In a single bite, mosquitoes can transmit a dangerous parasite called heartworm to your dog or cat. Before the weather turns warm and mosquitoes start buzzing, give us a call to learn how to protect your pets. Heartworms are blood parasites that make their home in your pet’s heart and pulmonary arteries (in the lungs). Infection occurs when a mosquito picks up a microscopic heartworm from an infected animal and then bites your pet, depositing the worm in the process. The heartworm larvae then work their way through the blood stream, growing to be about 5 inches in length and resembling strands of angel hair pasta. As the worms reach maturity and reproduce in your pet’s arteries, they can cause serious illness including heart failure and even death. Signs that your pet has heartworms are: a persisting cough, tiring easily during exercise and weight loss.
Preventing your pet from getting heartworms is much safer, not to mention far less expensive, than treating your pet for infection. Heartworm prevention medication is safe, effective and is dosed once-a-month for 12 months each year. A simple blood test will be needed in order to determine that no adult heartworms are present in your pet before heartworm prevention can begin. In addition to heartworms, a number of prevention products protect against other parasites, such as fleas, ticks, mites, roundworms, hook-worms and whipworms. Some of these additional parasites also can affect people. Pets should be given heartworm prevention medicine even if they are indoor pets. Give us a call and let us help you decide which approach is best for the health of your pet.
The old adage, “An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure,” is particularly true when it comes to heartworm disease, especially when you consider these statistics.
In 2005 we diagnosed 26 dogs with Heartworm, and 73 dogs with Lyme disease.
1 - Number of heartworms, needed to kill an infected cat
5 - Number of years a heartworm can live inside a dog
6 - Age at which pets can begin taking heartworm preventives (in weeks)
14 - Potential length of a female heartworm (in inches)
50 - U.S. states in which heartworm disease has been reported
100 - Percentage of heartworm cases that are preventable
