Ticking away
Bites can lead to Lyme disease, which can be difficult to treat

An after-work beer and a walk along his wooded property used to help Ray Guzic unwind after a stressful workday.
That was until a creature only a little bigger than the head of a pin — and the disease it carried — put an end to that routine.
“That walk in the woods isn’t as safe as it used to be,” Guzic said earlier this month. “That would be my relief when I got home. I don’t want anything to do with it anymore.”
From a tick bite, Guzic contracted Lyme disease, a sometimes-debilitating illness that now infects thousands of Pennsylvanians each year, including locally.
As weather warms and more people turn to outdoor recreation, Guzic and others have agreed to speak about their illnesses to raise awareness about the disease.
Thousands infected
Most recent Lyme data published by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention ends in 2016, a year when more than 8,900 cases of the disease were confirmed in Pennsylvania.
Of those cases, 154 were identified in Blair County, according to the state Department of Health.
Tick bites can lead to a number of infections, but among those illnesses, Lyme is the most common, according to the CDC.
In its early stages, Lyme may produce a bull’s-eye-shaped rash near the site of a tick bite, and a person infected may begin to experience flu-like symptoms — fever, headache, fatigue and muscle and joint pain.
As it progresses, signs of Lyme may become more severe, causing arthritis, facial drooping, irregular heartbeat and nerve pain, among other symptoms, according to the CDC.
For Guzic, symptoms didn’t show until six month after he found a tick crawling across his stomach.
“I started getting numbness, tingling in my arms,” Guzic said, explaining he later experience vertigo and a ringing in his ears. “I didn’t know what the heck was going on at the time.”
A series of medical tests and doctor visits followed, Guzic said, but doctors struggled to find the cause of his symptoms.
“Everything came back negative,” said Guzic, who is a supervisor in Cambria County’s Washington Township.
Several local Lyme sufferers have reported similar failures by doctors, who doled out misdiagnoses.
Eventually, Guzic visited an out-of-town Lyme specialist, who he called a “Lyme-literate doctor.” The doctor determined he had been exposed to Lyme and put him on a treatment course that included antimalarial medication used to treat a co-infection, he said. Ticks can carry a number of diseases, and a co-infection refers to an illness caused by a tick that is contracted at the same time as Lyme.
The symptoms and effects of co-infections can be as bad as if not worse than those of Lyme, experts said.
Life-changing illness
Despite a treatment course, Guzic said the effects of Lyme have not disappeared. In fact, he anticipates he may have to deal with those effects for the rest of his life.
“You don’t want to be affected by this disease,” Guzic said. “It’s changed my life, and it’s not for the good.”
Giving an example, Guzic said his diet has changed drastically since contracting the disease.
Once a lover of sweets and an occasional beer, Guzic said he now experiences increased symptoms if he consumes either.
“If I drink alcohol or anything like that, it knocks me down for a week at a time,” he said.
Lyme has also affected the way Guzic thinks and communicates, he said. Guzic said he now suffers from “brain fog,” which has limited his ability to quickly analyze information and respond to complicated questions.
“I have to really sit back and think about what I have to say,” he said.
Harold Conrad, owner of Altoona’s Captain’s Quarters barber shop, recalled a time when he had to sit down while cutting hair.
“I started to get up every morning, and I was having trouble moving my legs, supporting myself with my legs,” he said.
At the time, Conrad said he did not know what was causing the problem, but a test eventually showed he, too, had contracted Lyme.
Conrad, who spent time near the woods on a dirt racetrack, said a Lyme specialist later pointed out two spots where he had been bitten by a tick.
Like Guzic, Conrad continues to struggle with the symptoms of Lyme.
Those symptoms have affected his memory, which has sometimes impacted Conrad’s ability to remember his customers’ names, he said.
“I have pain from my waist all the way to my ankles,” Conrad said. “This winter has really been bad.”
Blacklegged ticks
When it comes to Lyme, blacklegged ticks are the primary vector or transmitter of the disease, said Michael Skvarla, insect identification lab director at Penn State University.
Locally, blacklegged ticks are often referred to as deer ticks, but Skvarla said that name might not be the most accurate.
While blacklegged ticks will feed on deer, they prefer small rodents, such as mice, Skvarla said.
“We are trying to get away from calling it a deer tick because deer are not their preferred host,” he said.
When a tick is looking for a meal, it will often crawl to the end of a stem or a leaf and wait for an animal host to pass by, Skvarla said, explaining the act of seeking a host is called questing.
