Tag Archives: Lyme disease

Lyme Disease Vaccine

One of my friends is the wife of a veterinarian. That makes her a useful resource whenever I have questions about my pets’ health. Today we got on the topic of immunizations, and she mentioned one of which I’d never heard: Lyme disease. My friend said that at her husband’s veterinary practice it was standard to immunize against Lyme disease once a year. I was surprised, mostly because I’d never even heard of a vaccine for the disease before, and now I learn that some places administer it yearly. I wanted to know more, so I began researching as soon … Continue reading →

Pet First Aid: Tick-Borne Diseases

Ticks are dangerous for pets and people. A tick’s saliva can transmit microscopic organisms into the person or pet getting bitten. Some of the same diseases that are dangerous to humans are dangerous to pets, and vice versa. The good news is that ticks don’t generally hop from a person to an animal or from a pet to an owner. Once the tick is feeding, it will usually stay with the host. And it can take up to twelve hours or more for a feeding tick to transmit one of the following diseases to a pet. Babesiosis causes severe anemia. … Continue reading →

Lyme Disease: Treatment

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Lyme disease can be effectively treated with antibiotics. As with many diseases, the sooner you catch the disease and begin treatment, the smoother the recovery will be. Oral antibiotics (like doxycycline, penicillin, and amoxicillin) can speed the healing of the circular, red EM rash and prevent symptoms (like arthritis and neurological problems) that may show up if the disease were to go untreated. If the initial rash is missed and other symptoms develop, it isn’t too late to treat Lyme disease effectively. Lyme arthritis is also treated with antibiotics. Depending on the severity of the arthritis, the antibiotics may be … Continue reading →

How To Remove A Tick

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Though we refer to them as “tick bites,” ticks don’t exactly bite. They burrow into the skin head first and get stuck there if you don’t remove them correctly. Why are ticks dangerous? Several different types of tick can cause Lyme disease — so they need to be removed quickly and they need to be removed correctly. Try not to touch the tick with your bare hands; wear gloves if you have them available. Grasp the tick with tweezers as close to the skin as you can get them. Pull gently, using constant pressure. Don’t twist or jerk the tick; … Continue reading →

Lyme Disease: Symptoms

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Medical literature has evidence of Lyme-like symptoms dating back to the beginning of the nineteen hundreds. The disease itself was pinpointed and named in the 1970s when researchers found serious symptoms coming from tick bites in and around Lyme, Connecticut. Ticks all over the United States, Europe, and Asia can transmit Lyme disease. Deer ticks are perhaps the best known culprit, at least on the East Coast of the United States. Adult deer ticks feed on deer; deer tick larvae and immature ticks (called nymphs) feed on rodents and other small mammals. Both nymphs and adult ticks can spread Lyme … Continue reading →

Can viruses cause mental illness?

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Spend time in a crowded shopping center or in an air conditioned office during peak winter virus time and you’d expect that your chances of picking up a cold or flu virus would be increased. But what if you could pick up a mental illness via the same method? Conditions such as depression and schizophrenia have long been regarded as having a strong biological component by most doctors. That is, it is believed that there exists a genetic link in the development of these conditions. But what if these illnesses were caused by viruses? This is exactly what researchers in … Continue reading →