surchinmy
Ultra ALPHA
Dec 7, 2004, 7:59 AM
Views: 4249
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Re: [Bailey] 45 days for Heartgard?
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As I understand it ... monthly heartworm preventives can cause a severe reaction if given to a dog who already has ADULT heartworms present in its system ...
The "antigen test" is to make sure the dog does not have any adult heartworms BEFORE starting on heartworm treatment ...
So, yes - can understand why your vet would say that it is not necessary to carry out an "antigen test" a pup that is less than 6 months old ...
Heartworm larvae take about 6 months to develop into adult heartworms ... And since the "antigen test" only detects the presence of adult heartworms ... any puppy less that 6 months old is probably going to test negative anyway - because even if heartworm larvae is present in the pup, the larvae would not have had time to mature into adults and would not be detected by the "antigen test".
Cheers
(This post was edited by surchinmy on Dec 7, 2004, 8:10 AM)
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