Borellia burgdorferi infection in removed ticks and anti-borrelia antibodies in infested patients admitted to the Pasteur institute, Novi Sad

The primary objectives of this study were (1) to determine the presence of Borrelia burgdorferi infection in ticks removed from patients for the purpose of singling out sites with increased risk of Lyme borreliosis, and (2) to determine the presence of IgM and/or IgG antibodies against B. burgdorferi sensu lato (s. l.) complex in sera of patients who had ticks removed. From 108 ticks removed from patients, all were examined zoologically and a sub-sample of 91 ticks was tested using PCR analysis to determine the presence of DNA indicating B. burgdorferi infection. To detect anti-Borrelia IgM and/ or IgG antibodies in 61 patients bitten by ticks, we used line recombinant immunoblot test. The most common tick identified was Ixodes ricinus. B. burgdorferi s. l. was present in 37 of 91 tested ticks (40.7%). Seroconversion against B. burgdorferi s. l. antigen was detected in 12 of 61 patients (19.7%). Most of the infected ticks were from the province of Vojvodina (11 municipalities), with the city of Novi Sad proving to be the site with the highest number of infected ticks, 6 in total.