She also experienced “stroke-like” symptoms that included blurred vision, facial tingling, and left-sided body numbness. Despite the occurrence of these symptoms within a month after she was exposed to a tick at a baseball field in May 2012, the patient had four negative Lyme test (ELISA) results.

Dong shared with a packed room the case of a 19-year-old female college sophomore who suffered neuropsychiatric manifestations of early-stage Lyme disease. The patient experienced sustained panic attacks lasting for hours at a time and severely disturbed sleep, and she described a “brain fog” that caused difficulty with concentration and memory and left her feeling detached from reality. She also experienced “stroke-like” symptoms that included blurred vision, facial tingling, and left-sided body numbness. Despite the occurrence of these symptoms within a month after she was exposed to a tick at a baseball field in May 2012, the patient had four negative Lyme test (ELISA) results.