Therapy | Skin rash after tick bite

Therapy

Early removal of the tick within the first 24 hours after the tick bite protects against infection in most cases. If, however, a characteristic rash or flu-like symptoms appear one to two weeks after a tick bite, antibiotic therapy should be started. This usually ensures that the pathogen is killed before the disease has serious consequences or enters a chronic stage.

In the first stage of Lyme disease, in which the flush occurs, the antibiotics doxycycline or amoxicillin are typically administered. Over which period of time the selected antibiotic is administered depends on the individual risk factors of the patient. Among other things, it is taken into account whether the patient suffers from an allergy to antibiotics or from renal insufficiency.

On average, however, the therapy is administered over a period of two to four weeks. The typical skin rash after a tick bite is the so-called traveling rash. This indicates that the tick bite has caused an infection with the bacteria Borrelia.

In most cases Borrelia bacteria only cause local symptoms, but can also attack nerves and organs, especially the brain. Usually general symptoms such as fever and malaise occur first. Afterwards there is a long phase without symptoms.

Usually the infection heals in time. Occasionally, however, the serious complications associated with an infestation of the brain occur. An early antibiotic treatment already when the rash appears after the tick bite together with the removal of the tick can prevent this disease (advanced Lyme disease). Without therapy the disease can progress.

Further diagnostics

The migration redness usually appears for the first time within a few days to about two weeks after the tick bite. In the following weeks it will migrate in a ring-shaped pattern over the surrounding skin. How long this rash lasts depends mainly on how quickly the Lyme disease was detected and an appropriate antibiotic therapy initiated. Within a few days to a few weeks after starting this treatment, the rash should have receded.