Candida flare vs. PANDAS flare

[Luna]

I've read on this forum that candida overgrowth can cause behavioral and psychiatric flare symptoms that can be mistaken for a typical PANDAS. And now, after several of these flares I'm starting to think what I thought of as PANDAS has really been Candida all along, or at least on several occasions.

 

Questions--

1) what are the behavioral/psychiatric symptoms associated with candida overgrowth? are they different than a strep induced PANDAS flare?

2) from my description, do you think she has candida, if not, what else could it be?

3) any treatment recommendations for candida overgrowth?

 

DD6 was diagnosed with strep throat and PANDAS two years ago and had a remarkable turnaround after antibiotics and oral steroids, but no return to 100% baseline. She was then diagnosed with Lyme a year ago and we are taking the slow and steady approach to treating lyme with our LLMD. We are also treating PANDAS flares with oral steroids and now more recently with IV steroids (solumedrol), with the hope that she will not need repeated steroids in the future as the lyme dies off.

 

Over the years she has on several occasions experienced acute episodes of: a red rectum, red vagina, agitation, anger, fears, separation anxiety, and sensory sensitivities - but coupled with normal perianal culture and normal urinalysis. All of this (perianal redness and aggitation, normal test results, etc.) came back with a vengeance following her recent IV steroid infusion. Im thinking its Candida. Any thoughts on it being something other than candida?

 

Her Current Treatments Are--

GAPS Diet

daily prophylactic amoxicillin

Beyond Balance MC-BAR-1, MC-BB-1, MC-BAB-2, Mycoregen, MC-BFM-P, IMN-V-II

DesBio Upper Respiratory Staph and Strep

Klaire Labs Ther Biotic Complete, and Klaire Labs BioSpora

Prescript Assist Probiotic

Glutathione Tri Fortify orange

Takesumi Supreme

 

Thank You for any time spent reading and responding to this post, as I am second guessing my entire treatment plan for her right now.

 

[Plum99]

My kids both have those symptoms and I have never had anyone willing to do any kind of swab in that area. I actually had this on my list of things I'm hoping to get some kind of testing for, but it looks like there are so many different ways to look for it? Have you tried the spit test? I'm not sure if that's not a real thing to try, but I did try myself and my daughter, and I wasn't exactly sure what my interpretation was. I had spots on my tongue that came and went my whole childhood and had no idea what it was until I met a nutritionist who told me it was Candida. She gave me some information, I did the Candida diet and a cleanse, and I never had the spots on my tongue again. That was 15 years ago. Right before my daughter started having Pandas symptoms, I saw the same spots on her tongue. I thought it must be the same, but couldn't give her anything like I had taken because she's too young. I just changed her probiotics to something I thought was better, reduced sugar, but then we all fell apart with the Pandas symptoms, treatment, craziness. It has always been in the back of my mind as something I didn't really understand, especially since the spots on her tongue went away after antibiotics. But both of my children still have recurring red bottoms, and the same symptoms you describe.

So I have no helpful information to offer you, but I am curious about the same thing.

[boysrlove24]

I've read on this forum that candida overgrowth can cause behavioral and psychiatric flare symptoms that can be mistaken for a typical PANDAS. And now, after several of these flares I'm starting to think what I thought of as PANDAS has really been Candida all along, or at least on several occasions.

 

Questions--

1) what are the behavioral/psychiatric symptoms associated with candida overgrowth? are they different than a strep induced PANDAS flare?

2) from my description, do you think she has candida, if not, what else could it be?

3) any treatment recommendations for candida overgrowth?

 

DD6 was diagnosed with strep throat and PANDAS two years ago and had a remarkable turnaround after antibiotics and oral steroids, but no return to 100% baseline. She was then diagnosed with Lyme a year ago and we are taking the slow and steady approach to treating lyme with our LLMD. We are also treating PANDAS flares with oral steroids and now more recently with IV steroids (solumedrol), with the hope that she will not need repeated steroids in the future as the lyme dies off.

 

Over the years she has on several occasions experienced acute episodes of: a red rectum, red vagina, agitation, anger, fears, separation anxiety, and sensory sensitivities - but coupled with normal perianal culture and normal urinalysis. All of this (perianal redness and aggitation, normal test results, etc.) came back with a vengeance following her recent IV steroid infusion. Im thinking its Candida. Any thoughts on it being something other than candida?

