“Prescription drug” and “controlled substance” are not the same. Unless heartworm medication can be recreationally abused, it ain’t likely to be a controlled substance.
Controlled substances are narrowly defined by the FDA to include those with addiction and abuse risk. See §812. Schedules of controlled substances. Heartworm medication does not fall within those guidelines.
That “condescending” dear is just a part of my speech pattern. I call lots of people dear, honey, sweetie, darlin’, etc. Get the fuck over yourself. Or don’t, I don’t really give a rat’s ass either way.
Your imaginings really have no relevance to this discussion, nor do your rebuttals of points I didn’t make. The point I made was that three years ago, while the internet companies were selling Heartgard and Frontline, Merial sent a mass mailing to vet clinics saying that they did not sell these products to such companies, nor did they approve the resale of these products to them. To my knowlege, this situation has not changed. If you have proof that this has changed, I’ll be perfectly happy to amend my post to read that Merial used to refuse to sell to the internet companies. If you have no such proof, or Merial tells you this is still the case, I’ll be expecting an apology for basically calling me a liar.
Elenfair, the climate in Minnesota and the climate in southern Ohio are different enough that we have a reasonable concern about heartworms during the winter. (I’m not from Ohio, but I lived in Kentucky for 26 years, 8 of them roughly an hour southeast of the OP. The climate’s not significantly different.) We get a lot of cold weather, but we also routinely have weeks of 50+ degree weather throughout the winter, with occasional outlier days where it gets above 70. We just don’t have long enough stretches of cold enough weather to completely kill off the mosquitoes, so heartworm is always an issue. If someone does year-round heartworm prevention, we test every other year. If they’ve missed more than one dose, we retest 'em before dispensing any more. That’s standard practice for every vet I’ve ever known.
And somehow, it seemed like I always wound up having this discussion with owners on days when it was 12 degrees outside. They would always gesture out the window to the snow and say, “You’re telling this isn’t too cold for mosquitoes?” and I’d have to remind them of last week, when we were wearing shorts. It was never a fun conversation, and I got accused of being a horrid, unfeeling person out to rip people off quite frequently. (Pretty standard part of the job, that. If such accusations upset or offend you, you’re in the wrong field.) When I whipped out my calculator and proved to them that year-round prevention would save them money, though, I was suddenly Mother Theresa and St. Francis all wrapped up in cheesecake and dipped in chocolate sauce, the very personification of love and compassion for all God’s creatures. :rolleyes: Some people.
PL, out of curiosity, if the trip to the vet’s is such a big deal, why didn’t you go on and stock up at the annual visit? I know you had some at home, but since you didn’t have enough to last the whole summer, you were going to have to make a special trip over there just for Heartgard anyway. (Unless you were figuring on someone getting sick or hurt before then; in day practice we always had a few clients who could count on exactly that.) If you don’t already do so, buy your Heartgard in the 12-pack. Not only is it cheaper than two of the 6-packs, I think Merial still offers $5 rebates on the 12-packs. Don’t hold me to the rebate thing, though; since my current clinic doesn’t do primary care, we don’t sell Heartgard and we’re not entirely up to date on the promotions. Similarly, the 6-pack of Frontline is cheaper than 2 3-packs and I think they still send you a coupon for future purchases of Frontline.
My vet does price-matching for Internet drugs. That’s a win-win situation all around. I get better prices (sometimes significantly better) and the vet gets my business and good will. It’s worth asking if your vet will do the same.
I’d like to see some cites (if any exist) showing that heartworm infections are transmitted to dogs over the winter in climates such as Cincinnati’s.
The descriptions of balmy winters in that locale not withstanding, the “weeks of 50+ weather” in the winter are an illusion, even stretching things to include the Lexington KY area (where I used to live). Mosquitoes get killed off or go into hibernation in wintertime, and brief thaws should not bring them suddenly back to life to menace one’s pets.
Absent some solid documentation regarding real-life infection risks, it makes no more sense to me to continue heartworm medication over the winter in my part of the country, than to keep spraying DEET on myself whenever I go outdoors in the winter (under the assumption that a stray mosquito might emerge to give me West Nile virus).
