Do you think heartworm preventatives and treatments are just a ploy for vets to make money?

Question

Growing up, my dogs were never treated for heartworms or given expensive preventative medicine once a month. And my dogs never died of heartworms or parasites.

Apparently, my dog did get heartworms and it cost me more than I paid for the dog (over $500) to get rid of them. I order heartguard online at 1-800Petmeds.com. They are cheaper, but dang.

My dogs in the past either died from attacks from other dogs or hit by cars. Never parasites.

Answer 1

I live in a tiny town on the coast. We have no mosquitoes. There are two vet clinics.
One will not prescribe heartworm preventative, unless the dog will be traveling, as he says there has never been a case here.
The other vet demands his patients all be on preventative, and says that because we are a tourist community, we are exposed to all canine diseases.
Well, if you go inland, there are mosquitoes, but I have never seen one anywhere near town...
The vet who does not precribe the stuff is a mature man, who is well established in his practice, in an old fashoined clinic.
The one who demands testing and preventative is a younger man, who's state of the art cliniic is owned by an investment group.
I use REVOLUTION on my dogs during the summer, because I visit my freind in a nearby town, and her many cats have fleas (and ear mites) that like to stowaway on my dogs.
REVOLUTION is also a heartworm preventative. It is drops to apply on the skin.

Answer 2

Then you were lucky. It only takes one parasite to make a dog ill and it only takes one mosquito to transmit heartworm! While not all heartworm will be fatal, if they make it to certain areas of the body, they can be. At the very least, they can make a dog very sick. No, they are not a ploy by vets to make money. Vets make a very very small profit on them. And you can order the products online anyway and then, the vet makes nothing or you can buy them at pet store pharmacies and again, the vet does not make money.

I wonder what your dogs did die of? Could it have been a heartworm-associated illness and you just didn't realize it? Most people don't realize their dog has been infested. A long time later, when their dog keels over dead and the vet does a necropsy, the cause of death is determined and it's heartworm. The worms can grow to 14 inches and take up half the heart before they kill the dog. But heartworm disease is fatal. Do you really want to risk your dog getting in for the sake of the few bucks you would spend on heartworm preventives? I don't.

Read this information about heartworm and see if you still feel like it's not necessary to treat your dogs:

http://www.thepetcenter.com/gen/hw.html

http://petcaretips.net/heartworms_in_dogs.html

http://www.cah.com/dr_library/canineheartworm.html

Answer 3

A dog that is wormed regularly will rarely get heartworms. Worm larvae work their way from the intestine into the blood vessels in the intestine. When the get to the heart they attach to the muscle and start eating. The lay more eggs an the infestation eventually kills the dog. Dogs are usually born with worms and if they are wormed shortly after birth and every 6 months, heartworm is rarely a problem.

A dog can get heartworm from misquito bites that are infected with egg from another animal. These do the same and attach in the heart with the same results.

If your dog does get heartworm, it's very expensive to treat and the damage is done to the heart. Heartworm treatment will run $1000 or more to treat. So weigh the cost of the preventative treatment against the other and make your decision. The odds are your dog won't get them if regularly and properly wormed.

Answer 4

Heartworms are for real. How do you know that your dogs did not die of heartworm or from parasites? How old were they when they died?
Now if you go the the government's website and read how all the heartworm meds were tested before they were approved, you will see that they are 100% efficient. So why do we have to test for them every year? That is a waste of money! Also, all the heartworm meds were tested on dogs who were heartworm positive at the start of the tests. They were heartworm negative at the end of the tests.

Answer 5

No, it's not a scam. Heartworm is a more recent disease - as more and more dogs get it, more and more mosquitoes will be infected and pass it along to other dogs. This is a horrible and expensive thing to treat, and the dog is never the same. My cousin had to put her 3 year old Shepherd down because of it. I was at the autopsy and the dog's heart was completely clogged with them. If I could afford to treat my dog with only one preventative, it would be for heartworm. Even if you keep him away from all other animals, he can still get heartworm.

Answer 6

The vets nowadays use anything as a ploy t get your money. It depends on where you are of course, but here in Arizona, the vets start off at $500 and work up. They are serious crooks and so far, nothing can be done about it..

Yes, heart worm is a reality. I paid last week, $30 to a place to test my 16-year old dog for heart worm.. it is a blood test. Every Saturday there is a roving vet that goes to two different feed stores here... just on Saturdays from 1 pm to 3 pm. I get my dog/pet shots there. I paid $30 for the heart worm test. At other vets, it would have been $180 and if any major treatment, it would have been $500 plus.. Vets here are discouraging the adopting of any pet.. is that why they overcharge all the time???

Answer 7

all dogs need heartworm meds. Heartworms come from mosquetoes. ( i know i did not spell that right) Ask your vet to show you a heart with heartworms. Do your pet a favor and give him his meds. The preventtative meds are not that expensive. a lot cheaper than the treatment to get rid of them. I feel if people can't afford to take care of their animals then they should have them

Answer 8

No, definitely not. They are not that expensive and trust me, without them you will be paying a huge price, financially to treat them, and for your dog's health. Not fun getting heartworms! Your dogs were lucky they never got heartworms. There are so many that I've seen come down with them ( I am involved with animal rescue), please don't continue to take the chance.That's like saying, 'I've never been in an accident, so I don't need car insurance!"
If you can't afford heartworm preventative, please consider waiting to own a dog until your financial situation gets better.

Answer 9

I don't. I never had any issues either until moving to southern California. I lost my first sheltie out there to heart worms since I didn't take any preventative measures as I'd never had to deal with it before. I think a lot of it has to do with the region in which you live. Frankly, at this point, I'll listen to my vet. Compared to the ultimate price, I don't mind spending a little for a for a little preventative care.

Answer 10

Hard to say man. So, have you ever had polio? You know why you have not? Everybody has been inoculated for it.

In places where they are not, they are starting to get it again.

We will not even get into smallpox.

Look the dogs are not getting the disease because it is not being spread because they are all inoculated against it.

So, we stop, then what happens?

Heart worms have not been eradicated, so draw your own conclusions as to what happens if everybody stops medicating their dogs.