 

Her Current Treatments Are--

GAPS Diet

daily prophylactic amoxicillin

Beyond Balance MC-BAR-1, MC-BB-1, MC-BAB-2, Mycoregen, MC-BFM-P, IMN-V-II

DesBio Upper Respiratory Staph and Strep

Klaire Labs Ther Biotic Complete, and Klaire Labs BioSpora

Prescript Assist Probiotic

Glutathione Tri Fortify orange

Takesumi Supreme

 

Thank You for any time spent reading and responding to this post, as I am second guessing my entire treatment plan for her right now.

 

My son has Lyme (and Babesia) as well - sorry that your daughter is going through this, it's really horrible. When I read your post two things come to mind: 1) sounds like lots of steroids while treating lyme and 2) definitely sounds like candida.

 

As far as #1 is concerned...I have been told that steroids are definitely helpful and sometimes absolutely necessary to get inflammation down. However, steroids do suppress the immune system so they are not the first line of defense for lyme. From what I understand many experience a major flare in lyme symptoms while on steroids because of the immune suppression which gives Lyme an opportunity to take over. In your post you said that the agitation and skin irritation came back with a vengeance following her last steroid burst. It may be that her Lyme was opportunistic and flared since it had the opportunity. Not to say that steroids should never be used I would just say it's a good thing to discuss with your LLMD...

 

For #2 - the redness definitely makes me think candida. My son had that on his bottom at one point too. We were told to get an over the counter yeast infection cream and apply it a couple of times a day until the rash was gone. It did go away however, his tongue was whiter than normal so I had a stool test done by Genova Labs and it was very insightful. It showed high candida AND bacterial overgrowth in his stomach. We are treating that now and it is helpful. I recommend getting a stool test done right away to see if you can determine what is going on in her gut. Every time I do any research at all I keep landing on things that tell me that it all starts in the gut. So we have to be mindful of whats happening there and give as much support as possible.

 

Hope that helps...I am no expert and after only 1 year and 2 months (and counting) of treating I'm still very new to the whole thing. There are many more qualified parents on this forum than me and hopefully they will chime in too!!

[maybaby]

I can always tell when my daughter has a candida/yeast problem because she gets very silly/loud after she eats. Her stomach will also become distended and she'll have increased gas after meals.

 

We've also done the stool test by Genova Labs. The OAT test is helpful diagnostic as well.

 

Here is link that helped me to understand yeast symptoms: www.tacanow.org/family-resources/what-is-yeast-overgrowth/

 

When we see a yeast problem in her, I usually just treat with Nystatin (although we go through a whole herx reaction and have problems with increased silliness, lack of focus, and poor sleep for the first few weeks of the Nystatin treatment).

[jennapow]

If you searched the forum you probably found a post from me from a year ago asking the exact same question. DS11 has very similar symptoms. Things started fall of 2015 with urinary frequency/difficulty. Tested for UTI and nothing. Then we got mood swings, school refusal, separation anxiety, couldn't sleep without the light on, wanted me to sleep with him. He deteriorated to 24/7 anger with any small request turning into a rage episode. At the same time he had a red rash on his bottom and severely dry/chapped hands. Things improved drastically after two weeks on Augmentin. The rashes even went away, so I assumed it was perianal strep. He's had abx again several times over the last year for mild flares in his symptoms, but has had a bigger flare in the last couple of months. He had 6 weeks of abx November - December and a steroid burst in December. Most PANDAS symptoms were down with the exception of school refusal and occasional urination difficulties. Now yesterday he went to the bathroom about 40 times, spending at least 10 minutes on every visit. The rash on his hands is severe. I haven't checked his bottom, but I'm betting it's red. His labs did not show any increased bacterial or viral issues so we haven't identified a trigger. We go to the doctor today for the urination issue. I'm afraid the abx and steroids have caused yeast to flare. I don't know what's causing the symptoms - pandas, yeast or both.

[laurac]

Here's a blood test you can order.

http://www.mylabsforlife.com/OrderBloodTestsOnline/dr-amy-myers-candida-panel

 

I ordered the stool test from the same site for my son. It showed he had yeast overgrowth; we've been treating with diet, probiotics and alternating prescription and natural anti-fungals. His energy has improved, but he still has PANDAS/PANS symptoms. We just got results back from the cunningham panel and it seems to indicate he has this disorder. I've heard that yeast can trigger an autoimmune flare up, since it's another infection.