Dearie.
You’ll have to pardon me, I don’t hang out in the Pit a lot anymore. Are you often like this? Because if you are, I’ll just ignore you from now on whenever you act this combative. However, if I really was out of order, then maybe a broader sampling of the Pit population will have to confirm that, because I can’t really put much weighting on anything you say.
I’m sorry, you don’t understand how logical argument works. You made an assertion right here in this thread, with your only proof being a letter you received 3 years ago. Your assertion ended with this, which I will quote:
There’s nothing ambiguous about that - you said that a major online company was selling illicit (your term, earlier, same post) medicine. I said that’s a bold statement to make based on flimsy evidence. Especially since online and Net business is so dynamic and changing. Aside from the fact that Occam’s Razor would tell us that it’s unlikely a major pharmaceutical company would willfully overlook a large Net retailer illegally selling their products in the same country…
You somehow took offense YET AGAIN at that, and decided to be rude back again. I sorta wonder why, and sorta don’t care. An odd duality of emotion.
Turns out that’s not the case - 1800PetMeds is NOT selling illegitimately obtained products. I phoned Merial this morning (1-888-Merial1), something you could have done yourself this morning if in fact you had wanted to know the truth, instead of trying to engage in yet another Pit fight. According to the Merial rep I spoke to:
- Merial does not sell directly to 1800PetMeds.
- However, there is nothing illegal whatsoever in PetMeds re-selling the items so long as they obtained the items through a licensed vet and/or veterinary sales avenue. Nor is it a violation of any sales terms and conditions with a licensed vet and distributor. “We can’t control what happens after the first sale”.
- They had, as of today, received no legal complaints about 1800PetMeds.
- They knew of no regulatory agency doing any investigation into 1800PetMeds, nor was she aware that Merial had ever asked for such an investigation.
- As far as the representative was aware, this was true for all 50 States, but she was not sure about Canada, Mexico, or other international sales.
- In fact, the representative recommended I use 1800PetMeds if they were significantly cheaper than my vet, as they would “rather see (my) dog treated than not if money is tight”.
- The only downside she (the rep) said there was is that they can quickly contact the vet in case there is a problem with a specific lot number of medicine, whereas they can’t guarantee being able to contact you directly via 1800PetMeds since they do not communicate directly with said company.
- However, she also said my vet should be the one to contact me to check if they knew there was an issue with ANY lots, since many vets evidently don’t record a database of lot numbers given out to customers. Therefore, that aspect is of limited use.
Maybe you should get off your “expecting an apology” high horse and put your money where your mouth is and apologize to me for being a rude and inconsiderate person - since I was correct, and I wasn’t the one attacking or flaming you. I think it says a lot about you that you’re trying your best to get into a good old-fashioned Pit fight with someone who is mainly posting factual and reasoned rebuttals to your claims.
Y’know, I hang out in the Pit a fair amount. I like to think that I have destroyed the arguments/positions of other posters occasionally, and I’ve also had mine dissected and trashed. But I swear, I’ve never been able to thoroughly dismantle a post like Una Persson just did.
I am in awe.
Am I often like what, exactly, Una? Am I often prone to calling people with whom I’m having a friendly discussion “dear” or “honey” or “sweetie” or “darlin’”. Yes. Yes I am. Am I often prone to telling people who manufacture offense where none was intended to get the hell over themselves? Yes, I am. Am I often indifferent as to whether or not such people actually do get the hell over themselves? You bet; I have no control over the emotions and actions of other people, and there are far too many things I can control to spend much time worrying about the stuff I can’t.
I originally said that unless something had changed the Merial products sold online weren’t obtained through legitimate channels. Your response was that they did so sell Merial products, so obviously I was wrong. Quite the reasoned, logical response, that. (We’ll leave out your baseless accusations that the OP’s vet was ripping her off, as you seem so eager to ignore that part of my response to that post.) I responded that I never said they didn’t sell it, just that the last I knew they weren’t authorized by Merial to sell it. If you have a problem comprehending that “Well, they do so sell it, so there!” is not an appropriate response to “The stuff they sell isn’t obtained through legitimate channels,” you have some really huge honkin’ problems. They are, however, your problems and not mine. Frankly, I think it says quite a lot about you that you’re trying to create a fight where none exists, but that’s just me.
