Preventing Tick Bites

Summer is here.  It’s the season to spend more time outdoors and with the outdoors, comes the possibility of ticks.  Ticks carry many diseases so it’s important to avoid them as much as possible.

Here are some suggestions from the CDC for dealing with ticks this summer:

Avoid Direct Contact with Ticks

-Avoid wooded and bushy areas with high grass and leaf litter.

-Walk in the center of trails.

Repel Ticks with DEET or Permethrin

-Use repellents that contain 20% or more DEET (N, N-diethyl-m-toluamide) on the exposed skin for protection that lasts up to several hours. Always follow product instructions. Parents should apply this product to their children, avoiding hands, eyes, and mouth.

-Use products that contain permethrin on clothing. Treat clothing and gear, such as boots, pants, socks and tents. It remains protective through several washings. Pre-treated clothing is available and remains protective for up to 70 washings.

-Other repellents registered by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) may be found at http://cfpub.epa.gov/oppref/insect/.

Find and Remove Ticks from Your Body

-Bathe or shower as soon as possible after coming indoors (preferably within two hours) to wash off and more easily find ticks that are crawling on you.

-Conduct a full-body tick check using a hand-held or full-length mirror to view all parts of your body upon return from tick-infested areas. Parents should check their children for ticks under the arms, in and around the ears, inside the belly button, behind the knees, between the legs, around the waist, and especially in their hair.

-Examine gear and pets. Ticks can ride into the home on clothing and pets, then attach to a person later, so carefully examine pets, coats, and day packs. Tumble clothes in a dryer on high heat for an hour to kill remaining ticks.

If you find a tick on your body, here is the tick removal recommendation from the CDC:

-Use fine-tipped tweezers to grasp the tick as close to the skin's surface as possible.

-Pull upward with steady, even pressure. Don't twist or jerk the tick; this can cause the mouth-parts to break off and remain in the skin. If this happens, remove the mouth-parts with tweezers. If you are unable to remove the mouth easily with clean tweezers, leave it alone and let the skin heal.

-After removing the tick, thoroughly clean the bite area and your hands with rubbing alcohol, an iodine scrub, or soap and water.

Don’t use any of the folk remedies that have gone around over the years.  The goal is to remove the tick as quickly as possible and tweezers are the best way to do that.  Here’s a link to the instructions from the CD that has diagrams of the tweezers technique:  http://www.cdc.gov/ticks/removing_a_tick.html

Here is a diagram from the CDC of the stages and relative sizes of ticks:

Here’s an excellent link from the CDC for the prevention of tick bites: Stop Ticks (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention)

Other links:

Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever (National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases)

Tick-Borne Diseases: The Big Two (MedlinePlus Magazine)

For Children:

Hey! A Tick Bit Me! (Nemours Foundation)

Tick Tactics (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention)

Protect Yourself from Ticks this Summer

Summer is here and with summer comes more outdoor activities and more chance of coming in contact with ticks. Ticks can be in woods, tall grass, and many other areas. It’s important to protect yourself from ticks since they can cause many illnesses.

Tips to protect yourself from ticks:

- Use a chemical repellent with DEET, permethrin or picaridin

- Wear light-colored protective clothing (long sleeves and long pants)

- Tuck pant legs into socks

- Avoid tick-infested areas

- Check yourself, your children and your pets daily for ticks and carefully remove any ticks you find

If you find that a tick has attached itself to you, it’s important to remove it immediately. The best method for removing ticks is using tweezers. Here is some guidance from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention:

How to remove a tick

1. Use fine-tipped tweezers to grasp the tick as close to the skin's surface as possible.

2. Pull upward with steady, even pressure. Don't twist or jerk the tick; this can cause the mouth-parts to break off and remain in the skin. If this happens, remove the mouth-parts with tweezers. If you are unable to remove the mouth easily with clean tweezers, leave it alone and let the skin heal.

3. After removing the tick, thoroughly clean the bite area and your hands with rubbing alcohol, an iodine scrub, or soap and water.

There are many illnesses caused by tick bites. Many tickborne illnesses have common symptoms:

- A skin rash

- Fever/chills

- Headache

- Muscle pain

- Stiff neck

- Swelling of knees and other large joints

It can be hard to diagnose a tickborne illness since these symptoms are vague and can be caused by any number of things. If you experience any of these symptoms, contact your health care provider.

For more information on tick bites and tickborne illness, check out these web sites:

Ticks (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) This site has some great illustrations of the different kinds of ticks: Tick Life Cycle and Hosts

Tick Removal (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention)

Tickborne Diseases (National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases)

Lyme Disease/Tick Bites

Since summer is in full swing and people are out enjoying the great outdoors, I thought I'd share some information on Lyme disease, a very common tickborne disease.

There are a number of tickborne diseases but I am going to cover Lyme disease in this post, since it is the most familiar and one that can be difficult to diagnosis since the symptoms are similar to other illnesses.

Lyme disease is spread through the bite of the deer tick. Both nymphs (immature ticks) and adult deer ticks can spread the disease. The deer population has been increasing in the Northeast United States and more housing developments in rural parts of the country where deer ticks are common, have lead to the spread of Lyme disease.

Symptoms:

The first symptom of Lyme disease is usually Erythema migrans, a rash that starts as a small red spot at the site of the tick bite. The spot then grows bigger over a period of days or weeks and eventually forms a circle or oval.

As the disease spreads, the rash can spread to other parts of the body.

Other symptoms of Lyme disease include:

Other symptoms include:
- Fever
- Headache
- Stiff neck
- Body aches
- Tiredness

If the disease is not treated with antibiotics, arthritis may develop in the joint, most commonly the knee.

Lyme disease can also affect the nervous system. Here are some symptoms of the neurological effects:

- Stiff neck and severe headache (meningitis)
- Temporary paralysis of your facial muscles (Bell’s palsy)
- Numbness, pain, or weakness in your limbs
- Poor muscle movement

Lyme disease can also cause more subtle changes such as :

- Memory loss
- Difficulty with concentration
- Change in mood or sleep habits

If you think you may have Lyme disease, tell your health care provider so they can make a definitive diagnosis.

Antibiotics are used to effectively treat Lyme disease.

For more information on Lyme disease and other tickborne diseases, including detailed information on diagnosis and treatment, check out the booklet Tickborne Diseases from the National Institute on Allergy and Infectious diseases.

Here are some helpful tips to avoid tick bites:

- Use a chemical repellent with DEET, permethrin or picaridin
- Wear light-colored protective clothing
- Tuck pant legs into socks
- Avoid tick-infested areas
- Check yourself, your children and your pets daily for ticks and carefully remove any ticks you find