Ticks also can detect carbon dioxide, which is exhaled by humans as they breathe. That means people who sit outdoors long enough in a single place may attract ticks, Skvarla said.
Skvarla cautioned that people should be vigilant while spending time in wooded or grassy areas — including backyards.
Once a tick finds its host — human or otherwise — it might not bite immediately.
“They will crawl around for a while and try to find a suitable place to bite,” Skvarla said, adding a tick may crawl for hours before finding an ideal feeding place, typically a crease or confined area.
Then, the tick will sink its “mouth parts” below the host’s skin. The mouth parts are particularly hard to remove because they have backward-facing barbs that lock into the skin, Skvarla said.
Typically, a tick will feed on a host for about 24 to 48 hours before it consumes a full “blood meal,” he said.
During that time, Lyme, as well as numerous co-infections, can be transmitted, he said.
And ticks are active throughout the year — even during winter.
“They don’t really hibernate,” Skvarla said. “They become less active.”
Ticks become more active as temperatures move above freezing, he said.
Deadly disease
Last spring, dozens of Lyme advocates dressed in bright green cheered as Jerry Beiswenger sat holding a sign with a message to his wife, Diane.
The message was an invitation to a dinner date — the first the Altoona couple would have as Jerry recovered from paralysis, which was spurred by a tick bite.
However, Diane said Jerry’s illness rebounded and killed him on Feb. 17.
“I wouldn’t wish this on my worst enemy,” Diane said. “These ticks are nothing to mess with.”
In October 2016, the couple spent some leisure time in a wooded area, and in the coming days and weeks, Jerry’s health declined, Diane said.
Diane recalled Jerry’s symptoms — dark urine, joint pain and eventually paralysis.
She also remembered finding an engorged tick on their bedroom floor.
In addition to contracting Lyme, Jerry was affected by tick paralysis.
According to the CDC, tick paralysis is a “rare disease” caused by a toxin in tick saliva. Those affected by the toxin experience ascending paralysis that “is often confused with other neurologic disorders,” according to CDC.
In Jerry’s case, the toxin was completely debilitating, Diane said.
“I’m scared now because I don’t want another family member … to die from the same thing my husband did,” Diane said.
That fear is constant, Diane said. She said she watches from her home as neighbors feed feral cats, which can carry ticks. The food also attracts other tick hosts like mice and raccoons, she said.
“We never had tick issues,” she said. “This neighborhood has tick issues now.”
Offering support
Spreading awareness about tick issues is the goal of the Altoona Area Lyme Disease Support Group, said Amber Altiero, a regional leader for the group.
The group, which is part of the Pennsylvania Lyme Resource Network, was set up in 2016, and members now host monthly public meetings every second Thursday in St. Rose of Lima Catholic Church’s social hall.
“Our goal is to support people who have Lyme disease and their families and also to educate the public,” Altiero said.
Altiero, who is also a registered nurse, said she contracted Lyme in the late 1980s.
Now, she volunteers her time collecting and disseminating information about the disease.
Last week, Altiero offered tips about how to avoid tick bites. She suggested tucking long pants into socks when walking in wooded areas and spraying on natural or chemical repellents.
She also talked about building stone barriers along property lines, and making sure grass is clipped to a short length.
“Even with all that, when you are done with your activity and come in doors, you need to check,” she said, encouraging pet owner to also examine their animals, which can carry ticks into homes. “You don’t have to be in the woods or high grass to get a tick bite.”
Altiero talked at length about numerous Lyme-related issues, but she spent the most time speaking about one topic: finding a “Lyme-literate” doctor.
Average doctors often have a belief system that Lyme is hard to contract and can be treated easily and quickly with medication, Altiero said.
Lyme specialists, she said, hold the opposite view, believing Lyme is easy to contract and difficult to treat.
“Insurance unfortunately only pays for the first option,” she said.
Long-term treatment often is not cheap, and Conrad estimated he spent $20,000 on medical bills since he was diagnosed with Lyme.
Guzic said he is in a similar situation.
“Every time you visit your Lyme doctors, it’s several hundred dollars,” Guzic said.
Last year, state lawmakers — including Sen. Wayne Langerholc Jr., R-Cambria — proposed legislation that would require insurers to provide coverage for more Lyme-related medical expenses.
A bill was passed by the state House of Representatives last May but was held up in the state Senate Banking and Insurance Committee.
Barring the new law, Conrad had a suggestion for those suffering with Lyme.
“I encourage (them) to visit that support group,” he said. “For people to give up their time once a month to educate people, I think that’s wonderful.”
Mirror Staff Writer Sean Sauro is at 946-7535.