
In the past ten years, practitioners have identified this condition in which a simple case of strep throat sets of as sudden change in behavior in children. Many kids after experiencing strep throat find they have anxiety and bipolar behaviors suddenly appearing.
This information suggests that infections by bacteria of the Streptococcus family may initiate or exacerbate predispositions for many disorders that we currently understand poorly, including Tourette’s syndrome, tic disorders, OCD, generalized anxiety disorder, ADHD, and anorexia nervosa. Possible connections to lupus, fibromyalgia, and rheumatoid arthritis are also being studied.
The question of PANDAS in adults largely has been ignored with uninformed, erroneous comments and statements that adults cannot acquire PANDAS. Yet, it has been known for well more than a century that in certain individuals, now known to be genetically predisposed, when exposed to or infected by streptococcus developed antibodies to the streptococcus which mistake that individuals tissues as bacterium and attack those tissues. Most people have heard of rheumatic fever (attack on the heart), glomerulonephritis (attack on the kidneys), and some may have heard of St. Vitus' Dance and Sydenham's Chorea (attack on the nervous system) that cause bizarre movement disorders.
We now know that the attack on the nervous system in P.A.N.D.A.S. is more broad, deep and subtle than previously understood. Furthermore, evidence-based clinical research verifies that patients with fibromyalgia are often found to have low-level rheumatoid arthritis or lupus and the first autoimmune post infectious process lead to P.A.N.D.A.S.
P.A.N.D.A.S. can be diagnosed with a good clinical examination and one blood test. The test does need to be done by one of the few labs that can do it properly. Correct diagnosis and treatment intervention can change your life._