How to Safely Remove Ticks and Avoid Lyme Disease

Given all the bad press surrounding tiny arachnids, finding a tick on you is always a little worrying. Every year, almost one in ten people will experience a tick bite, and 476,000 Lyme disease will be treated in the US, according to CDC.

Although these statistics may be worrying, there is no reason to panic. This action has to be taken. The most important thing you can do to reduce your chances of developing a tick-borne disease is to find one of the little suckers on you. get it off.

“Ticks need to feed in order to transmit diseases, so ideally, ticks should be removed before they begin to freeze and feed,” the infectious disease doctor says. Laura Kirkman, MDAssociate Professor of Medicine and Microbiology at Weill Cornell Medicine in New York City. “They’re a bit methodical and take their time (unlike mosquitoes), which gives human hosts a chance to fend them off.”

Unfortunately, we are not always so lucky.

how to remove tick

Here’s how to remove a tick already bitten you: :

1. Clean a pair of fine-tipped tweezers with soap and water or rubbing alcohol.
2. Grasp the tick with tweezers as close to your skin as possible.
3. Pull the tick straight up from your skin without twisting or jerking it to avoid breaking parts of your skin.
4. Place the tick in a sealed bag or container. You don’t need to keep the tick or crush it with your fingers for testing, but you may want to take a picture of it before throwing it away or flushing it down the toilet.
5. After removing the tick, clean the bite site and your hands thoroughly. You can use soap and water, rubbing alcohol, or hand sanitizer.
6. Check the rest of your body thoroughly. Remove any other ticks if necessary.

Don’t worry too much about pulling out the tick completely or completely. “Simply remove the tick, because the longer it remains attached, the greater the chance of spreading the pathogen,” says Jean Tsao, PhDProfessor of Fisheries and Wildlife and Large Animal Clinical Sciences at Michigan State University in East Lansing, Michigan.

And don’t delay pulling out a tick to wait to get to an emergency room or doctor’s office, which only increases the amount of time the tick has to feast on, says Dr. Kirkman.

It’s also not worth trying rumored treatments like petroleum jelly, nail polish, or even burning the tick. That said, these tips don’t work to remove ticks and may harm you in the process. Paul G. Auvater, MD, MBAProfessor of Medicine in Infectious Diseases at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine.

Once the ticking stops, take a deep breath. You have completed the most important step. You don’t need to go to the doctor or emergency room.

After you remove the tick

Check the rest of your body carefully if you haven’t already. “They’re very small, often the size of a poppy seed, so they can be difficult to see,” says Dr. Kirkman. Dr. Auvater says to use a full-length mirror and a hand mirror to inspect your body from head to toe, paying extra attention to areas with skin folds.

If the tick is in good condition after removing it, take a photo of it before throwing it away. This can help you identify the species of tick that bit you, Dr. Kirkman says, which “affects the infections we worry about and how likely the tick was to carry a human pathogen.”

Identifying ticks can be challenging for the average hiker or trail runner, but there are professionals who can help. Take a photo of the tick from above where you can see more of its features, says Tsao, then try an online image search to see if you can match your tick.

However, the most reliable option is to submit your photo to a trusted online resource such as your state’s health department, tick appOr tick encounter. “These online resources can respond with identification within 24 to 48 hours, which is the right amount of time for medical management,” says Tsao. To be extra careful, you can submit your photo to more than one of these resources so you can get a timely response, she adds.

Depending on the type of tick that bit you, you may be a candidate for preventive antibiotics. “For high-risk tick bites, a single Prophylactic dose of doxycycline Can be given to prevent Lyme disease,” says Dr. Kirkman. This is only the case if you were bitten by a blacklegged tick, which transmits Lyme, the tick was ingested, and it has been less than 72 hours since the tick was removed.

If you are in a high risk area for lyme disease (usually the Northeastern, Mid-Atlantic, and upper Midwestern United States) and remove an emerged tick, talk to a doctor about whether this is the right course of treatment for you, says Dr. Auwerter.

Regardless, over the next several days, keep an eye on yourself for any changes. “If you start feeling sick or have a skin rash, you should see your doctor, and you can inform them when you removed the tick and ideally what species it is,” says Dr. Kirkman. Keep an eye out for any new rashes, changes at the site of the tick bite, or flu-like symptoms, says Dr. Auwater.

And if it happens next time, consider stashing a few pairs of tweezers where you need them, like in your car’s first aid kit and your hiking backpack, says Tsao. That said, if you find a tick and don’t have tweezers nearby, it’s still worth trying to remove as much of it as possible with your fingers, says Dr. Auwerter. Removing that evil quickly is always the first objective.