Dogs with heartworm disease can live high-quality lives as long as they are given appropriate care. After completing treatment and following your veterinarian's recommenda- tions on heartworm disease testing and prevention, the chances of any long-term effects are very low.
“Heartworm disease causes lasting damage to the heart, lungs, and arteries, and can negatively affect the dog's health and quality of life.” If the organ damage from heartworms is severe enough, it may be fatal.
How long after heartworm treatment can a dog be active? According to Dr. Marteney, your dog will have to wait about six months after his diagnosis before he can get back to all his favorite activities.
There is some risk involved in treating dogs with heartworms, although fatalities are rare. "A new drug is available that does not have as many side effects, allowing successful treatment of more than 95% of dogs with heartworms."
Heartworm disease causes lasting damage to the heart, lungs and arteries, and can affect the dog's health and quality of life long after the parasites are gone.
Not every aspiring pet owner is equipped to provide the extra care a special-needs pet requires; however, with proper treatment, heartworm-positive pets can be excellent candidates for adoption.
What they do is prevent a major infestation. In fact, if a dog has a mild heartworm infestation, a veterinarian might recommend treating it with a heartworm preventative over a course of several months.
With the three-dose adulticide protocol described above, in conjunction with doxycycline and macrocyclic lactones as recommended by the American Heartworm Society, 98% of dogs will be cleared of heartworm infection.
n The majority of dogs clear all heartworms with the standard treatment, but treatment is not always 100 percent effective. The label reads 90-99 percent effective; this is due to variation in each individual animal.
Treatment Requires a Vet's Help
Once a positive test is confirmed, our veterinarians (in alignment with the American Heartworm Society) recommend treating adult heartworm infections with 3 treatments (injections) of a drug called melarsomine.
Heartworm disease can be prevented in dogs and cats by giving them medication once a month that also controls various internal and external parasites. Heartworm infections are diagnosed in about 250,000 dogs each year. 1 But there is no good reason for dogs to receive preventives all year; it is just not needed.
In general, however, it is thought that heartworms can significantly shorten a dog's life expectancy. For the most part, treatment will not kill the worms—it only decreases their lifespan. This means that an infected dog's lifespan will be reduced by around 6 years or less depending on the severity of the infection.
Treatment for heartworm can cause serious complications for your pet's health and can be potentially toxic to the dog's body. Many dogs experience soreness and swelling at the site of their injections. The most severe side effects are related to a large number of worms suddenly dying.
After treatment, the adult worms die and are carried by the blood to the lungs where they lodge in small blood vessels. There they decompose and are absorbed by the body over a period of several months. Reactions to the drugs are not uncommon, and there is always some risk involved in treating a dog for heartworms.
Many people believe that thanks to advances in heartworm prevention in the past decade, heartworm is rarely found in Australia.
Heartworm treatment is a process carried out through 4-6 months. During heartworm treatment the patient must stay confined while the heartworms are dying off to prevent embolisms and other health risks.
Circulating heartworm antigen appears in the blood as early as five months post-infection in a small percentage of dogs, but most dogs are not antigen positive until seven months post-infection. Yes, contrary to popular belief, a dog infected six months previously can be negative on an antigen test.
There should be no physical activity for 6 weeks or until cleared by the veterinarian. No play, no running. Active dogs that have a hard time resting after treatment, may be prescribed calming meds during recovery. The recovery period is a great time to train the brain.
Twenty-six dogs (52%) experienced minor complications, such as injection site reactions, gastrointestinal signs (vomiting, diarrhea, inappetance), and behavioral changes (lethargy, depression) during or after heartworm treatment.
Treatment of heartworm disease is hard on your pet, but it can be difficult for your family as well. You worry about the severity of the disease and its effect on your dog. You feel bad seeing her discomfort during the injections.
Less Common Warning Signs of Heartworm Infections
In fairly rare cases, heartworms can migrate to the eyes and brain which causes neurological symptoms including: Blindness. Nosebleeds. Lameness.
Heartworm disease is not contagious, meaning that a dog cannot catch the disease from being near an infected dog.
Is heartworm painful? - Animal Hospital of Statesville. It's not painful, per se, but they feel sick, uncomfortable, and they're likely having difficulty breathing. They're not perfusing very well, so they don't feel well.
Dogs become infected with heartworms through mosquito bites, so if you live in a climate with cold late autumns and winters, why worry about giving your dog preventive medication every single month of the year?