People suffering from Morgellons are constantly going to see doctors. These doctors are generally dismissive of the symptoms of fibers coming out of the skin.
The Morgellons Community claims there are thousands of people with Morgellons. Many also claim that it is a contagious disease.
If so, then why have none of these skeptical doctors ever been infected with Morgellons?
Think about it, if 10,000 people have Morgellons, they have probably been to see a doctor at least 10 times, that’s at least 100,000 times a doctor has been in contact with a Morgellons sufferer. (Probably more like 1,000,000).
Why, over all those visits, being in close contact with the patient, has a skeptical doctor never been infected?
This lack of infection proves with a very strong degree of confidence that either Morgellons is not a contagious disease, or that conventional Doctors are somehow immune to it.
From what I’ve read, the physicians and nurse practitioners who believe there is a physical affliction (instead of a delusion)don’t know if it’s contagious or not. This makes sense, since nobody has discovered what is causing the affliction named Morgellons.
I have seen some (very few) claim it is infectious, but this doesn’t seem to be a widespread claim. People who live in a household where more than one person is afflicted believe it’s contagious.
As for getting sick .. doctors and other health care workers deal with infectious ailments all the time. Part of their jobs. Doesn’t mean they are constantly catching the ailments.
First of all, Morgellons isn’t an “it”. Morgies suffer from nothing at all to everything under the sun. The worse thing the Morgies suffers from is the delusion that Morgellons is a disease. If they have a disease, it can’t be Morgellons. Credible doctors aren’t aren’t likely to suffer from such a condition. Another problem that Morgies have is a mind that just cannot accept the truth. They’ll eat up nonsense like flies on a manure pile, but the truth seems to be impossible for them to swallow. God help them. They really need it.
What people are failing to see, is that the physicians and nurse practitioners who believe there is a physical affliction instead of a delusion, are suffering from something, EXTREME, themselves.
Gosh, that was a short comment from me, but it cuts right down to it.
It’s not just doctors who appear to be immune. Apparently anyone outside of the southern United States is also immune – though this may become the first known condition to be spread by television and internet use.
Morgellons = Delusional parasitosis
The belief that “something is growing inside me” is by no means new to medical science. It is a well-known and widely-observed delusion, common among drug users and alcoholics. The only defining factor in “Morgellons” is the element of hysterical conagion.
**contagion in the last post there.
Here’s an idea – why don’t we just take the “gell” out of the middle and call it “Moron’s disease” ?
Interestingly, the wikipedia article on Morgellons mentions that teachers and nurses are some of the most common patients. I know doctors are not nurses, but I don’t think that’s a valid distinction to make here — both are in frequent contact with patients.
I’m not claiming any particular position on the issue, I’m just adding in some data.
Actually it says “many sufferers are teachers and nurses”, which is rather vague. 22 Morgellons sufferers used Meth amphetamine – is 22 “many”?
Look at it another way – suppose there are 10,000 morgellons suffers, 300,000,000 people in the USA, then given that there are 500,000 Doctors in the USA, then about 16 Morgellon suffers should be doctors, regardless of if it is contagious or not. Are they immune?
And by the same reasoning, there should be 32 lawyers with Morgellons.
“Many sufferers are teachers and nurses.”
Well, there’s some damned dumb teachers and nurses, is all I gotta say about that.
What is up with that? Is it because, maybe, teachers are exposed to more cellulosic fibers, due to all the spiral notebooks in the classroom, and nurses are always ripping opened paper envelopes that have sterile medical supplies in them?
Ooooh, watch out for those fibers. Gawd!!!
(I said, “dumb”, not “crazy”, in case anyone wants to rip me.)
Smileykins…you called me an idiot. You guys are scary now…not too funny anymore. Your obsession with this delusional disease is beginning to alarm me. If it’s a delusion, why all the hoop-la over it folks. Let it go…release, breath. Find something interesting and beneficial to do with your selves. Why bother with a bunch of nut cases? What is so intriguing? Get a life…if you’ve got one, act like it. And you call us sick!? Carrie
Carrie
I have a theory – this is an atypical product being found in the human body. Could it be the affect of bio-engineered food? We are being fed food that has been altered by genetic engineering, which in itself is unnatural. DNA is being tampered with – we do not know the results of this. Maybe this is just the beginning.
Don’t doctors eat?
There is no “atypical product” being found in human bodies.
Everyone’s cellular debris and environmental crap all resembles the next person’s, and that’s perfectly normal.
Those things are not “specimens”, they’re not “evidence”, and normal people don’t obsess with microscopes.
Take that stuff into a doctor, and what do you expect to happen? Precisely what does.
If anyone is digging through their own feces, they’re more than likely seeing digested food, mucous, and squamous epithelial cells, which would be in urine, too, as well as casts floating around.
