German Shepherd dog

None whatsoever.

Heartworm can kill your dog.

I don't Google at all.     Google is the big brother of all our nightmare's.   Google for google in china and what its done to curious chinese.     Our google its connections to US  domestic survailence.    Oh well just ask Preston.

I didn't know I had that effect on you Blitzen,  I'm sure I must have said some thing's you didn't like, its my fault for not paying attention I guess.     For that I am sorry.

Larrydee, I know that they can kill a dog.     But I believe it takes years.   

Maybe I should have found a Youtube clip.    Maybe I should put on my helmut and vest and prepare for a bashing here, I dunno.     Right now I'm gonna go outside and enjoy the day.   I dont have all the time in the world anymore.

Later.

I don't even know where to start.. I'm almost speechless but not quite... heartworms are very damaging and I'm not sure anyone can predict how much damage they can do regardless of the timespan..... the treatment is EXTREMELY hard on the dog and its whole system and causes them a lot of pain. It is not an effective method of heartworm preventation, an neither is it cheap. And the treatment and its results can kill them.

NOTHING is 100% not even the Rabies vaccination so yes its still a good idea to test for heartworms periodically.

There are many ways to reduce your costs, using different products but since you don't trust your vet.. you may never know.. not every vet is a money hungry ogre.. can't blame them for needing to make a living, but you also need to develop a relationship with someone who knows a spit about how to care for your animals, do research and make informed decisions.......

The amount of time a dog has heartworms is not an issue so much as how heavy the infection is. It takes about 6 months for a heartworm to mature,  your dog could have MANY aduly heartworms by the end of that year. The treatment is VERY hard on a dog, even the new Immiticide! The treatment alone can kill your dog!

This past Saturday I lost a dog from Complications of Heartworm Disease. I had her less then 2 months. She died from blood clots caused by the heartworms lodging in her lungs and her lung ruptured pretty much! It is a horrible thing!!!!!!

To even consider not having a dog on Heartworm preventative is horrifying to me! Even more so now.  You can by liquid Ivermectin at most feed stores for less then $40, you give 1 cc per 100 pounds of weight orally once a month. The bottle will last at least a year, even for mutiple dogs.

PLEASE keep your dogs on preventative!

Beth

There is actually a labeled (wormer) over the counter the public can buy that prevents and also kills the worms if infected. But, of course most the public doesn't know the 14 dollar secret and it's not in the doggy isle. I've noticed the serious hunting dog owners and farmers use it round here.  

Well, I don't even know where to begin with an answer...........................

1) HW Treatment can be VERY damaging or lethal to dogs, i've seen a dog get treated at our clinic, stay for two days, take all the steroid & antibiotic drugs and the next day after going home, dropped dead.

2) Dogs can get severe reactions at injection sites as well as severe pain in the back & rear end

HW Treatment is NOT easy on the dog nor is having HW. As someone else stated, it isn't possible to say how much damage the dog could have in 1 year since it depends on how infected the dog gets over the year (repeated exposure)

Tina

Ivermectin paste, horse dewormer, will also prevent h-worms in dogs. A syringe is around 8 bucks at Tractor Supply and will last a year or more for one dog.

I've been told that the paste doesn't have an even distribution of the medicine and to avoid it for dog treatment. I use the Ivermectin injectable cattle solution (make sure it's not got any other medicines in it); I mix it in their food once a month at the dose Wufpack suggested. I buy a 40ml bottle. It lasts at least a year and treats all my dogs for about $40.

If I had collies, border collies, or greyhounds, I'd stick with the vet-only stuff to be a bit safer--they, for some reason, are MUCH more sensitive to Ivermectin. I also use the pills for my 2 Jack Russells--with their size there's just a lot less room for error.

I also do annual spot checks on my dogs as they come into the vet for other reasons--just to make sure the treatment is effective.

If you have a good vet who understands that you are caring for multiple animals, they will work with you and make sure you know your correct dosages if you have any questions.

 BabyEagle.....you are absolutely incorrect. There is NO natural resistance to parasites whose infection is transmitted as a larvae into the new host, in this discussion that being the dog. You better do some reading on the life cycle of heartworms. Clearly, you don't have a clue about what you are talking about. 

