Heartworm Meds

[Katie]

Hoping I'm not repeating a commonly asked questions here but what is the best heartworm medicine for our doodles.  I have a 10 month old GD (43lb) currently taking Trifexis.  She has always had a very sensitive stomach which I always attributed to eating something bad.  I've had a REALLY hard time finding a food for her and now I'm beginning to wonder if maybe the Trifexis is causing some of our issues.  

She has never taken the Trifexis very well.  I usually have to load it up with peanut butter.  She doesnt vomit either with it. I'm going to watch her this month when I give it to her and see if stomach issues start after the Trifexis.

She takes her Proviable like a champ!  

I love my doodle enough to know she NEEDS her HW prevention.  I've had fosters go through HW treatment and it's aweful!

[Karen, Jasper and Jackdoodle]

As with anything else, you must weigh the benefits against the risks. I've had a flea infestation in the past, and I can tell you that it is by far much worse than any kind of risk from Frontline, which I have used now for 12 years with no ill effects to my dogs. Once they are established in a home, which happens very quickly, it takes months and tons of far worse chemicals (multiple whole house bombings, etc) not to mention hundreds if not thousands of dollars to eradicate. Flea allergy is the number one type of allergy in dogs, and it is absolutely miserable. For some dogs, including mine, who have other health issues, a flea infestation can be a death sentence. In fact, fleas can and have killed humans in the past. So taking the risk of not using effective flea preventatives is not an option for me. 

In other parts of the country, tick-borne illnesses can and have killed dogs, and made both humans and dogs permanently ill. 

There is no known "natural" preventative that is effective.

Heartworm disease does kill dogs in many parts of the country. It also costs $1500 to treat a dog with advanced heartworm disease, and the treatment is both dangerous and excruciatingly painful for the dog. (It involves arsenic injections into the spine.)  

I know that there are areas of the country where heartworm doesn't present a problem, but those areas are growing fewer as the disease has spread geographically. For those of us living in areas where HW disease is a problem, it is simply irresponsible and unacceptable not to use an effective preventative. 

[Bonnie Barber]

As I said, our local vets say Frontline is no longer effective in our area. The fleas have adapted. The oral flea meds seem to be more popular. We live in the arid west, so while we have fleas, it isn't hard to eradicate them in the house, should we get a lot of them. I don't know which way to go ... Topical vs, oral. I was interested to hear your response. Thanks, as always.

As for heart worm, we have never encountered it here, which is not to say we shouldn't be vigilant. I am going to look at this potentially devasting disease more closely.

[Nancy, Ned, Clancy, and Charlie]

Bonnie, we live in Southern California also and it really is specific as to how bad fleas are in any area.  At our old house where there were lots of wild kitties around, we never really had a time when fleas weren't present and we couldn't take a 'winter break.'  When we moved across town, we had NO fleas ever for about 15 years, and now we do.  We are able to take a couple of months off though.  We use Frontline Plus - is it perfect?  No, because fleas have to bite the dog before dying, but it seems to keep the flea population down.  We also spray our yard quite often during the hot months.