Home Remedies for Tick Removal From Humans

Ticks are bugs about the size of a sesame seed that are found in tall grass and wooded areas. Ticks burrow part way into the skin, bite, draw blood, and fall off. Ticks can transmit bacteria that cause infections like Lyme disease, tularemia, and Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever. There are many home remedies for removing ticks, but only one method of removal is recommended by health professionals.

Tweezers

• Using sharp tweezers is the only effective way to remove a tick from your body.

  The Centers for Disease Control lists one method for effective home removal of ticks. Using sharp-pointed tweezers, grasp the tick as close to your skin as you can, getting as close to its embedded mouth parts as possible. If you grasp around the body or head, you might compress the tick, which will release even more bacteria through its mouth into your body. Don't twist the tick or turn the tweezers. A tick's mouth is barbed, so twisting will do little to release it from the skin, and could break off the head, complicating removal. Pull the tick out straight with a slow, steady motion. Once you've removed the tick, clean the bite area, and your hands with soap and water. You may also apply disinfectant. If the tick has been on you for several hours, it is very hard to remove it without leaving some mouth parts behind, which can cause an infection, so it is recommended that you see your doctor immediately to ensure you haven't been infected.

Grease or Gasoline

• Gasoline will not remove a tick from your skin.

  Some believe that grease or gasoline will force the tick out, or poison and kill it. This is not true. Applying grease or gasoline to a tick will only irritate it and force it to burrow farther under your skin, or throw up the contents of its stomach into the bite site, and increase your chance of infection.

Rubbing Alcohol

• You can kill ticks by soaking them in rubbing alcohol, but you cannot safely remove a tick with rubbing alcohol. Again, it will more likely irritate the tick while it's in your skin, and increase your chance of infection. This remedy is intended only to kill the tick once it is out of your skin, not remove the tick from your skin.

Petroleum Jelly

• Petroleum jelly to "smother" the tick, which forces it out of your skin, is another home remedy often recommended. However, the Centers for Disease Control warns this is not an effective way to safely and thoroughly remove the tick from your skin. It is more likely to irritate the tick, forcing it farther under your skin, and it makes removal difficult, because both the tick and your skin will be slippery from the jelly, so a good grip with tweezers will be difficult.

Nail Polish

• Nail polish is believed to kill ticks, and therefore eliminates the risk of infection, but this is not true. Nail polish will kill it, but it will also irritate it and likely cause it to regurgitate its stomach contents into your body before it dies. This increases your chance of infection.

Burning

• Other than burning yourself, irritating the tick, and causing it to push more bacteria into your skin, burning or using a match head does little to remove a tick. It will continue sucking your blood while pumping pathogens into your body, and it will make it more difficult to remove the tick. You need to remove all parts from under your skin to avoid illness and infection, and this method will not do that.