Heartworm Basics

Heart-worm disease is transmitted through bites of mosquito.

Adult female heart-worms living in infected dogs, cats, fox or even coyotes produce microfilaria. When the mosquito take a blood meal from an infected animals it pick up baby heart-worms or microfilaria. These baby worms mature into the "infection stage" larvae over a period of 10 to 14 days. Once the animal has been infected with these larvae they can then start spreading the disease to other animals by being bitten by a mosquito.

It takes about 6 months for these worms to fully mature to adult heart-worms. At this stage they can live up to 5 to 7 years in canine the hosts and 2 to 3 years in cats.

The heart-worm testing can only test for adult heart-worms so sometimes additional testing is recommended by your veterinarian. It is best to talk to your veterinarian about the best ways to help prevent your dog can cat from becoming infected with heart-worm disease through prevention.

Please feel free to call our friendly staff with questions or to set up an appointment to talk to our veterinarian.