Doctors recommend caution to those who come to picnic
Due to doubled number of people who came to a doctor claiming they were bitten by ticks, experts recommend caution to those who are going for a picnic.
Articol de Marilena Frâncu, 21 Aprilie 2012, 10:48
Doctors recommend caution to those who stand in the garden after the cases explosion of people bitten by ticks.
At national level, according to the ministry of health, there are twice as many cases compared to the same period of last year.
Ticks are parasitic insects that are found in the grass, where they can go directly to skin or fur.
Most cases of people bitten by ticks occur during spring and summer, and administrators of green spaces are required to apply treatments against ticks, where they were detected until the removing of the outbreak.
Usually, the bites are not painful and therefore their presence is not felt by the host.
The veterinarian Cristian Magdas notes that the areas where ticks live are hard to avoid.
"The most commonly incriminated species in our country in the transmission of diseases is Ixodes Ricinus.”
"It lives practically across the country, from north to south, from east to west at altitudes of 0 m up to altitudes above 1000 meters and lives in vegetation.
"So, basically, we should avoid vegetation," said Cristian Magdas.
Rules to be observed to keep us from ticks
The doctor Cristian Magdas recommends us not to walk through the vegetation in shorts or use clothing impregnated with repellent.
The most important is, after we do such a nature walk, to ensure our body for the presence of these ticks, and if we observe them we have to remove them and go to the doctor immediately.
"The fastest the tick is removed from the body, of course, decreases the chance of infection because, in the first 24 hours after the tick attachment to cells, the risk of infection is almost zero.
"So, the maximum risk is practically after 48-72 hours of tick attachment," said Cristian Magdas.
Diseases transmitted by ticks
Ticks are the main vector of Lyme disease or the disease with a thousand faces, a disease difficult to diagnose and extremely painful.
"There are possibilities of localization in the joints, neurological level.
"The most common are at the central nervous system that leaves balance disorder, motor deficits, and not least, psycho-behavioral disorders.
"Also, there may be signs of heart arrhythmia or myocarditis, fortunately, rare, and eye damage, uveite, erythema, diseases that can also draw permanent disability," said the research director of the Hospital Bagdasar Arsenie from Bucharest, Professor Doctor Gelu Onose.
Fortunately, Lyme disease does not occur unless the tick is carrying the bacterium Borrelia and the treatment of disease, if it is early detected, is usually a course of antibiotics for three to four weeks.
Translated by Alexandra-Diana Mircea
MTTLC, Bucharest University
