After a walk in the countryside, it is important to check both children's clothing and the entire body for ticks
Don't store avocado like this: it's dangerousYou took a nice walk in the countryside or in the park with your child but on your return you found an unpleasant surprise: a tick. Do not be alarmed, the animal must be removed immediately, but without panicking.
Ticks are more common at this time of year. And life in the open air, hiking or a simple walk in the park can unfortunately make us run into these unpleasant encounters.
Prevention is better than cure…
If you are planning a walk in the open, it is best to avoid open shoes and shorts. Better to wear, both us and the children, long and opaque dresses. Furthermore, upon returning, both clothes and the whole body must be checked.
In fact, ticks attach themselves to hair, hair or clothing e we do not always immediately feel its presence. Even less do children. For this reason, it is good, after an excursion or a walk, to examine every corner of their body, paying particular attention to the most "hidden" parts, from the armpits to the groin to the toes, but also the head and hair where these annoying animals can nestle, going unnoticed.
The tick bite, unlike the stings of wasps, gadflies, bees, mosquitoes, is not painful and does not itch. For this reason it is very difficult to notice the presence of the parasite when it attaches to the body. Almost always the awareness of having come into contact with the animal comes after some time, when the areas surrounding the bite begin to cause annoying itching, explain the doctors of the Bambin Gesù in Rome.
How to properly remove a tick
Don't panic. If we have noticed a tick on the child's body we must immediately remove it. Never do it with your bare hands or by squeezing it: it must be removed with tweezers.
The best way to get rid of the animal is to grab it at the base, as close as possible to the rostrum (small hook with which the tick remains attached to the skin). The tool to do this can be tweezers - there are special tweezers in the pharmacy, but ordinary tweezers are fine. Once firmly grasped, gently swirl it.
Here our in-depth study: How to remove ticks correctly: which methods are suitable and which to avoid
If, even in the following weeks, a small lesion develops at the site of the puncture or symptoms such as general malaise, high fever, joint pain, swollen lymph nodes, headache should appear, you should immediately contact your doctor:
If diagnosed quickly and treated with antibiotics, it is almost always treatable in children: the rash disappears within a few days of treatment. The incubation of the disease ranges from three to fifteen days but sometimes up to a month.
Reference source: Bambino Gesù Hospital
READ also:
- Tick bite: symptoms, what to do and how to remove them
- Lyme disease: everything you need to know about tick bites
- If it's too hot, ticks prefer humans to dogs. New harmful effect of changing climate
