CALDA

Letters

It is amusing to read IDSA disclaimers – “Our guidelines are only suggestions” – now that IDSA is under attack for possible antitrust violations. The most generous interpretation is that their protestations are disingenuous.

The excessively detailed 46-page document prohibits many classes of life-saving medications recommended by doctors whom patients affectionately call their “LLMDs” (Lyme-literate doctors). Insurance companies are only too happy to adopt low-cost alternatives, even if patients suffer as a consequence. ID specialists frequently consult with insurance companies to deny expensive treatments for Lyme by claiming that they are medically unnecessary or experimental.

If IDSA guidelines were “only suggestions,” we question why the guidelines panel refused input from the world body of experts on tick-borne diseases, doctors and scientists from the International Lyme and Associated Diseases Society (www.ILADS.org) and patient representatives.

The rigor the IDSA insists on for others, apparently it does not feel constrained to follow itself: many of the recommendations in the IDSA guidelines are based on the lowest class of evidence – opinion.