Preventative treatment of heartworm disease

Although treating your dog with heartworm medicine after the dog became infected is mostly successful, it is usually cheaper and safer to prevent infection of your dog. A wide variety of options is available to your dog and preventative heartworm medicine come in many forms : monthly tablets, chewables, monthly topicals (on the skin) and also a six-month injectable vaccine. All of those products are highly effective and, when properly used, will prevent  infection with the parasite.

In areas-regions known to have a high number of heartworm infections, year-round use of  preventative medicine is recommended, even if it mostly seasonal (i.e. during summer). This way, you will be assured of compliance and will avoid forgetting giving your dog a preventative medicine when the mosquito season starts. Also, most monthly heartworm preventives products are good against other intestinal parasites that can also infect people.

However, before you start a preventative program, have your dog checked for heartworm disease if you think your dog is possibly infected.

"Prevention is much easier than treatment," says Martine Hartogensis, D.V.M., a veterinarian in FDA's Center for Veterinary Medicine (CVM), because most heartworm preventive products are given to pets only once a month. Source:http://www.fda.gov/consumer/updates/heartworm061908.html

Don’t let your dog suffer, treat him with heartworm medicine.