Anyhoo, I would like to state for the record that although Merial has not ever and does not now sell to online pet pharmacies, they do not at this time have a policy against veterinarians reselling their medications to such companies. Thank you, that is all.
Oh, and to shoot down the “one warm day in the middle of the winter puts your dog at risk for heartworms” theory, see the information on this Web site.
Some of the salient info: "In a study entitled ‘Seasonal Timing of Heartworm Chemoprophylaxis (Heartworm Meds) in the United States’, Dr. David Knight and James Lok of the American Heartworm Society have taken the guesswork out of when to start and stop heartworm prevention. It was found that specific conditions must exist in order for the larvae in the mosquito to move on to stage L3, allowing the mosquito to pass on heartworm through its mouthparts. The larvae require approximately 30 consecutive days of 60-degree weather where the temperature does not dip below 57F (14C) in order to reach this condition.
“Simply put, it must stay above 60 degrees for 30 consecutive days AND nights for the larvae to progress to stage L3 and be passed through the mouthparts of a mosquito to a host animal. If the temperature dips below 57F the maturation is retarded and cannot continue. This process would become accelerated if there were two weeks of temperature at or above 80F (27C), days AND nights. As a result, heartworm disease is not only geographically limited, but also seasonally limited. For many of us this means that year round heartworm prevention is totally unnecessary.” {Bolding mine - Sauron}
The American Heartworm Society confirms this report: “Laboratory studies indicate that development and maturation requires the equivalent of a steady 24-hour daily temperature in excess of 64[sup]o[/sup]F (18[sup]o[/sup]C) for approximately one month. Intermittent diurnal declines in temperature below the developmental threshold of 57[sup]o[/sup]F (14[sup]o[/sup]C) for only a few hours retard maturation, even when the average daily temperature supports continued development. At 80[sup]o[/sup]F (27[sup]o[/sup]C), 10 to 14 days are required for development of microfilariae to the infective stage.”
In the Ohio area, the recommended dates for heartworm medicine dosage begin in June and end in November. It appears to me that any vet who recommends and dispenses year-round dosages of heartworm medicine in that area is overmedicating dogs with little or no benefit to the animals. I dunno if you’d wanna classify that as “ripping somebody off,” but it does tend to put their actions in a slightly different light than that of simply looking out for the best interests of the animal.
Jackmanii, honey, I don’t know that the risk of getting heartworm over the winter is really any higher than that of an adult dog getting parvo, and I’ve never even heard a rumor about a dog over the age of a year and a half getting parvo. Still, every vet I’ve ever dealt with has recommended yearly parvo vaccines for adult dogs. Some of them recommend getting a booster three weeks later if you’re more than a couple months late, and some recommend six-month boosters for adult dogs. The latter was the protocol at my previous practice, which was in an area with a very high incidence of parvo. (Other clinics in town didn’t even keep parvo tests in stock because they didn’t need them; if we had less than two full boxes at any point during the summer, we were running really low.) Every practice evaluates the risk of a given situation and makes its own protocols. At every vet clinic where I’ve ever been a customer or an employee, the owning vet has felt the risk of winter heartworm infection was great enough to require either year-round preventative or annual testing.
What research did they base this decision on? I don’t know. I can’t even say for sure that any peer-reviewed studies in that region have been done. I just know the protocol the vets I’ve dealt with use, and the explanation they have always given me for that protocol. Since it’s always been the same protocol and the same explanation, it’s honestly never occured to me that they might just be pulling out of their asses.
Of course, heartworm preventative is somewhat different from parvovirus vaccination. You can’t kill a dog with a parvo vaccine. (Unless it has an anaphalactic reaction, which is vanishingly rare and would happen right there in the office where you can tube it and give IV drugs immediately, so you’d have a decent chance of pulling it through.) You can, however, kill a dog with heartworm preventative. Vets tend to be understandably cautious when it comes to potentially killing their patients.