Better yet, stop posting about subjects you do not understand. Infection with heartworm is a serious infection leading to disabiliity and likely death. Even those dogs who survive treatment often have serious and significant sequelae.

Two Moons, treat your dogs or don't. The choice is yours. Prevention, like in almost every other instance, is worth the trouble and expense. If you do not live in an area where proper environmental conditions exist for mosquitoes, then it is not so crucial. Only you know that. 

Man what a pretty day, the dogwoods have come on and its just great!!    I see everyones been busy, thanks for all the input.

OK, first off I take excellent care of all my animals thats why my expense's are so high.   My posing these questions was just to hear from dog owners instead of vets on heartworms.    They are nasty little buggers and quickly spred through a dogs circulatory system and then pass through organs into other systems.   Yes they are fatal and the treatment is too.   My friend was lucky I guess, I have lost a dog to heartworms years ago.  An Irish Setter who ran with the coyote's and was lost for over a year.   We couldn't treat her because they had pretty much spred through her entire body including her brain.   She lived for three years after we got her back and eventually was put to sleep.

Blitzen,

Google in china censors the internet for the government and when someone search's for something not on the approved list google reports them to that government and people go to prisons, or just disappear.   I hope the olympics are a total flop.   Google does the same thing here for homeland security, keeping an eye on us all.  Anyway thats what I think of google. 

Does everyone trust interceptor and was my vet just looking for more of my money with the 100% remark and wanting to do test's?

I have used the Ivermectin on several different animals and liked it but too much or the wrong dosage can cause organ damage I have been told.

Anyway I didnt really learn what I was hoping to learn today, but wofpack came the closest, thanks everyone.

 This is also an excellent resource. Not that as climate warms and there is more rain, the likelihood of mosquitoes increases.  There is an excellent article here on guidelines and it would be a good thing for people to read it thoroughly before making a decision about if and how to prophylactically treat for HW.

http://www.heartwormsociety.org/article.asp?id=48

 They affect both the heart and the lungs......

Cats are infected in the lungs.

Two Moons, if you should become lyme, h-worm. W Nile, or RMSF positive, will you be opting for treatment or will you just wait and see what happens to  you?

Blitzen,

I guess it all depends on the odd's.   I'm more concerned about a heart attack which will either take me or not.  I would have surgery only if I was unable to choose for myself.   Then there is the cancer that worries me,  I would have to know that my chance's were excellent to go through the treatment.  I would die just from being in a hospitol for so long.   I would rather go on my terms, and would probably put myself down if it came to that.    Anything thats treatable I guess like a case of worms is ok , but anything else involving long suffering I will go my way.

I am already waiting to see what happens Blitzen, I know you were just being sarcastic but I am serious as a heart attack.

You already think me strange, yes I am.  

I require a certain quality of life and my own dignity to go on, when thats no longer possible then I have choice's to make.

I kinda wish you hadn't asked me that question. 

 A major tenet in toxicology concerns how substances are taken into the body. A substance may be taken in one way and not be particularly effective for a variety of possible reasons. Secondly, how the substance is metabolized is critical. Different species also metabolize differently than dogs, as an example. Thirdly, how is the substance distributed in the body? Some medications, for example, have to be in certain doses, or forms of administration before they can even be metabolized and/or distributed in the body. And of course, one must also be interested in how something is eliminated from the body. So, all this to point out that for those of you who simply go get medications intended for horses, as an example, you may or may not be delivering the drug appropriately simply because of the issues mentioned above. This is why it is always better to get medications in dosages intended for canines, in forms that are tested as being capable of metabolizing, distribution and appropriate time framed elimination. At the very least, if one is going to use a medication intended for a horse, for example, for a dog, then one ought to understand and know the answers to all these questions above and more. 

For what it is worth...................

Two Moons, you are just special, not strange .

