Tick bites and Lyme disease
It is the perfect time of year to go camping here in Tennessee. The weather is nice, the trees and flowers are in bloom and the mountains are right at our back door. What are you waiting for? Go pack a bag!
However, the great outdoors do come with certain annoyances such as ticks. These little bloodsucking creatures easily latch onto your skin. Then they stick their head inside your body and start sucking blood. Always check yourself for ticks after you have been outside, especially in the mountains. The best way to remove them is using tweezers to grasp the tick as close to the skin as possible, pulling upward and not twisting.
There are a number of types of ticks, but one specific kind, the blacklegged ticks, carries Lyme disease. If a tick is removed within 24 hours of the first bite, your risk of infection drops dramatically. About 80 to 90 percent of people who develop Lyme disease from a tick will have a red rash with a red ring emanating from the site of the bite. When treated with antibiotics in the early stages of the disease, Lyme disappears quickly in most people.
If you have a tick bite or you think you might have developed Lyme disease and want a doctor to look at it, please call us today at 865-690-9467. Skin health is an important part of total body wellness. Schedule an appointment with one of our board certified physicians to get your skin the care it needs so it can reach its fullest, healthiest potential.