I love our vet. Or, rather, I love our vets. It’s a four vet practice and all of them are just lovely.
A few years ago, I stopped by to pick up some cans of the special food my cat was on for kidney failure. (I knew what it was called then.) So I told the woman behind the desk that I needed a case of X food. And she looked at me most suspiciously and demanded to know if I had a prescription.
That threw me. Apparently I would want to spend three times more for food my cat doesn’t need. I said I didn’t have anything written and she again looked at me most suspiciously and demanded to know if my cat were a patient.
I said he certainly was and my name blah blah and his name blah blah blah and she still eyed me and sighed heavily and said she’d have to ask the doctor if it was okay. Imagine this said in a tone of ultimate sacrifice.
She seemed to feel pretty embarrassed, I think, when the doctor sailed through the door and demanded, “How is my Tuffy cat holding up?” And we chatted for about five minutes about him.
She’s still there and has calmed down considerably. I think she was new and feeling the weight of the world at first.
Though I still don’t understand why I needed a prescription for kidney diet.
To be honest, I thought I could just buy it at PetSmart. Turns out that what I saw was the flea medicine (the kind where you make a line on the back of the dog), which used to only be avail at the vet and now is avail everywhere. I didn’t realize that it would be easier for me to score crack cocaine than to get ahold of heartworm preventative. Trust me, I’ve learned my lesson. Once I get done cruising the Dope boards, I am making the hour trip to my old vet to pick up the written prescription and to transfer Bud’s file to the new vet. I really would hate for anything to happen to Bud. He’s a good dog.
The breeder I purchased my dog from has about 20 dogs in his yard and has always treated them himself with liquid Ivermectin purchased at the feed store. It costs about $30 a bottle and lasts several months even with the large amount of dogs he has. However, as a precaution he does have them tested about every 2 years. They are all champions and he isn’t so stupid to want to lose even one to something like heartworms.
I have a few dogs as well and have begun to medicate them for heartworms with the same liquid Ivermectin. The advice of the breeder was 1/10th of a cc for every 5 lbs. of body weight. I’m sure someone will come along to scold me for this practice but that’s ok. They’re my dogs and I spend enough at the vet as it is. I love my vets and wouldn’t dream of switching but I’m not rich and have to save where I can. Plus, if it works, why not use it?
All of that being said, I will have them tested at the very least every 18 months. Since I’ve just started this regiment I will have them tested at the end of this year and then again in 1 year. PunditLisa is a moron for not getting the test done. I wonder if she realizes how expensive it is to treat an infected dog? If you are attached to your pet I can tell you $400 is about the minimum it costs for treatment and there is no guaranty the dog will survive the treatment. They are treated with arsenic in low doses (or is it strychnine?) I’m sure CatLady can confirm which one but either way it is a highly toxic substance and a very costly porcedure. Of course if you don’t care about your pet so much then why even treat them for anything? Better question: Why do you have a pet? A dog can live many, many years before it dies from heartworms but it is no way for an animal to live IMO.
One of the links posted in this thread was very interesting and I wonder now if I should in fact treat every 45 days instead of every 30? Any thoughts on this CatLady? Also, what signs should I look for to determine if I’ve over medicated (signs of toxicity). Any help would be appreciated.
And if my treating them shows any negative signs I will return to the vet and use Heartgaurd again. Or, if one or more of my dogs tests positive I will also discontinue this practice and WILL have them treated. So please, save the lectures unless you have some hard facts showing what I am doing is harming the animals (which I am very open to hearing).
A side note: I called 888-MERIAL-1 and they stated they DO NOT sell medicine to any reseller like 800PETMEDS and will only deal with licensed Vet CLINICS. When i asked why something wasn’t being done to stop those resellers she could only say things are pending but of course she is not privy to all of the information. So CatLady is 100% correct, they DO NOT deal with those resellers and could not even speculate where they get they’re meds from. Like she told me “You’re guess is as good as mine but they don’t get it from us”.Take it for what it’s worth but I urge all of you purchasing from thos places to call the above number and to STOP purchasing from those places.
