Healthy Options 5/6/26: Update: Lyme disease, tick-borne illnesses & how to avoid tick bites

Host/Producer: Rhonda Feiman
Co-Producer: Petra Hall
Technical Assistance: Joel Mann

Healthy Options: For Well-being & Being Well

This month:
– The spreasd of new tick species and diseases in Maine & the Northeast
– Prevention is the best medicine! Keep ticks from attaching. Create a barrier with clothes. Using permethrin on clothes & gear (embedded commercially, or sprayed on carefully).
– Use repellants on skin (deet, picaridin, lemon-eucalyptus)
– Essential oils not effective for very long & may cause skin irritation
– Symptoms of tick infections for Alpha-gal syndrome, Lyme, Anaplasmosis, Babesiosis, Ehrlichiosis, Borrelia miyamotoi, Powassan virus & which ticks carry them
– When doxycycline is used & most effective, & other treatments for tick illness
– How soon can disease be transmitted after a bite (Powassan virus within 15 minutes!)

Guest(s):
Dr. Beatrice Szantyr on Lyme disease & other tick-borne illness, for an update on tick diseases & new tick species which are spreading here in Maine (& beyond), how we need to be tick-conscious to try to prevent tick bites, & the challenges in identifying and treating tick-borne illness.

FMI:
EPA info on effective repellents
www.epa.gov/insect-repellents?

EPA tool to find the repellent that is right for you
www.epa.gov/insect-repellents/find-repellent-right-you

EPA info on repellent-treated clothing
www.epa.gov/insect-repellents/repellent-treated-clothing?

University of Maine Tick Lab?- Protect Yourself from ticks & tick-borne diseases?(Identify a tick for free; $20 to ID diseases the tick may contain)
extension.umaine.edu/ticks/

Tick testing Amherst MA. (tests for more diseases):
www.tickreport.com

Maine Tracking Network- Tickborne Diseases?Improving public health with better information:
data.mainepublichealth.gov/tracking/home

Columbia University Lyme and Tick-Borne Diseases Research Center
www.columbia-lyme.org/

Powered by patients. Home of Lyme Times and My Lyme Data:
www.lymedisease.org/

TickEncounter The University of Rhode Island Tick-borne Disease prevention Education
web.uri.edu/tickencounter/

This article is brief enough for a patient to bring to a doctor’s visit for them to consider:
The Management of Ixodes scapularis Bites in the Upper Midwest
wmjonline.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/110/2/78.pdf

ESPECIALLY FOR MEDICAL PROVIDERS:
VectorWise CME: “Empowering clinicians through vector-borne disease education – free, virtual, accredited CME”
vectorwisecme.org/

LymeCME: “Free, Evidence-based, AAFP-Accredited Courses that Physicians Can Trust”
lymecme.info/

About the host:
Rhonda Feiman is a nationally-certified, licensed acupuncturist practicing in Belfast, Maine since 1993. She primarily practices Toyohari Japanese acupuncture, using gentle and powerful non-insertion needle techniques, and also utilizes Chinese acupuncture and herbology. In addition, Rhonda is a practitioner of Qi Gong and an instructor of Tai Chi Chuan in the Yang Family tradition.