Background. The efficacy of 10-day doxycycline treatment in patients with erythema migrans has been assessed in the United States but not in Europe. Experts disagree on the significance of post-Lyme borreliosis symptoms. Methods. In a noninferiority trial, the efficacies of 10 days and 15 days of oral doxycycline therapy were evaluated in adult European patients with erythema migrans. The prevalence of nonspecific symptoms was compared between patients with erythema migrans and 81 control subjects without a history of Lyme borreliosis. The efficacy of treatment, determined on the basis of clinical observations and microbiologic tests, was assessed at 14 days and at 2, 6, and 12 months. Nonspecific symptoms in patients and controls were compared at 6 months after enrollment. Results. A total of 117 patients (52%) were treated with doxycycline for 15 days, and 108 (48%) received doxycycline for 10 days. Twelve months after enrollment, 85 of 91 patients (93.4%) in the 15-day group and 79 of 86 (91.9%) in the 10-day group had complete response (difference, 1.6 percentage points; upper limit of the 95% confidence interval, 9.1 percentage points). At 6 months, the frequency of nonspecific symptoms in the patients was similar to that among controls. Conclusions. The 10-day regimen of oral doxycycline was not inferior to the 15-day regimen among adult European patients with solitary erythema migrans. Six months aftertreatment, the frequency of nonspecific symptoms among erythema migrans patients was similar to that among control subjects.
COBISS.SI-ID: 298668
Background. The causes of post-Lyme disease symptoms are unclear. Herein, we investigated whether specific immune responses were correlated with such symptoms. Methods. The levels of 23 cytokines and chemokines, representative of innate and adaptive immune responses, were assessed in sera from 86 antibiotic-treated European patients with erythema migrans, 45 with post-Lyme symptoms and 41 without symptoms, who were evaluated prior to treatment and 2, 6, and 12 months thereafter. Results. At study entry, significant differences between groups were observed for the type 1 helper T cell (TH1)associated chemokines CXCL9 and CXCL10, which were associated with negative Borrelia cultures, and the type 17 helper T cell (TH17)associated cytokine interleukin 23 (IL-23), which was associated with positive cultures and the development of post-Lyme symptoms (P .02). Moreover, of the 41 patients with detectable IL-23 levels, 25 (61%) developed post-Lyme symptoms, and all 7 with IL-23 levels 230 ng/mL had such symptoms. Furthermore, antibody responses to the ECGF autoantigen were more common in patients with post-Lyme symptoms (P = .07) and were correlated directly with IL-23 levels (P = .02). Despite the presence of post-Lyme symptoms, all posttreatment culture results were negative, antiborrelial antibody responses declined, and there were no objective signs of disseminated disease, suggesting that spirochetal eradication had occurred with treatment in all patients. Conclusions. High TH1-associated responses correlated with more effective immune-mediated spirochetal killing, whereas high TH17-associated immune responses, often accompanied by autoantibodies, correlated with post-Lyme symptoms, providing a new paradigm for the study of postinfectious symptoms in a subset of patients with Lyme disease.
COBISS.SI-ID: 1184172