Those skin symptoms are a biological process of the immune system reacting to a foreign substance in the environment; something that they’ve consumed, that they’re allergic to (could even be all the antibiotics they get online..yeah, and they’re so against “big pharma”); and/or autoimmune disorders in people. Allergies are very baffling, and it’s difficult to track down, and try to eliminate, all the possible sources.
Either heredity factors, and/or improper skin care that causes a breach in the innate immunity of the epidermal layer of the skin is to blame. It could be from using deodorant soaps, antibacterial body washes, or from suffocating the skin with skin care products, as well as general dehydration. Environmental toxins, as well as particulate matter (specs and fibers of all types), adhere to us all, but it will stay in the epidermis, if it isn’t exfoliated, and people’s natural body oils and things they apply to their skin glues it on tighter. That layer of skin has a job to do and if it isn’t functioning correctly, any dermatologist is educated well enough to diagnose the problem without having to go to extreme measures to see anything.
Histamine causes a itch, an itch causes a scratch, a scratch causes an open sore that allows the entrance of germs and fibers. Our skin’s flora can become pathogenic once it enters a wound.
Scabs are not suppose to keep being pulled off to see what is underneath them.
Focus on the main reason Mary Leitao came up with “her disease” to begin with. Don’t work in her other list of symptoms she compiled, that have zero revelance, as to what her original claim was for beginning her blessed MRF.
She’s created, perpetuated, and facilated so much widespread absurdity stemming from her own “problems”.
She’s on fire.
Oh, I’m sorry. There are some doctors with morgellons. They’re part of Morgellons Research Foundation. We certainly mustn’t overlook these fine, reputable men of medicine.
Doug “Doc” Buckner, Ph.D.
Associate Director
Douglas Buckner, Ph.D. Dr. Buckner has an extensive background in biology. Having personally suffered with Morgellons Disease for over fours years, Doc joined the MRF in an effort to find a cure, not only for himself, but for all who suffer with this insidious condition.
Gregory V. Smith, M.D.
Director
Medical Advisory Board
Dr. Smith is a board certified pediatrician who has practiced in Georgia for the past 27 years. Greg also suffers from Morgellons Disease as does his wife, Judy, who is a nurse.
Dr. Smith is also co-founder of the Longstreet Clinic in Gainesville, Georgia.
Despicable, ain’t it.
Here in Portland, we just did a long piece on Morgellons that included a doctor who claims to be afflicted.
story link
video link
You may need to sign in to make the video play. Sorry.
If you already have opinons about whether Morgellons is real or not, this is unlikely to add anything to the debate, but I think it was a good introduction piece for viewers who weren’t aware of it.
-Aaron Weiss
News Producer
KGW-TV
Portland, Oregon
Thank you for sharing!!
The first sentence in the article speaks in past tense…
“What sounds like science fiction was real life for Portland’s Dr. Beverly Drottar.”
…which stunned me, enough, but we see later…
“Meanwhile Drottar is battling her illness by trying to lead as normal a life as possible.”
Dr. Beverly Drottar.
The same Doctor Beverly Drottar, from Portland, Oregon, who posted on Lymebusters’ message board in February or March 2005.
She’d told everyone that what they had was a normal reaction/response in their skin, and that she, herself, had recovered from it, going into explicits, so we’d know that she knew what she was talking about.
And “yes”, she did, indeed, know what she was talking about.
Can we “only assume now” that she must have gone off any psychiatric medication, that she failed mentioning, for her to have this SUDDEN change of heart?
How very, very, special.
…and Lymebusters lost their archives during a ProBoard’s upgrade. I remember the doctor all too well, because (hehe), I had gotten reprimanded by members of the message board for being disrespectful speaking towards her. But she’d just posted and moved on, for pity sakes.
Well, I actually meant doctors who were currently practicing mainstream medicine. There’s still 500,000 of them.
Beverly B. Drottar does not practice, since she’s disabled by a 20 year infection chronic Lyme.
I’m sorry. I know. It’s just the three, though, that have it…
“sniff, sniff” …ya know.
Why dont docs get morgellons.
Because what doc is going to say “I have something and I dont understand what it is”
That isnt going to happen. They are most likely NOT going to tell anyone and keep the problem concealed.
People associate the word “Doctor” with the word “expert”. If the “expert” doesnt know then why would this “expert” treat me for anything.
Make sense. No Doctor is going to risk that to his profession and possibly loose his patients as a result of his actual acquiring of something not understood or even the idea that he could be a wack job.
That is why doctors dont admit ever getting such a thing.
“
This post has been removed by the author.
Most doctors know how important it is to take care of their skin, and they know the necessary proceedures for doing so. When a problem does develop, most doctors don’t invent a disease to blame it on, nor do they blame it on a condition that isn’t recognized by the medical community.
Doctors have standards they must go by, just like electricians have their codes. Some doctors are better than others, but as a group, they are our experts. An individual doctor may come along that has better ideas, but until he can convince the medical association that he has discovered a better way, he must follow older proceedures. This also applies to disease identification and medical terminology.
