Testing Ticks for Lyme Disease

Determining whether your tick was infected provides you the opportunity for your physician (or veterinarian) to offer lab-based confirmation services or recommend a proactive treatment regimen.

We offer test ticks for Lyme disease which provide results that are 98-99% accurate. We’ll test up to five ticks at a time, so if you pull multiple ticks off yourself or Fido, it’s the same price as testing just one! Get results within 72 hours of us receiving the tick – some of the fastest and most accurate in the industry!

Please Note that our offices (lab) is open Monday – Friday from 10am to 11pm, and is typically CLOSED on weekends and holidays. Rush and Urgent orders are processed ONLY Monday through Friday.

NEWLY ANNOUNCED: Rush + Urgent testing! Need results sooner than three days? With our new Rush Testing, we’ll have results ready within 24 HOURS of receiving the tick(s). Need results even sooner? Order our Urgent Testing, and we’ll email and call you with the results within 90 MINUTES of us receiving the tick!

The cost to test up to five nymph stage Blacklegged “Deer” Ticks for Lyme disease is just $35 per test. One single test can test up to 5 nymph ticks, 3 non-engorged adult ticks, or 1 engorged (attached for 48 hours or more; see diagram above) adult tick. Results of each test are emailed to you and at no time is any personal information shared with anyone. We do however share general statistics of how many ticks have been test, how many were infected, and the city & state where found.

A Note About The Tick(s) You Can Submit: We are now able to test ticks in ANY Condition (dead, alive, frozen, dried out, swabbed with alcohol, in pieces, etc.). Any tick that is sent to us in a state where we cannot visually identify the species will be tested for Lyme in the event that the tick is in fact a Blacklegged “Deer” tick (Ixodes sp.).

We test Blacklegged Deer and Western Deer ticks in all sorts of conditions — both nymphs and adults. Simply place your order and follow the instructions that will be emailed to you upon successful placement of the order.

Simply place the tick in a tightly sealed Zip-Lock bag with the order number written on the bag with permanent marker, then mail it to us (or drop off in person) here in Loudoun County, Virginia! Additional information on exactly how and where to mail the ticks to, will be emailed to you once you have placed your order.

IMPORTANT! Since COVID-19, we have been working with a very limited staff and on average receive anywhere between 20 to 50 or more ticks daily. Any ticks that we receive that do NOT have an Order/Lab Number written on the bag or container housing the tick will be Discarded or returned to sender.

IMPORTANT NOTE:

Our lab is open Monday–Friday, 10AM–10PM (ET),
and is CLOSED on weekends and most holidays.
All Rush + Urgent tests are performed during business hours ONLY.

Center for Wilderness Safety‘s Tick Safety Program offers ELISA (enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay) tick testing that 98-99% accurately detects the presence of the three most common pathogens that cause Lyme disease (Borrelia garinii, Borrelia afzelii, and Borrelia burgdorferi sensu stricto) directly in the tick itself.

One test can accommodate up to five nymph ticks at a time (or one engorged tick) in just over an hour. Tick testing is an established laboratory procedure used to determine if a tick specifically carries the pathogens that cause Lyme disease. If you or your pet have been bitten by a tick (meaning it was attached), we highly recommend testing the tick to determine your risk of contracting serious tick-borne diseases and decide on an early diagnosis and treatment regimen.

When your tick arrives at our lab in Loudoun County, Virginia, we immediately work to properly identify it, photograph it under a microscope and determine how long it was actually attached and feeding. Once all of this is completed, testing for Borrelia pathogens begins.

Traditionally, it takes anywhere between 4 to 6 weeks or more for a blood sample to come back from a medical lab with qualitative results for Lyme disease. By testing the tick instead of humans, we are able to detect whether the tick itself carries the Lyme disease pathogen, helping with early detection and proactive treatment regimen.

Our program is dedicated to providing laboratory-quality tick testing to people in areas considered high-risk for Lyme both nationwide and internationally. Unlike traditional laboratories’ complicated test requisition forms, our tick testing program offers a simple, easy to use interface to order a tick test. Simply place your order, mail your tick(s) to our lab, and check your email for your results! Test results are typically be ready within 72 hours or less of lab receipt.