Bluegrass Animal Hospital

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Written by Cristi Moser, DVM

As most dog owners are aware, the veterinary community recommends that our canine companions receive heartworm preventative year round in the southeastern United States.  This is because heartworms are transmitted from dog to dog by the bite of a mosquito and our winters are not consistently cold enough to eliminate the mosquito population for an extended period of time.

The life cycle of the heartworm is such that it takes approximately six months from the time of the bite until our test will detect the adult heartworm.  Consequently, the current recommendation is that our canine friends get tested annually.

Until recently, if one of our canine friends tested positively for heartworms, veterinarians had a treatment option at our disposal to kill the heartworms.  This medication was called melarsomine (Immiticide) and it was given as multiple intramuscular injections.  Unfortunately, due to some glitches in manufacturing, Merial is completely out of the medication.  What this means for our companion canines is that there is no treatment available for heartworm infections in the foreseeable future unless a veterinary hospital has some Immiticide put back in their inventory supply.

The take home message is that every canine needs to be on a heartworm preventative to ensure that owners do not find themselves in a tough situation.  Previously, canines treated for heartworm infections with Immiticide had to endure approximately three to four months of restricted activity.  The recommendation for untreated heartworm positive canines is twelve to eighteen months of restricted activity.

Please pickup heartworm preventative for your canine friend today!