National Pet Parents Day is today April 25th! As a pet parent it is our teapot to care for our animals just as we care for our children. We leaned last month when we took Bella in for her annual appointment that she had heartworms. Whether a month was miss or not of heartworm prevention medicine or not–she was diagnosed with heartworms. Since her diagnosis I have learned the five states with the highest incidence of heartworm cases are Mississippi, Louisiana, South Carolina, Arkansas, and Alabama. Bella is our fifth Labrador Retriever and this is our first experience with testing positive to heartworms.
Our veterinarian gave us two options to rid Bella of her heartworms–Fast Kill Method or Slow Kill Method. We chose fast kill because the slow kill method is just giving her her monthly heartworm medication. Obviously we need something more effective than her monthly heartworm medication to kill off all of the heartworms.
Last month she was injected with Immiticide and just this Thursday and Friday she was injected with the rest of her medication to kill the heartworms. Immiticide therapy injection is the only method approved by the American Heartworm Society. Now we just have to wait to see if it works and we will go back in a month to see her results. We personally know of animals that have had successful treatments and are still going strong today.