Pet Preventative Medicine

The key to keeping a healthy pet is routine wellness care and prevention. There are many simple, routine treatments that can be done in the comfort of an owner’s home that can help manage the health and wellbeing of pets. We recommend routine screening blood work such as heartworm/tick panels or blood chemistries to have a baseline as guide to what is normal for your pet. Early detection leads to early treatment and intervention that may help our pets live a longer happier healthy life.

We recommend the use of year-round heartworm preventatives such and Interceptor Plus, flea and tick control such as Credelio or a Seresto flea and tick collar.

Flea Prevention
When your cat or dog has fleas, you will notice they may appear restless and are constantly scratching. Fleas are not harmless and can be life-threatening to your pet.

Fleas can also play a huge part in underlying pet allergies as many pets are allergic to flea saliva. All it takes is one flea bite to set off an allergy flare up or infection.

It is important to provide your pet with a flea preventive year-round. Fleas can also give our pets intestinal worms. Did you know that fleas can bite our humans too?

Tick Prevention
Ticks can spread diseases including Lyme disease, tick paralysis, and other serious diseases.  Whether your pet spends most of their time indoors or outdoors it is important to invest in a tick preventative to keep them safe. After you and your pet spend time outdoors, it is important that you check both yourself and the pet to catch any ticks that may have found their way onto you and your pet. Tick borne diseases can be life long and can result in death.

Heartworm Prevention
Heartworm is a serious disease that can be fatal, and treatment is costly and painful. Heartworm spreads by an infected mosquito who bites a pet and transmits heartworms that live in the lungs and heart. Protecting your pet is easy. Products like Interceptor Plus protect your pet from this serious disease. We recommend year-round heartworm prevention. Our winters are much warmer then in previous years and we may still see mosquitos in the winter. All it takes is one bite. If your pet is social and spends time with other pets, you may not know the other pet’s health status but at least you know that your pet is protected.

We have learned that heartworms are becoming more and more prevalent in our area and many pets are left untreated and increasing the chance of infecting others. It is important to give a quality preventative purchased form your veterinarian and given every month.

Vaccinations
We have our core vaccines that we recommend for all cats and dogs. We have other vaccines, non-core, that we recommend based upon your pet’s lifestyle and potential risks. Talking with your veterinarian about home life, hobbies, and exposure to wildlife will help to ensure that the proper measures are taken to vaccinate your pet. At East Longmeadow Animal Hospital, we currently vaccinate for these common diseases:

Canine

• Rabies
• DA2PP (Parvo/Distemper)
• Lyme
• Leptospirosis
• Bordetella (Kennel Cough)
• Flu

Feline:

• Rabies
• FVRCP (Feline Distemper)
• Leukemia