Time For Lyme Offers Video About Students And Lyme Disease

GREENWICH — Time For Lyme, Inc. (TFL), a not-for-profit Lyme disease research, education and advocacy network, has announced the availability of its educational video, Time For Lyme: The Students, the Educators & Lyme Disease, for use by schools, public health organizations, and other groups and individuals interested in identifying and assisting students who may be suffering from Lyme disease.

The video provides information from nationally respected healthcare professionals and Lyme disease experts about the cognitive, social, and emotional issues that can occur in students with chronic Lyme disease.

Time for Lyme is making the video more widely available to meet the growing need for such information as Lyme disease and other tick-borne illness reach epidemic proportions in many areas of the country. Already in use in 22 states throughout the country, the one-hour video is $11 per copy, plus delivery, to cover Time For Lyme’s reproduction costs. Clips from the video are available for download free of charge on the Lyme Disease Association website, www.lymediseaseassociation.org.

Time For Lyme: The Students, The Educators & Lyme Disease was originally presented in May 2002 as an educational forum for teachers, guidance counselors, social workers, and school nurses in the Greenwich school system, where Time For Lyme is based. The forum’s purpose was to help these educational professionals in the often-complex task of recognizing manifestations of the disease so that they, in turn, would help these students and their families. Chronic or undiagnosed Lyme disease often has symptoms that mimic other disorders including ADD/HDD and other cognitive and neuropsychological problems that affect academic, social, and behavioral performance.

The forum was videotaped by award-winning producer Mary Ann Shanahan so that this information could be shared with school systems across Connecticut. Word of the video spread quickly beyond Connecticut, leading to interest from both educational and noneducational groups across the country.

Today, the video is being shown in 22 states, including Connecticut.

The forum panel includes Patricia Smith, president of the Lyme Disease Association (LDA), a national advocacy organization based in New Jersey, Brian Fallon, MD, MPH, assistant professor, Department of Psychiatry, Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons and Director of the Lyme Disease Research Center at Columbia being endowed by TFL and LDA; Leo J. Shea III, PhD, clinical neuro-psychologist and assistant professor of rehabilitation medicine, Rusk Institute of Rehabilitation in New York; Sandra Berenbaum, CSW-R, BCD, clinical social worker, Family Connections Center for Counseling, Wappingers Falls, N.Y.; Caroline Calderone Baisley, director of health, Greenwich Department of Health.

The panelists focus on five key points in their presentations.

*Lyme disease may cause changes in school performance and behavior.

*The symptoms of Lyme disease can fluctuate from day to day. As a result, many students with Lyme disease have transitory learning disabilities and attention problems that are often perceived as behavioral problems.

*Early intervention and referral may prevent serious brain involvement in students with Lyme disease.

*Chronic Lyme disease is a serious long-term illness with debilitating symptoms that are not always apparent.

*School systems can make simple and creative classroom modifications to enhance learning and promote feelings of competence in students with Lyme disease.

Time for Lyme, Inc is a not-for-profit Lyme disease research, education, and advocacy network headquartered in Greenwich. Since it began in 1998, Time for Lyme has raised more than $1.5 million, much of which has been earmarked to create the Lyme Disease Research Center at Columbia University in New York, the first endowed research facility in the nation dedicated to undiagnosed or late diagnosed Lyme disease and other tick-borne illness.