North Dakotans will have the opportunity to take part in a tick surveillance research study expanding into the area.
The Marshfield Clinic Research Institute with Sanford Health is expanding its Tick Inventory via Citizen Science research study from Wisconsin and Minnesota into North Dakota. Research officer Jen Meece says a soft launch of this program is underway this fall, with a full scale launch to follow next spring.
She says participants are encouraged to send ticks they find on themselves or their pets. The ticks will be tested for a range of pathogens, and be noted for their location and prevalence in the areas they are found. Meece says as the climate changes and the number of freezing days go down, it has impacts on tick populations.
"If you don't look for something, you're certainly never going to find it... and it's certainly an important thing for us as researchers, and people who are public health minded to be doing studies like this so we can educate on prevention, and then when people have symptoms that might be aligned with a tickborne disease - that they get medical care quickly, because we don't want people to suffer from the long-term effects of untreated diseases such as lyme disease."
Meece says the tick kits will be available at some Sanford walk-in clinics, but may expand at be available at vet clinics, public libraries and nature stations. Participants can also call and request they be sent tick kits in the mail. The kits include bags to place the ticks, self-addressed and pre-paid envelopes, and ways to share information about the tick, where it was found and when.