Ummm, read again. I DO have the test done, every single year.
Oh, dear God, please tell me you aren’t putting that miserable Hartz BioSpot shit on your animals. That’s the only flea preventative I can think of that’s available pretty much everywhere, and I would never, ever put it on an animal I cared about. I would douse them with pesticides from the garden section of Walmart before I would put that stuff on them.
Don’t buy that crap, it’s just pouring your money down a rathole. It’s pretty much concentrated flea spray. As such, it tends to not be terribly effective, it tends to wash off when they swim, have a bath, or get caught in a heavy rain, and if I had a dollar for every animal I’d seen have a neurotoxic reaction to it, I’d have a bigass pile of money I didn’t want. You’re much better off springing the extra money for Frontline–it’s water-proof and will last for a bare minimum of a month. Actually, with mainly indoor animals it usually lasts closer to three months (I pop it on mine 3-4x/year), and it’s got a money-back guarantee, which I’ve never seen on any OTC flea product. It can wind up saving you all kinds of money if your pets are prone to flea infestations, because you don’t have to buy flea shampoos, and flea bombs for your house, and vaccuum bags for sucking up the fleas from the carpeting, etc.
Out of curiosity, PL, how much does your vet charge for a heartworm snap test? It might save you money to switch your fuzzies over to year-round prevention and test every other year. At my old clinic, six months of Heartgard for a 100# dog cost less than a heartworm test. For a small dog, the Heartgard was roughly half the price of the test. And that’s if you bought it six months at a time. If you bought it a 12 doses at a time, you got a lower price and a $5 rebate on top of that, so taking your dogs off for the winter could actually wind up costing you a fair chunk of change, especially if you had multiple dogs.
Hooch, I would certainly hope you’d already spoken to your veterinarian about the signs of ivermectin toxicity and optimal dosing periodicity before starting such a program on the advice of a breeder. You have to be careful taking medical advice from such sources; some breeders are quite knowlegeable about veterinary care, and some are veritable fonts of dangerous misinformation. Like the woman who told a client that she should take a puppy with vomiting and diarrhea home and feed it ice cream, because the IV fluids and antibiotics we were giving it would make it sick. At any rate, you should be basing your dosages on miligrams, not mililiters. If you get something that’s a different concentration, it becomes awfully easy to overdose your dogs and kill them.
To add to the Biospot trashing, my sister put it on a kitten she adopted several years ago, and watched the poor kitten die pitifully. She wrote off to Biospot for copies of its safety testing; according to her, their safety testing consisted entirely of testing on ten adult cats. The label does not mention that it’s only safe for adults, however.
I’d stay far away from it, too.
Daniel
Not only does the Biospot-type stuff make our dogs sick (no, I did NOT buy it!) it doesn’t work at all. Not even for a few days.
I dug up some links warning about Hartz/Biospot - the second link mentions that the possibility of severe reactions isn’t always even printed on the package, and that Frontline/Advantage should be given instead.
PunditLisa: My apologies for the comment if you do indeed have them tested every year. However, when you skip months it does put them at risk. It’s only a few more dollars to keep them treated year round.
CrazyCatLady: I did not consult my vet but I will this week. I already know he’s going to tell me not to do this but maybe if I pay the consultation fee he will at least advise me on how to do it correctly. My breeder is one of the very knowledgable people and I trust him to not steer me wrong. I do love my dogs though and I will consult my vet. I don’t see why the concentration of Ivermectin would ever differ. Farmers rely on these products for their cattle and that would seem ridiculous to change the concentration. Sorry, I don’t buy that arguement for even a second.
So no thoughts on a 45 day regiment as opposed to 30 days?
Please see my post earlier in the thread. Skipping cold months does NOT put your dogs at risk, unless you have an unseasonably warm winter (30 straight days or more of lows no less than 57[sup]o[/sup] F).
According to the American Heartworm Society, most “monthly” heartworm medications are effective for 45 days. So you’re safe if you use that schedule. I’d check with the vet and/or the manufacturer of the treatment, just to be sure. I’d also want to carefully keep track of the days so I’m not missing a dose.