Spring may be a time of renewal, but it is also the time for ticks and other biting creatures! Massage Therapists are often the first people to see things that are going on with you that really need the attention of an MD. It is our job to refer you to practitioners outside our scope of practice when we see something that requires immediate attention.
Lyme Disease is one of those things we can recognize the signs of and this is what I saw on one of my clients last year in the month of November! Notice the red circular “bull’s eye” mark on her skin, getting bigger over 3 weeks.
After alerting her, she went to her doctor. Her doctor told her not to worry after being tested. He said the symptoms and test were not enough to diagnose Lyme Disease. Being an MD and a smart cookie herself, my client called the CDC and got more information. She decided to go on antibiotics anyway and she ended up having her cute little dog treated too who was also showing signs and symptoms also. She thinks they both got tick bites in the Hamptons. My client and her dog are fine now, but here are some photos we took on her iPhone of the bite for your examination. By the way, we used Lavender massage oil and applied it liberally without massage to the tick bite area and she said it was the only thing that decreased the pain from the bite! Let’s keep the Spring in our step this spring!