DKiah, a few years ago I read a report that indicated h-worm preventative is just as effective given every other month as every month. I believe the drug they tested was ivermectin.  Of course I can no longer find it on the net.  You may know this, when we first realized h-worms were a problem with our dogs, we only had a drug called caricide.  It needed to be given every single day beginning one month before the mosquito season and continued for one month after the first killing frost. It was a very bitter liquid, most dogs hated the taste. It was a PIA to administer, had to be drawn into an empty syringe according to the dog's weight and either mixed in the food or squirted into their mouthes which would make them foam and gag. It was also available in tablet form; even though my dogs ate like they were on death row, many left that darned pill in the bottom of the food dish. I was thrilled when we finally had a monthly preventative.

Hodie, a vet at Penn formulated the dosage for me for the horse paste. He uses it for his dogs as do many of the vets there.

I have had one dog get heartworms in my life and NEVER would wish to go through that again.  He WAS on preventative but nothing is 100%.  The treatment nearly killed him and I believe he was never 100% again even after the recovery period. Seeing my dog in the condition he was during the treatment phase broke my heart.

I use Interceptor now - Heartguard does not take care of Whipworms which is prevalent here. That of course is never brought up by the vets but I always make sure to tell anyone I speak with about dogs to use Interceptor instead because it covers more parasites.

With regard to Ivermectin- What does it prevent besides the heartworm from the mosquito?  I have heard numerous breeders say they use it as well as lots of dog owners here in horse country of Missouri.  Could someone please list the parasites it controls and what are the dosages, methods of ingestion, etc for the product?  The price sounds to good to be true.

Speaking of pest prevention.  Numerous breeders who feed a raw diet have told me they do not use Frontline.  The theory being a healthy immune system occurs when feeding raw?  Any thought, comments out there from RAW feeders with regard to ticks and fleas?  Geeze with the amount of ticks in my wooded, pastured property I can't imagine life without Frontline but am open to others experiences.  My dogs are outside 90% of the time, we have 0 fleas here but the TICKS are awful.  We only use Frontline about 7-8 months of the year.

I'd love to get guinea hens to free range for tick control but I tried free range chickens for that and the dogs REALLY love to eat moving prey, feathers, claws and all.  We did get a few eggs before the entire flock was consumed!  Hah LOL  My husband is a dreamer-guess we need a movable chicken tractor,  will Guineas hens stay in a movable chicken tractor?  I have never seen them contained before , I know chickens will do fine like that.

Blitzen,

I remember the Styrid Caricide days.. uhoh, what does that say about us?? I was in college in Fort Lauderdale at the time ....

nasty potent stuff, too.. now THAT was poison.. what we have now is in and out of a dogs system in 12 hours or so

BTW if you're using Frontline and have a multiple dogs, you might want to check out Bio Spot instead. It does the same job for a lot less money. The Foster & Smith web site offers a chart with a nice comparison of the different brands of flea and tick control topicals. Bio Spot ranks at the top of that list. I've used it for many years, have never seen a flea or a tick on any of my dogs. Sooner or later fleas develope a resistence to the insecticide in all topicals, so what's working today might not work tomorrow. It doesn't necessarily mean the medication is no good. Fleas are bionic and seem to be able to reinvent themselves when necessary. They can live up to 7 years in th environment without taking a blood meal.

I don't think a raw diet eliminates the need for h-worm preventative. A breeder I know in New England, a raw feeder who raises all her dogs naturally using nosodes instead of vacs,  had that thought and ended up treating 5 dogs for h-worms. In fact all were positive but the remaining 4 were too old to treat.

The drug name is Ivermectin. The Brand Name is Ivomec. Never use Ivomec Plus on your dog. NEVER.

The heartworm treatment can be very dangerous!  Basically they can literally just drop dead from it!  I wouldn't risk it, just keep the dog on heartworm prevention year round.  You can get the Interceptor from other places if you are worried so much about cost.  Test the dog every other year, I believe that's what the company itself recommends if on it year round.  And.........I believe, but don't quote me on it.  IF, the dog happens to get get heartworms while being on preventative, Novartis will pay for it.  I think that one of the reasons we don't see a lot of heartworm in NJ, is that most dogs are on prevention, but there is the "stray" case here and there.  If you live in places like Florida or the deep south.  If your dog is not on prevention, your dog will get heartworms it's only a matter of time.