ASPIRE Blog

My message to parents is to listen to your child and trust yourself. We all have strong parental instincts for a reason. I know there will be days when all you want to do is hide under the covers and shut the world out. But, perhaps there will be days when your child is healthy enough that you start to forget how bad it was.

So today, we ask YOU to ask your kids this one question: Without Teachers, what would you have never learned. You can ask about teachers in general or one particular teacher. Then post their answers in the comments below!

Zheng J, Frankovich J, McKenna ES, et al. Association of Pediatric Acute-Onset Neuropsychiatric Syndrome With Microstructural Differences in Brain Regions Detected via Diffusion-Weighted Magnetic Resonance Imaging. JAMA Netw Open. 2020;3(5):e204063. […]

Nurses’ Role in PANS/PANDAS What role do nurses play in helping families with PANS/PANDAS? Nurses are an integral part of the team. Nurses are often the first point of contact […]

Tick Testing and Disease Transmission Statistics Gabriella: Thank you to Dr. Rich for talking with ASPIRE today about Tick Report and his lab at U Mass.  Dr. Rich and I […]

Neurocognitive and neuropsychiatric symptoms associated with tick-borne disease. Gabriella: Dr. Roseann, thank you for joining ASPIRE to talk about neurocognitive and neuropsychiatric symptoms associated with tick-borne disease. Many of our […]

Every Friday during Lyme Disease Awareness Month, the Vector-Borne Disease Regional Centers of Excellence will give interactive presentations on their work for tickborne diseases such as; tick surveillance, how to collect ticks, tick bite prevention, tickborne disease research, and other activities.  Every Week at 1:00pm.

Tick Resources Tick Types, Tick Stages, Tick Diseases Tick Type & Stage Identification Chart List of Tick Borne Diseases Tick Table Tick Life Cycle CDC AKC Lyme Disease Rash Examples […]

Patients with obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) have increased levels of Immuno-moodulin (Imood), a protein in their lymphocytes, a type of immune cell.

Anxious mice returned to normal in a couple of days after being given an antibody that blocked Imood. Twenty-three people with OCD and twenty healthy people without OCD were tested; Imood expression was about six times higher in those with OCD. Additional research indicates the same protein, Immod, is elevated in ADHD.

For my son, symptom onset was not overnight. He had so many health issues starting the first few weeks of life, which continued throughout his early childhood. His body was in a near-constant state of infection and inflammation. Add his medical history to a family history riddled with autoimmune and strep-related health issues and it is no wonder that my son has PANS/PANDAS.

Today Dr. Wells is going to focus on zinc, resveratrol, and Chinese Skullcap. But first, let’s do a review of COVID-19 symptoms.

April 12th, 2019, is a day I will never forget. It was exactly one week after my daughter’s 4th birthday, a Friday. Springtime, my favorite time of the year, the buds of my favorite wisteria, were just starting to crack open. As the seasons change, our life was about to change dramatically. Our four-year-old daughter, the youngest of five kids, awoke possessed.