If you find a tick on your body, remove it immediately with fine-tipped tweezers. Speed matters: a tick generally needs to be attached for more than 24 hours before it can transmit the bacterium that causes Lyme disease, so quick removal dramatically lowers your risk. Here’s exactly what to do, step by step, from the moment you spot one.
How to Remove a Tick Safely
Grab a pair of fine-tipped tweezers (not the wide, flat kind used for eyebrows). Grasp the tick as close to your skin’s surface as possible, right where its mouthparts enter the skin. Pull upward with steady, even pressure. Do not twist or jerk the tick, because that can cause the mouthparts to break off and stay embedded in your skin.
If the mouthparts do break off, try to remove them with clean tweezers. If you can’t get them out easily, leave them alone and let the skin heal on its own.
After removing the tick, clean the bite area and your hands with rubbing alcohol, iodine, or soap and water.
Methods You Should Never Use
Forget every folk remedy you’ve heard about. Painting the tick with nail polish, smothering it in petroleum jelly, or touching it with a hot match will not make it “back out.” These methods actually make things worse. Irritating a tick while it’s still attached can cause it to regurgitate its stomach contents into the wound, which is exactly how disease-causing organisms enter your bloodstream. Squeezing the tick’s body has the same effect. The goal is to pull it out quickly and cleanly, not to wait for it to detach on its own.
What to Do With the Tick Afterward
Once the tick is out, you need to dispose of it safely. Never crush it with your bare fingers, because the contents of a tick can transmit disease through small skin abrasions. The CDC lists four safe disposal options:
- Submerge it in rubbing alcohol
- Place it in a sealed container or bag
- Wrap it tightly in tape
- Flush it down the toilet
If you want to keep the tick for identification purposes, placing it in a sealed bag or a small container of rubbing alcohol is the best approach. Take a photo of it as well, since that can help a healthcare provider identify the species later if needed.
Should You Get the Tick Tested?
Several commercial labs will test a tick for pathogens if you mail it in, but the CDC does not recommend using these services to make treatment decisions. The labs that test ticks aren’t held to the same quality-control standards as clinical diagnostic labs. A positive result doesn’t necessarily mean you were infected, and a negative result can give you false reassurance, since you may have been bitten by a different infected tick you never noticed. If you do develop symptoms, you’ll likely develop them before test results come back anyway.
Knowing the species of tick can still be useful, though. Your healthcare provider may want to know whether it was the type that carries Lyme disease (blacklegged ticks, also called deer ticks) versus other species. Some university extension programs offer free tick identification.
When the Bite May Need Medical Attention
Not every tick bite requires a trip to the doctor. A small red bump or irritation at the bite site is normal and typically fades within one to two days, similar to a mosquito bite. That’s not a sign of infection.
The situation changes if the tick was attached for a long time. Current medical guidelines consider a bite “high risk” for Lyme disease only when all three of these are true: the tick is a blacklegged tick (the species that carries Lyme), the bite happened in an area where Lyme disease is common, and the tick was attached for 36 hours or more. When those criteria are met, a single preventive dose of an antibiotic can be given within 72 hours of removal.
If you’re unsure how long the tick was attached, a good clue is the tick’s size. A flat, small tick likely attached recently. An engorged tick that looks swollen and round has been feeding for a longer period.
Symptoms to Watch For
Even after a successful removal, keep an eye on the bite site and your overall health for the next 30 days. Lyme disease symptoms appear anywhere from 3 to 30 days after a bite, with an average onset around 7 days.
The most recognizable sign is a spreading rash called erythema migrans, which shows up in roughly 70 to 80 percent of people infected with Lyme disease. It starts at the bite site and expands gradually over several days, sometimes reaching 12 inches or more across. The rash may feel warm to the touch but is rarely itchy or painful. It sometimes clears in the center as it grows, creating the well-known “bull’s-eye” pattern, but it doesn’t always look like that. Any expanding rash near a tick bite site is worth getting checked.
Some people develop flu-like symptoms without a visible rash: fever, chills, headache, fatigue, muscle and joint aches, and swollen lymph nodes. These can appear alone or alongside the rash. Lyme disease is highly treatable with antibiotics, especially when caught early, so acting on these symptoms quickly leads to much better outcomes.
Removing Ticks From Pets
The process for dogs and cats is the same as for humans: fine-tipped tweezers, grasp close to the skin, pull straight up with steady pressure. Several tick-removal devices designed for pets are available, but plain fine-tipped tweezers remain the most effective tool. Clean the bite area afterward, and avoid crushing the tick with your hands. Ticks found on pets should be removed immediately, just as they should on people, since dogs in particular are susceptible to several tick-borne illnesses. If your pet develops lethargy, joint stiffness, or loss of appetite in the weeks following a bite, contact your veterinarian.