Get It Right! Treat The Bite!
Everyone agrees- the sooner the treatment begins after a bite by an infected tick, the better! Ticks live in dirt and consume blood from a number of animals that can carry multiple disease causing organisms. Ticks are known to be infected with pathogens that can spread through the body quickly and cause a variety of mild to life-threatening symptoms.
Forget the old "wait and see if you get sick" or develop a rash...
Once tick borne organisms become entrenched in your body, it is more costly to your health and to your wallet to try to get rid of them, if you can.
A full panel of environmental and tick associated disease testing costs approximately $3,000.00 per person. Don't waste your money on tests in the early stages!
The blood tests for Lyme disease have been shown to miss 75% (or more) of people who are infected, and nearly all people will test negative within the first 1-4 weeks after a tick bite (barring prior exposure).
In 1997 seventeen laboratories performed 100,000 serologic tests for Lyme disease, costing one state's residents $7.1 million for these unreliable tests.
According to a 1998 study, treatment for early Lyme disease averaged $161 per patient, and longstanding Lyme disease averaged $61,243 per patient, per year!
From Advanced Topics in Lyme Disease, by Dr. Joseph Burrascano, Pages 19 & 20
"TICK BITES - Embedded Deer Tick With No Signs or Symptoms of Lyme (see appendix):
Decide to treat based on the type of tick, whether it came from an endemic area, how it was removed, and length of attachment (anecdotally, as little as four hours of attachment can transmit pathogens).
The risk of transmission is greater if the tick is engorged, or of it was removed improperly allowing the tick's contents to spill into the bite wound. High-risk bites are treated as follows (remember the possibility of co-infection!):
1) Adults: Oral therapy for 28 days.
2) Pregnancy: Amoxicillin 1000 mg q6h for 6 weeks. Test for Babesia, Bartonella and Ehrlichia.
Alternative: Cefuroxime axetil 1000 mg q12h for 6 weeks.
3) Young Children: Oral therapy for 28 days.
EARLY LOCALIZED - Single erythema migrans with no constitutional symptoms:
1) Adults: oral therapy- must continue until symptom and sign free for at least one month, with a 6 week minimum.
2) Pregnancy: 1st and 2nd trimesters: I.V. X 30 days then oral X 6 weeks 3rd trimester: Oral therapy X 6+ weeks as above.
Any trimester- test for Babesia and Ehrlichia
3) Children: oral therapy for 6+ weeks."
[About the Author- Dr. Joseph Burrascano lives and works in one of the most endemic areas of the country and has treated over 11,000 people suffering from Lyme and tick borne diseases. He has over 25 years experience in the therapeutic areas of Internal Medicine and Infectious Diseases. Dr. Burrascano also has a wide range of experience with clinical trials and has also been a contributing author to numerous scientific articles for both the lay and peer-reviewed press.]
For more information from Dr. Burrascano about treating people with Lyme and tick borne diseases click HERE
To print a one-page handout of Dr. Burrascano's tick bite treatment recommendations that you should take to the doctor's office with you....
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Because they are seeing so many people (children) suffering from Lyme disease, even some infectious disease doctors are going against their own organization's guidelines and saying don't wait- TREAT THE BITE!
Article here- https://sites.google.com/view/treating-lyme-related-diseases/absolutely-treat-the-bite/id-docs-say-treat-the-bite?authuser=0
Last Updated- April 2019
Lucy Barnes