What you should know about Canine Heartworms

Written by Susun Andrews, LVT

As the weather starts warming back-up, we start thinking about getting outside more and enjoying all the fun activities that spring and summer bring to the Grand Valley. One bad thing that comes with all the great weather is the BUGS!

While bugs are not usually enjoyable, they can be downright deadly to our beloved pets! Especially mosquito’s, who can transfer heart worms to our pets. Heart worms are not easily treatable but they are preventable.

Mosquito’s are very adaptable little nuisances, who breed, swarm and love to spread diseases and worms. While Mesa County has been going through extensive efforts to keep these pests at bay, they still thrive in the Grand Valley.

The best method for keeping your pets safe is prevention. This prevention comes in a handy chewable tablet that you give your pet monthly. The added benefit of this monthly preventative is that it gets rid of other GI parasites as well. This comes especially handy if your dog is a hunter, traveler, or you have small children at home, as some of these parasites are Zoonotic (meaning that we can get them as well)

The current recommendation is to test for heart worms yearly and to do preventative monthly year-round. It is often cheaper to keep your pet on preventative year-round rather than testing gin the spring and keeping on preventative for the summer months only.

For more information then you probably want to know please visit www.heartwormnsociety.org