How to Use Heartworm Medicine for Dogs

Heartworm medicine for dogs is used at home as a simple and straightforward way to prevent heartworm disease ever occurring. To ensure your dog is safe and protected it is important that you understand exactly how such medications work, and follow the instructions closely.

Please read on for more information that should make preventing the condition easy and natural for you and your dogs.

Monthly heartworm medicines such as discount Heartgard Plus, Revolution and Advantage may all contain slightly different ingredients, but they all work in the same basic way. Basically all these products work retrospectively.

That is to say, they will not prevent heartworm disease in the future. But they will work backwards, destroying any larvae already contracted during the month prior to treatment. This is important because if you leave it too long between treatments, your dog may already be infected with larval stage worms that have had a chance to develop into parasites too large to be effectively destroyed by these preventatives.

Monthly heartworm treatments are designed to be safe and a low as dosage as possible. This means that whilst they are extremely efficient at destroying any lavae that are less than a month old, they might not be able to get rid of more mature ones.

Using such products every 30 days will ensure that no larvae ever survive long enough to mature into adult worms that actually pose a threat to health.

If your dog has not been given these types of medication during the last two months you should speak to your vet since a test for the disease may be required first.  If you miss a treatment, never double dose.  So long as only two months have elapsed since the last dose was given simply give a new one as soon as possible, and continue every 30 days thereafter.

To ensure your dog is treated both safely and effectively it is important to use the right sized dose for the weight and type of animal to be treated.  A product designed for small dogs may not have enough medicine in it to fully destroy all parasites within the system of a larger dog.  Similarly the volume of medication in a pack designed for a large dog might be dangerous and cause adverse reactions if given to a small breed.

There are a few heartworm preventatives available for cats too.  Never be tempted to use a dog medication on a cat though, as there systems are highly intolerant of many of the ingredients used in canine medications.

Adverse reactions are rare but you should read the pack to know what to look out for.  If your pet is adverse to taking tablets you can buy chewable treats containing the medicine that are more palatable.  It is important that they are broken up or chewed so that all the medication is absorbed correctly.  If you are concerned that oral medications are not being taken correctly you might find one of the monthly spot on treatments such as Advantage Multi for effective.  These have the added advantage of controlling some external parasites such as fleas as well as preventing heartworm disease.

Always ensure that you only ever use one medication containing a heartworm preventative at a time.  So for example do not use Advantage Multi alongside Heartgard Plus for dogs.