If you have been considering putting off a yearly physical examination for your pet, think again. In the long run, bringing your pet in for preventive care such as vaccinations and parasite control will help keep him or her in overall better health. In addition, the cost of preventive care doesn’t come close to the costs associated with treating serious illnesses. Preventive medicine includes regular physical examinations, vaccinations, and parasite preventives.

Physical Examination

During an examination, your veterinarian will look at your pet to ensure he or she is in good health. We will talk to you about topics such as your pet’s activities, body condition, energy level, and food intake to see if any changes might indicate an illness. If we find any abnormalities, we will talk to you about these and make a plan for how to address them.

Treating problems early usually results in a better outcome than waiting until your pet is showing signs of disease at home. For example, finding mild tartar and gingivitis in your pet’s mouth during a yearly physical examination means that we can schedule a dental to clean your pet’s teeth. Early intervention prevents the dental disease from progressing to a point where teeth need to be extracted or bacteria in the mouth travels elsewhere in the body and causes disease. If your pet is overweight, we can discuss a weight loss plan. Losing weight will decrease your pet’s risk of developing weight-related conditions such as diabetes.

Vaccinations

Vaccinations are routinely given to pets to prevent infectious disease. Many of these diseases can be fatal. Without routine vaccination or blood tests to check your pet’s immune status, your pet may be at risk of contracting what should be a preventable disease. In some cases, such as rabies, not vaccinating your pet also puts you and your family at risk because some diseases can be passed between pets and people.

Preventives

Fleas, ticks, heartworms, and intestinal worms are all parasites that can make your pet ill. Some of these parasites, such as hookworms and roundworms, infect people as well as pets. These parasites can also carry diseases that people can catch like cat scratch fever and Lyme disease.

Monthly topical products are effective at preventing fleas and ticks. Monthly heartworm prevention tablets are an excellent way to prevent both heartworm and intestinal parasites.

Prevention is much less expensive than treating the diseases these parasites can cause, and also less debilitating to your pet. Flea allergies can result in large amounts of hair loss and skin infection which can take months to recover from. Heartworm treatment can be fatal to some patients depending on the number of worms they carry. Intestinal parasites can be difficult or impossible to remove from a property once their eggs have been shed in the soil. A contaminated environment puts both people and new pets at risk of contracting an otherwise preventable disease.

At Ridge Runner Veterinary Services, we recommend yearly physical examinations along with protecting your pet from infectious diseases through vaccination. In addition, we strongly recommend preventives for fleas, ticks and internal parasites year round. By making the choice to perform preventive care, your pet will be healthier and in the long run you will spend less on veterinary care.

There are a variety of parasites that your dogs and cats can catch, especially as the weather begins to warm up again. Treating them with a dewormer or a flea and tick preventive can help remove the infestation from your pet. However, if the environment is not treated, your pet will be infected again. The following lists ways to control some parasites on your pet and in your environment.

Fleas

Fleas lay eggs in your pet’s hair coat which then fall off. The eggs develop into larvae in the environment, feeding on the adult flea feces that drop off your pet. The larvae will spin cocoons, usually in carpet, to pupate. These pupae can lie dormant for months until they are stimulated to emerge as adult fleas by vibration, warming, or elevated carbon dioxide levels. New fleas need to find a host within a few days. Treatment and Prevention: The best way to control fleas is to treat year round with a topical flea preventive such as Frontline or Advantix because this will kill fleas currently on your pet and also kill any newly emerged fleas that jump onto your pet during the 30 days that the topical product is effective. If your pet currently has fleas, we can also give an oral medication that quickly kills adult fleas. To try and remove eggs, larvae, and pupae from the environment you should vacuum throughout your home including chairs and couches. Wash all the bedding in your home. There are also sprays for indoor and outdoor applications to kill adults and their eggs, but pupae are extremely resistant to insecticides, freezing, and drying.

Hookworms, Roundworms, and Whipworms

These intestinal parasites are picked up in your pet’s environment in areas where eggs have been shed. Roundworms and hookworms can be contracted through eating an intermediate host such as a rodent. Roundworms can also be passed from a mother to her unborn pups across the placenta, while hookworms can be passed to puppies via nursing. Eggs and larvae often take weeks in the environment to become infectious. This means fecal material has likely disappeared before the eggs can infect your dog which makes it hard to identify areas in your yard that might harbor parasite eggs. These eggs can also be very resistant to environmental conditions such as freezing and drying.

