Is there such a thing as chronic Strep?

[samsmom]

Hello,

 

New to the forum and I have a 16 year old that was diagnosed with Lyme using FISH testing as well as PANDAS using the Cunningham Panel. He tested positive for four out of the 5 antibodies they look for in guiding the clinical diagnosis of PANDAS. He also had sudden onset OCD, separation anxiety, ADD and now as an adolescent depression. His symptoms morphed with each repeat strep infection (5 in total) and became somewhat compounded. As it is now, he is being treated by a psychiatrist for depression, ADD and OCD and until recently was taking Prosac and Vyvance.

 

I took him off all meds after 6 months of Lyme treatment to see if there was any marked improvement and there has not been. His OCD is manifesting with subtle, yet persistent, obsessions as well as consumption of sugar. He is apathetic, listless, unmotivated and ultimately...depressed.

 

He has had two brain CT's and one MRI for an isolated seizure and spontaneous pneumomediastinum and all three images showed a persistent, opacified sphenoid sinus. What makes this interesting is that these scans span a period of two years and this sinus is still opaque!! Could it be strep? He was on Azithromycin for 3 months but the ENT we are seeing for his tonsils (who is not qualified to remark on his sinus apparently) said that it doesn't effectively treat strep. Could my son have a chronic strep infection in his sinus that is preventing him from responding to treatment? Any advise on what to suggest to the sinus ENT that we see next month would be appreciated.

Samsmom

[MomWithOCDSon]

There was another parent on this forum up until a couple of years ago, actually, maybe a couple of them, who had experience with some sort of sinus cyst of strep that was found during a sinus scope procedure. They had it removed, and then the antibiotic treatment that followed seemed to help the child back to recovery. I think it was Kimballout, maybe? I would search for that user name, or search for "sinus" here on the forum, and you should hit some threads in this regard.

 

My DS, though classically asymptomatic for strep, was plagued with upper respiratory problems for years . . . chronic sinusitis, ear infections, general stuffiness, allergies, etc. We never had him scoped, but a lengthy regimen of abx (Augmentin XR) and n-acetylcystein (NAC) seems to have finally cleared all that up, along with helping him beat the behavioral impacts of PANDAS. There is research regarding NAC's properties as a "biofilm buster," as well as some research that indicates that some infections, including strep, can "hide out" in colonies protected by biofilms, making it difficult for abx and other interventions to fully eradicate it. So we think maybe we sort of "lucked into" a combination that helped us get at at least one of DS's issues without going through sinus surgery, etc.

 

Good luck!