Year round, but especially in the summer, ticks are everywhere and can carry some dangerous diseases. Here's how to remove any that attach to you or your pet.


Steps

1. Find a pair of pointed precision tweezers.
2. Find the head of the tick, which is usually buried just beneath the skin.
3. Get your tweezers as close to the head of the tick as you possibly can. Do not grasp the tick's body, as this will cause it to inject saliva or blood into your skin, greatly increasing the chance of transmitting a disease.
4. Without jerking, pull firmly and steadily directly outward.
5. Put the tick in a glass jar and seal it and keep it. Call your doctor and ask whether you should be tested for tick borne disease, whether the tick should be tested, and what symptoms to watch out for. In certain states of the US, a full fifty percent of ticks carry Lyme disease, which is a very disabling disease. Seeking the latest medical advice and attention is therefore very important.
6. Note the date of the tick bite on your calendar in case symptoms develop later. You will need this information for your doctor.

Tips

• Removing a tick quickly greatly reduces the chance of disease transmission. Lyme disease, for example, will require a number of hours of tick contact for transmission.
• If the tick has burrowed too deeply for easy removal, dip a cotton ball in nail polish remover and dab gently at the tick while slowly pulling outward with the tweezers.
• Rubbing alcohol can be used to help prevent the spreading of the disease. This is most effective right after the tick is removed.
• If your doctor advises watching for certain symptoms, write these on your calendar for the time period when they might appear. You might develop the target shaped rash Lyme disease a few weeks after a bite, and your calendar note will remind you that this might be related to the tick you removed and that you will need to call the doctor.
• A good idea is to cauterize the area once the tick has been removed.
• A tick may be safely rmoved by soaking a cotton ball in liquid soap and holding on the tick until it comes off. The tick will stay attached to cotton ball. Painless!

Warnings

• Do not twist the tick out or apply petroleum jelly, a hot match, alcohol or any other irritant to the tick in an attempt to get it to back out. These methods can backfire and even increase the chances of the tick transmitting the disease, because a tick will regurgitate when irritated.
• Do not try to pull it off with your hands. You will leave the head piece, and it will get infected.