Treatment and Prevention: If your pet is diagnosed with one of these parasites, we will recommend an immediate deworming, and likely recommend follow-up fecal checks. To prevent infection, a monthly dewormer such as Interceptor or Profender is recommended. Routine deworming of puppies and kittens starting at two weeks of age is also effective at preventing environmental contamination. Preventing hunting is another effective method of preventing exposure to roundworms and hookworms. In addition, cleaning up feces immediately can help prevent your yard from becoming contaminated with these worms.

Tapeworms

Unlike the other common intestinal parasites, tapeworms must pass through an intermediate host before being contagious to your pet. Typically, your pet will catch tapeworms from eating a flea carrying the parasite or by eating a rodent with tapeworm cysts. Rarely, pets can be exposed to tapeworms from eating lice infected with this parasite.

Treatment and Prevention: If you notice tapeworms, we will likely recommend a dewormer for your pet. In addition, we will recommend treating for fleas as described above. Decreasing hunting can also limit exposure to tapeworm infection.

If you have any questions or concerns about controlling parasite infections in your pets, please don’t hesitate to call.

Fleas are an external parasite of our pets that can cause a variety of issues in our pets and can carry infectious conditions, such as cat scratch disease, that we can catch as well. While fleas thrive in warm, humid environments, living in the north does not make us immune to this pest. Fleas can easily infest a home in Maine, and live outside during the summer months with no problems. Unseasonably warm winter days can also allow for fleas to reproduce outdoors. The following will discuss signs of fleas, the flea life cycle, and ways to treat for infestations.

Signs of Fleas

Not seeing fleas does not mean your pet is not affected by this parasite. Healthy animals are often very effective at keeping themselves well groomed so that only one or two fleas will be on them at any given time. Flea dirt – dark flecks of digested blood – is sometimes visible in your pet’s hair coat. Animals that have a flea allergy will experience hair loss and itchiness, often to the point of causing themselves to bleed.

Flea Life Cycle

Fleas lay eggs in your pet’s hair coat and these eggs then fall off. The eggs develop into larvae in the environment, feeding on the adult flea feces that also drops off your pet. The larvae will spin cocoons, usually in carpet, to pupate. These pupae can lie dormant for months until they are stimulated to emerge as adult fleas by vibration, warming, or elevated carbon dioxide levels. New fleas need to find a host within a few days. This life cycle can take months or be as short as 16 days when conditions are right.

Flea Control

The best way to control fleas is to treat year round with a topical flea preventive such as Frontline or Advantix because this will kill fleas currently on your pet and also kill any newly emerged fleas that jump onto your pet during the 30 days that the topical product is effective. If your pet currently has fleas, we can also give an oral medication that quickly kills adult fleas. To try and remove eggs, larvae, and pupae from the environment you should vacuum throughout your home including chairs and couches. Wash all the bedding in your home. There are also sprays for indoor and outdoor applications to kill adults and their eggs, but pupae are extremely resistant to insecticides, freezing, and drying.

If you think your pet might have fleas, please call us at 223-2596.

Lyme disease is a concern for animals along with humans in our region. The disease manifests itself very differently between people and dogs. In dogs, we do not usually see signs of Lyme for weeks to months after infection. Typically, you will notice lameness and lethargy in your pet. Very rarely we can see neurologic signs or have issues with the heart. In addition, the kidneys can be damaged if the infection is left untreated and becomes latent in the body.

How is Lyme Transmitted?

In the Northeast, Lyme disease is contracted by dogs bitten by a deer tick (Ixodes scapularis). Deer ticks can carry Borrelia burgdorferi, the bacteria responsible for causing Lyme disease. Ticks must stay attached for 48 hours for the bacteria to move from the tick into your pet’s body.

Three stages of the deer tick: The larva (bottom right)nymph (bottom left), and adult female (top).(www.vin.com)

Ticks can become infected with the Borrelia bacteria as larvae or nymphs, and nymphs and adults are both capable of transferring the bacteria to people or pets. Larvae usually are infected with Borrelia from small hosts, such as the white-footed mouse. Nymphs may also be exposed feeding from mice or a larger host such as a deer or dog. Typically, ticks feed from hosts in the spring and fall, making these the most likely time of year to find deer ticks on your dog.

How do you test for Lyme?

We screen dogs for Lyme disease with a laboratory test that can determine whether or not a dog has antibodies against the bacteria that causes the disease. This screening test does not indicate whether the infection is current or happened years earlier, it only indicates that the dog has been exposed to Borrelia bacteria sometime during its life.

