Most dogs can be safely leash-walked during the treatment recovery period and providing appropriate chew toys can help relieve some of that stored up physical energy.
All physical exertion must be stopped beginning the day of the first injection, 24 hours a day, for the full 8-week period, to reduce the risk of serious (catastrophic) heartworm-related problems.
Enforced Rest is ESSENTIAL! Positively NO Strenuous Exercise for 8 weeks! The heartworms will die over the next 6 weeks. As they die and are broken down, pieces of them could lodge in other parts of the body's blood vessels, causing unnecessary complications–if your pet's activity is too strenuous.
Step 7: Home Care During Heartworm Treatment
Strict rest is imperative for 6-8 weeks. This means that your pet can be leashed walked outside to urinate and defecated, but must come back inside to rest. Do not allow your pet to run, jump, climb stairs, or play rough with other dogs or children.
If exercise or excitement cause the treated dog's heart rate to rise, pieces of decomposing worms can be forced into the tiny blood vessels of the lungs, causing further complications. The more pronounced the clinical signs of heartworm disease are, the more restricted any activity or excitement need to be.
The dog may be required to stay at the hospital for 3-4 days. 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.
From the first injection until six to eight weeks following the last injection, it will be absolutely essential to keep your dog quiet. That means strictly restricting all exercise and activity that would elevate your dog's heart rate or increase his blood pressure.
Rest for 60 days (ideally in a crate): Rest is the single most important factor to successful heartworm treatment. This means 4 weeks of strict rest for your dog after each melarsomine injection.
After treatment, a dog with mild to moderate heartworm disease is generally kept on at least 4-8 weeks of exercise restriction, but then can gradually return to normal activity as recommended by your veterinarian.
Since your dog's heartworm recovery is all about staying as relaxed and inactive as possible, you should probably ask your vet about a prescription sedative. “Many dogs benefit from a sedative or anti-anxiety medication to help keep them calm after treatment,” Dr. Marteney said.
Recovery Symptoms
Increased energy - Even though your dog may begin to feel better after a few days, it is still important that he rest and refrain from exercise, so you'll need to continue to confine him for the first month. This means no walks and no playtime.
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."
Heartworms can also cause nosebleeds, pneumonia, high blood pressure, seizures, blindness, and excessive sleeping.
Heartworm disease is not contagious, meaning that a dog cannot catch the disease from being near an infected dog. Heartworm disease is only spread through the bite of a mosquito.
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.
Myth #3: If my pet has heartworms, I will see them in her feces. Although many worm types, such as roundworms and tiny hookworms, are shed in your pet's feces, heartworms do not live in the gastrointestinal (GI) tract, and are not found in feces.
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.
Myth: Heartworm disease is contagious for pets.
Truth: You should be concerned if we diagnose one of your pets with heartworm disease, but you do not need to quarantine your infected pet. Heartworms must go through a mosquito to develop into adults, so heartworm-positive pets are safe to be around.
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.
The injections are given within the muscle and can indeed be uncomfortable, but the inflammation that develops within the days following creates the most discomfort. Restlessness, panting, trembling and reduced appetite can all be signs that the dog is uncomfortable.
Approximately 6 months after treatment is completed, your veterinarian will perform a heartworm test to confirm that all heartworms have been eliminated. To avoid the possibility of your dog contracting heartworm disease again, you will want to administer heartworm prevention year-round for the rest of his life.
With heartworm disease treatment can be extremely difficult even for the young otherwise healthy dogs but our senior dogs can see more severe side effects and death if progressed disease is present. Know that 1 in 10 dogs will develop some form of heart disease as they age.
Treatment with doxycycline reduces Wolbachia numbers in all stages of heartworms and improves outcomes and decreased microfilaremia in dogs treated for heartworm disease.
The Immiticide is administered by deep intramuscular injections in the lumbar muscles. These injections can cause pain and soreness to spread throughout the lower back causing temporary difficulty getting up because of the muscle soreness. Some dogs experience nausea and are lethargic.