Tick-borne disease: A review of the more common entities found in the Northeastern United States

Borreliosis, ehrlichiosis, and babesiosis are three tick-borne diseases found in the northeastern United States. This article reviews the causative agents, clinical symptoms, and transmission of these entities, as well as how they are diagnosed in the clinical laboratory. These diseases can have similar and overlapping symptoms, and cases of coinfection continue to be reported in the literature. Age-tested techniques, such as serological studies, and peripheral blood evaluation, as well as relatively new techniques, such as PCR, all play an important role in laboratory diagnosis.