If your dog is positive for Lyme on our in-house test, we may recommend performing a confirmatory test at an outside laboratory. This test is better at indicating whether or not a dog identified with exposure to Lyme is currently fighting infection. We will often recheck this test six months later to ensure that treatment has been effective at reducing the number of bacteria in your dog’s system. We may also recommend additional lab work to investigate how well the kidneys are functioning.

Can Lyme be treated in dogs?

Lyme can typically be treated in dogs with a long course of antibiotics. Doxycycline is the most commonly used antibiotic in treating Lyme. It has few side effects in dogs and is relatively inexpensive. In addition, we will often prescribe your pet a pain relief medication to help with your pet’s lameness. In general, the treatment will eradicate most but not all of the Borrelia burgdorferi bacteria. If your pet has kidney damage from the Lyme infection, there may be additional medications and screenings that we would recommend.

Is there a way to prevent Lyme disease?

The best way to protect your dog from Lyme disease is to prevent ticks from biting him or her. Using a monthly flea and tick preventive such as Advantix or Vectra usually gives good protection. These products will typically kill the tick or cause it to drop off the dog before it has been attached for 48 hours.

In addition, there are several vaccinations available for Lyme disease in dogs. Dogs should receive two vaccines within 3 weeks the first time they are vaccinated against this disease. After the first shot series, the vaccine will need to be boostered yearly.

Should I vaccinate my Lyme positive dog?

There are conflicting opinions about vaccinating dogs that have already been exposed to Lyme. A positive in house Lyme test indicates that the dog has some immunity to the disease from its previous exposure and may be able to fight off future infections with no treatment. However, we do not know how much immunity this animal has, nor can we predict when the immunity will wane. We do know that Lyme positive dogs live in an environment where they may be exposed to the disease at a later date. We also know that the vaccine is safe in Lyme positive dogs, although all vaccinations have the possibility of causing reactions. At Ridge Runner, we recommend vaccination of Lyme positive dogs.

If you have any further questions, please don’t hesitate to call us at 223-2596.

We are pleased to offer shipping of many of your pet's medications to your home. You can request refills through the Drug Orders link at the top of the page. Just fill out the form, hit submit, and the order will be sent to Ridge Runner. Orders received before 2:00pm will be reviewed by a veterinarian and, if there are no questions, shipped in 1-2 business days. Along with medications we can send Purina™ brand foods right to your door. Shipping charges are explained on the Drug Orders page.

If you prefer not to order through the website but still want the convenience of receiving your pet's medications at home, please feel free to call us with your refill request at 223-2596.

Heartworm is a disease dogs can contract when bitten by a mosquito. Symptoms include a cough, exercise intolerance, and lack of appetite and weight loss. Prognosis depends on whether there is a mild infection or a more severe advanced infection. While Maine does not have as many cases of heartworm as there are in the southeastern states, it is still present in this area. In Maine, 1-5 cases are diagnosed per clinic per year. Incidence will probably rise in our area as people move in with dogs from other parts of the country or adopt rescue dogs from regions with more heartworm disease.

For those owners who do not have their pets on year-round heartworm preventive, March and April are the best months to test for heartworm disease. If you treat your dog year-round for heartworm but missed a dose or two during the year, it would also be a good idea to re-test your dog to ensure he or she didn’t become infected during the month or two the preventive was missed. The heartworm test used at Ridge Runner screens a dog’s heartworm status along with checking exposure to several tick-borne diseases including lyme, ehrlichia, and anaplasmosis. This test requires a few drops of blood from your dog and about 15 minutes of your time.

If your dog does not have a heartworm infection, he or she can immediately begin taking heartworm preventive medication, which is typically provided as a once a month chewable tablet. For those animals that test positive, treatment is available. However, the treatment require your pet to be hospitalized for several days and occasionally can have complications.

Can Cats be affected by heartworm?

Cats can contract heartworm disease, although adult worms are much less common than they are in dogs. Unlike dogs, much of the damage from heartworm infection in cats is in the lungs rather than the heart. Also, this damage is usually caused by juvenile worms, whereas in the dog juvenile stages of heartworm are of less concern than the adults.

There are tests available to help screen cats for adult heartworm as well as help decide whether or not heartworm is a component of a cat’s lung disease. Like dogs, cats can also be put on heartworm preventive tablets.

For more information on heartworm disease, please visit our links page and click on the “heartworm disease” link. If you have any questions, please call us and we would be happy to discuss this disease with you.

There are many opportunities for your dog to get into chocolates around holidays such as Valentine's and Halloween. Chocolate is toxic due to both its caffeine and theobromine content. The darker the chocolate, the more caffeine and theobromine it contains. Therefore, baker's chocolate is more toxic to your dog than milk chocolate. On average, dogs will experience toxicity after eating .6 oz of chocolate per 2 pounds of body weight (about 15oz for a 50 pound dog), but deaths have occurred at even lower amounts.

