Teen creates app after contracting Lyme disease

Olivia Goodreau suffered from Lyme disease after being bitten by a tick. During the summer Olivia and her family travelled from Colorado, where they live, to the Lake of the Ozarks. There, she was bitten by a tick she didn’t see.

Lyme disease is caused by the bacterium Borrelia burgdorferi and is transmitted through the bite of infected ticks. Typical symptoms include fever, headache, fatigue, and a characteristic ’bull’s-eye’ skin rash. If left untreated, infection can spread to joints, the heart, and the nervous system. However, early detection and treatment with antibiotics can allow patients to recover from Lyme disease.

She didn’t have the typical ‘bull’s-eye” rash. However, when she got back home to start school she started feeling sick, and it got progressively worse. “I would lose my vision for a period of time,” Olivia said. “I was extremely dizzy, I had a tremor in my right hand and I could not physically hold up my head.” It took more than 4 years of seeing several doctors until she finally got diagnosed with Lyme disease.

After her diagnosis, she had difficulties relating to her classmates because they were afraid Lyme disease was contagious, even though it isn’t. The condition has also affected her school work. “I feel like I had to work twice as hard just to get the same grade as someone else because I was having massive brain-fog issues,” she said.

Later during another trip to Lake of the Ozarks years later, Olivia found 200 poppy-seed ticks on her dog. She then wondered if there was a way to see what kinds of ticks are in certain locations.

That is when she decided to create a free smartphone app, called TickTracker, which allows users to log the types of ticks they see and where, so they can be displayed on a map. To develop the app, she partnered with a software company in Ohio.

The app also includes instructions about how to identify and remove ticks using tweezers.

TickTracker went live in 2018 and is available on the AppleStore and GooglePlay.

Adapted from: http://bit.ly/2YtxGwY
More info:
https://apple.co/2Kl4Zd6
http://bit.ly/2TgcrJk