For the Rapids City Times

MARSHFIELD – If you spend time outdoors in Wisconsin, chances are you’re at some risk for Lyme disease and other tick-borne illnesses.

It’s important to know about tick-borne illnesses because Wisconsin has one of the highest rates of Lyme disease in the nation, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and more than 300,000 cases are diagnosed each year across the U.S.

To help people who are heading for the outdoors learn more about tick-borne illnesses, Marshfield Clinic Health System is offering a set of new tick identification cards.

Brochure- and wallet-sized cards depict actual tick sizes and appearances for common Wisconsin ticks – blacklegged (deer), wood and a newcomer, the lone star tick. They also list diseases transmitted by ticks along with prevention tips, symptoms and instructions on how to remove an attached tick. The brochure-sized card includes a 2018 map of confirmed Wisconsin Lyme cases by county, showing spread of the disease.

“The range of ticks is changing as our environment changes,” said Jennifer Meece, Ph.D., research scientist and director of the Integrated Research and Development Laboratory at Marshfield Clinic Research Institute. “Different ticks are expanding their footprint in North America and surviving over winter in places they couldn’t before. For instance the lone star tick used to only be in the south. We now have it in Wisconsin.”

The cards are online at https://marshfieldresearch.org/nfmc/lyme-disease. To request printed copies, email nfmcsh@marshfieldclinic.org or phone 1-800-662-6900 and press 0.