I just saw this comment.
“Electricians and codes”.
I am an Electrician and I am taking online code courses at this time.
What are the odds that combination would be mentioned, “electrician and codes”?
Thats no off the wall coincidence.
Administrator, (Michael) running cookies eh?
If you want to know where I live just ask. Why else would you be looking?
Look, I appolized to you all, dont get me started again. I can flip on a dime.
What I do on my computer is nobodys business.
I think people are going to be apprehensive about logging on here if this sort of stalking tactic is going on.
I came across some discussion about doctors with “morgellons disease”, here.
http://tinyurl.com/gc5bz
My doc got it on his hands after touching my skin and fibers.
Greta, you say your doctor has Morgellons?
He certianly has the fibers, but just on his hands.
I think he needs to wash his hands.
He scrubs his hands all the time with a scrub brush. The fibers reappear quickly, without him touching anything.
**********
I just have a few problems with dismissing a disease I know nothing about…
(1)I know nothing about it
(2)new diseases emerge daily
(3)I have the ability to put myself in others’ shoes, and
(4)in my experience with the nation’s healthcare system, decent care for the most obvious problems can be elusive.
And what am I to make of respected nurses, doctors, and major league baseball players, who describe mysterious and devastating matching symptoms? And what of the absence of people in my daily life who have thrown away successful careers and families to become delusional?
I wouldn’t wish these symptoms on anyone. Someone close to me is–at age 60, with fairly severe Parkinsons’ and probably Lyme–describing symptoms that match morgellons. Like many others, he learned about it online recently after wondering about his strange symptoms (mild so far) for over a year, and being discouraged by his doctor.
IF you are suffering from the symptoms described as morgellons, I strongly encourage you to seek support, healthy relief, trustworthy medical professionals and friends, and ANSWERS. I hope you won’t let ignorant people slow you down. You deserve COMMUNITY that filters out what is not useful and supportive. (Consider a moderated blog; see Wikipedia for possibilities.) It is your right and need to pursue your health. YOU ARE NOT ALONE, and you have a lot to offer others who are going through what you are.
Consider documenting what you are experiencing in as much detail as possible, in case it helps with understanding this. People need to know. Presumably it can happen to them/US. A devastating illness must be recognized.
…
Thanks Nana J
Morgellons is not a disease. The forums of the Morgellons believers are detrimental to your health and do not provide real support. Follow your doctor’s advice.
Nana J. if you have a few problems dismissing a disease you know nothing about, I presume that you must, then, learn as much as you feel is necessary about diseases that you need to know about. “Morgellons disease” is not a disease. Too many people are becoming influenced into thinking they have this, by putting themselves into someone elses place, almost, in a way. You should learn how it came about, and you will discover that it was a made up by a woman suspected, by her own admission, to have Munchausen-by-Proxy, who, to this day, is still picking at her little boy, disfiguring him, rather than allowing a sore that was on his lower lip, from at least four to five years ago, to heal.
http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/06204/707970-85.stm
http://www.gainesvilletimes.com/news/stories/20060820/localnews/118795.shtml
I hope that you don’t worry about new diseases emerging daily, because there are apparently people who do. I’m sorry you’ve had problems with the nation’s healthcare system. Many people haven’t, though, and are actively involved as ongoing recipients of excellent healthcare.
I can’t tell you what you are to make of “respected nurses, doctors, and major league baseball players, who describe mysterious and devastating matching symptoms”, but if I were you, I would ask myself what any of those people have done that have caused you to consider any of them to be deserving of your respect. I don’t thoroughly understand your next question, but I’m very sorry at what it seems to be implying.
I know, all too well, what Parkinsons Disease is like, having lost a relative to it. I’m very sorry your close friend has it. It’s devastating, and far too much to handle on it’s own, without looking for anything else to be wrong. I hope he knows what he can expect, and I wish him the very best, as well as you. Based on your opening statement, I trust that you have learned about Parkinsons inside out.
Again, going back to your opening statement, “I just have a few problems with dismissing a disease I know nothing about…”
I think everyone should learn slowly, and carefully, without jumping to any conclusions. Michael presents excellence under all of his topic headings on this blog. Please stay here, and take your time.
NanaJ, I’m not dismissing anything. I have read everything ever written about Morgellons, I have corresponded with several sufferers and several interested scientists, I have performed experiments, I have researched various fields of medicine and fiber research. I take it seriously, and I know the suffering is very real.
I still do not think there is ANY evidence that suggests there is a new disease that produces fibers along with a common collection of other symptoms.
And Billy Koch denies having Morgellons. That’s just his wife creating excuses for him.
The reasons doctor dismiss it is:
It is not diagnosable.
If you want to help people, first study the disease.
That means many years of hard clinical observations instead
of simply saying “oh its morgellons” or “oh its Lyme” and then
treating the patient with potentially very harmful drugs.
Ginger is a fraud.