Wellness and Preventive Care

Wellness care focuses on maintaining your pet’s health over their lifetime. Disease prevention through regular vaccination and parasite prevention plays a large role in keeping your pet healthy.

Early Detection is Key In addition to a routine physical exam, we may recommend blood work to further evaluate your pet’s organ function. Although your pet may seem healthy, routine testing can reveal underlying problems before they cause obvious clinical signs. Early detection often allows us to provide treatment to eliminate an infection, or slow disease progression. Normal blood work results assure you that your pet is healthy, and provide baseline values to which we can compare future results. As your pet grows older, routine blood work becomes an even more critical part of their regular wellness visits, since the risk for disease and organ failure increases with age.  Head-to-Tail Exam During your pet’s visit, our veterinary team will perform a thorough nose-to-tail exam to check for any obvious health problems. We will review your pet’s body condition, weight, and overall health status. We will also answer any questions you may have about your pet’s overall wellness, including their behavior, diet, and any concerning changes. 

Vaccinations Routine vaccination is critical to protect your pet from dangerous, life-threatening diseases. Many pathogenic organisms are prevalent in the environment, and exposure is unavoidable. Vaccination helps your pet safely build immunity against these pathogens, so they can fight off infections and diseases. 

The vaccines your pet receives will depend on their lifestyle and risk factors. Instead of a one-size-fits-all approach, we will determine which infectious diseases your pet is likely to be exposed to, and administer the appropriate vaccines. 

Parasite Prevention

Your pet is susceptible to a number of internal and external parasites that can cause problems ranging from mild irritation to deadly disease transmission. During your pet’s wellness visit, we will perform routine screening for common parasites, and the diseases they can transmit. Parasites of concern include:

  • Heartworms — Microscopic, larval heartworms are passed by mosquitoes. As the worms mature, they travel to the heart and lung vessels, where they cause intense inflammation, and obstruct blood flow. Without treatment, heartworm disease is deadly. Cats are also susceptible to heartworm disease, although no curative treatment is available for them. Year-round heartworm prevention is critical for all dogs and cats.
  • Fleas — In addition to causing an itchy bite, fleas can transmit diseases such as bartonellosis, murine typhus, and tapeworm infections. We recommend year-round prevention to keep your pet flea-free.

 

  • Ticks — Ticks can transmit a range of diseases, including Lyme disease, ehrlichiosis, anaplasmosis, and Rocky Mountain spotted fever. We recommend annual testing for tick-borne infections, and year-round tick prevention to keep your pet safe.
  • Intestinal parasites — Dogs and cats can pick up a number of intestinal parasites, including roundworms, hookworms, whipworms, coccidia, and Giardia, from the environment. We recommend annual fecal analysis to screen for these parasites. Some heartworm preventives also protect against intestinal worms.

  • Heartworms — Microscopic, larval heartworms are passed by mosquitoes. As the worms mature, they travel to the heart and lung vessels, where they cause intense inflammation, and obstruct blood flow. Without treatment, heartworm disease is deadly. Cats are also susceptible to heartworm disease, although no curative treatment is available for them. Year-round heartworm prevention is critical for all dogs and cats.
  • Fleas — In addition to causing an itchy bite, fleas can transmit diseases such as bartonellosis, murine typhus, and tapeworm infections. We recommend year-round prevention to keep your pet flea-free.
  • Ticks — Ticks can transmit a range of diseases, including Lyme disease, ehrlichiosis, anaplasmosis, and Rocky Mountain spotted fever. We recommend annual testing for tick-borne infections, and year-round tick prevention to keep your pet safe.
  • Intestinal parasites — Dogs and cats can pick up a number of intestinal parasites, including roundworms, hookworms, whipworms, coccidia, and Giardia, from the environment. We recommend annual fecal analysis to screen for these parasites. Some heartworm preventives also protect against intestinal worms.

Microchipping A microchip provides permanent identification that can help your pet return home safely, should they become lost or run away. A microchip is the size of a rice grain, and is injected under the skin between your pet’s shoulder blades. Implantation is no more painful than a vaccine injection, and can be performed during a normal office visit. After placement, you must register your pet’s microchip and provide your contact information, so you can be contacted in the event your lost pet is found. Most animal shelters and veterinary hospitals have microchip scanners, and they scan all lost pets, in the hopes of reuniting them with their owners.

Contact us if you have any questions about wellness or preventive care for your pet, or to schedule an appointment.