Example:
******** says:
December 7, 2017 at 3:02 pm
I agree that most natural/holistic remedies are snake oil.
But… what do you think of testing the dog every 4 months for heart worms, and administering the medicine only after a positive (which presumably would be early enough that the dog could take the standard medication to eradicate the early-stage worms)?
skeptvet says:
December 7, 2017 at 8:25 pm
Heartworm prevention has to be tailored to the local risk. In my locale, incidence is close to zero, so prevention is optional. In other places I’ve lived, risk is high year-round and I recommend year-round prophylaxis. The testing strategy you suggest wouldn’t work because the test identifies adult female worms, so it is not positive until there is already a patent infection. The preventative kills larval stage heartworms, so at that point it would be useless, and the adulticide treatment is much riskier than prevention.
link to these comments is in my prior post