The effect of chocolate on a dog is to cause vomiting, diarrhea, and urinary incontinence. The range of neurological effects ranges from hyperactivity to depression. Abnormal heart rhythms or a slow heart, blood in the urine, tremors, seizures, incoordination, coma, and occasionally death are all possibilities after chocolate ingestion.

If your dog ingests chocolate, please call us immediately at 223-2596 or call the emergency clinic if it is after hours. If your dog ate the chocolate recently, we will likely have him vomit to have him get as much out of his stomach as we can. We may give charcoal to absorb any of the toxins that can't be removed from the stomach by vomiting. We will also treat your dog for seizures or abnormal heart rhythms if they occur.

If you can't get in to us immediately, we may instruct you to give hydrogen peroxide to your dog to cause him or her to vomit. Hydrogen peroxide can cause ulcers of the GI tract and narrowing of the esophagus, so it is not without risk and should not be given without direction from your veterinarian. Dogs should receive about 5mL (about a teaspoon) of a 3% hydrogen peroxide by mouth, and then another 5mL 10 minutes later if there is no vomiting after the first dose.

We often use anesthesia for procedures that we perform on your pets. While anesthesia is always risky, there are several steps we take at Ridge Runner to help decrease the risk.

On the day of your pet’s procedure, we always perform a physical examination to ensure he or she is healthy enough to have anesthesia. We also look at a sample of his or her blood. The blood is analyzed to see how well your pet will tolerate the drugs we use to sedate and anesthetize animals. If any values are of concern, we will call you to let you know. We may decide to postpone surgery or to use different medications for sedation.

Once your pet is sedated, we place an IV catheter to ensure the medications we use to anesthetize your dog are given directly into the vein. We also use this catheter to give fluids to your pet because some animals can become dehydrated during surgery.

When your pet is under anesthesia, we monitor vital signs such as blood pressure, EKG, oxygenation, and heart rate. We have a technician dedicated to monitoring these vital signs throughout the entire procedure. Changes to these values will signal us to give medications, change the anesthesia levels we are giving, or even wake your pet up and cancel the procedure if it is not an emergency surgery.

We keep animals in the hospital for at least several hours to allow us to monitor them as they wake up from anesthesia. Animals can be groggy from anesthesia for hours and up to a day. We will discuss any concerns about your pet’s anesthetic recovery by phone and at your discharge appointment.

We do our best to make anesthesia as safe as possible for your pet. If you have any questions before or after your pet undergoes a procedure, please don’t hesitate to call.

Dogs and cats in Maine come in contact with a variety of gastrointestinal parasites – also known as worms. Tapeworms can be passed to your pet through hunting or by ingesting prey such as mice that are carrying the parasites. Roundworms are often found in puppies and kittens and can also be passed to pets through rodents. Hookworms and whipworms are less commonly seen but are certainly a possible threat to our pets.

In addition to being a health concern for pets, some gastrointestinal parasites can also be passed to humans. Roundworms can cause several problems in people, but the most well-known issue is migration of the parasite through the eye which can cause blindness. Hookworms can cause skin rashes that are very uncomfortable.

The best way to detect a worm infestation in your pet is a fecal floatation. This microscopic examination of the stool allows us to check for and identify parasite eggs your pet may be carrying. Waiting for your pet to pass worms before treating puts other pets and potentially you at risk for becoming infected. At Ridge Runner Veterinary Services, we recommend annual fecal examinations to ensure that your pet is not harboring gastrointestinal parasites. If parasite eggs are found during a fecal floatation, we will recommend a series of dewormings and possibly a recheck of the feces about a month after treatment.

To prevent infection in dogs, we recommend monthly heartworm preventive such as Interceptor. Not only is this heartworm preventative effective at killing immature heartworms, it also is a good dewormer for the gastrointestinal tract. In cats, heartworm prevention can also be used monthly. In addition, there are topical dewormers approved in cats that are often easier than giving pills. All pets should be tested for heartworm with a blood test before starting a heartworm preventive. For more information on heartworm, please read the Heartworm Disease in Maine article on our website.

If you have any questions about worms in your pet or you would like to bring a stool sample for us to examine, please don’t hesitate to call us at 223-2596. Please bring a stool sample from your pet when you come for his/her annual visit. For additional information online, please visit the Companion Animal Parasite Council website at www.capcvet.org