow thank you both for your answers.

Girly - Are you able to tell me the name of the LLMD Who treats Lyme disease aggressively? Are either of you aware of some sort of list or compilation of LLMD's?

Garzie - You are impressively knowledgeable. When you say "autopsies of human chronic Lyme patients have found extensive biofilm colonies in tissues." Do you mean actual borrelia burgdorferi spirochetes That were viable and alive before the the person died? Are either of you familiar with Gary Wormser? I think he's even more radical "There's no such thing as chronic Lyme disease." than the 4 S's - Allen Steere, Robert Schoen, Eugene Shapiro and Leonard Sigal.

When the first Xenodiagnosis study In humans was getting started I remember thinking if anybody comes up positive Wormser will come out with something that says it doesn't matter it's not relevant. He actually did some preemptive work. I remember an online video presentation he gave At a Lyme disease conference where he said, "Even if spirochetes are found in these patients it doesn't mean that these few residual spirochetes are causing their ongoing symptoms. They are not inflammation inciting when their population is extremely low." I wonder what he would say about a colony of Borrelia burgdorferi in a patient previously treated with antibiotics.

Garzie - Are you aware of a published study showing definite spirochetes at autopsy?

Are attachments allowed on this forum? I would send a letter I had published in the journal science in the 1990s.

I believe you can contact ILADS (International Lyme and Diseases Society) for drs in your area

Garzie said...
i also recall i well known case of a woman who was treated with antibiotics on and off for 26 years and borrelia were found within various organs at autopsy - but i don't have the reference to hand.

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/pmc6963883/

Thank you all very much for this extremely helpful information. I will post occasional updates in a new thread at Major milestones in my quest for simultaneous use of those three antibiotics.