That's a great question. With core vaccines like rabies and the FVRCP, if your cat is vaccinated, the protection there will be excellent. So the answer to that is yes. The leukemia vaccine is also highly effective, but ideally, the information you would need would be the other cat’s status. If you have another cat that you're bringing into the house, they must have a leukemia and feline AIDS test done before understand if they are positive because that will potentially put your cat at risk. With that said, the leukemia vaccine is very effective, so most of the time, we are pretty comfortable with that. Still, it’s vital to understand the status so that you can help control environmental exposure.

Stuff happens, and sometimes the vaccine dates are off. The best thing to do is get in as quickly as possible so that the veterinarian can discuss lifestyle with you and make the appropriate recommendations on which vaccines need to be continued and how often. If you've missed the initial booster series—for example, if a leukemia vaccine was given, and then you miss the booster a month later, if it's beyond six weeks from the initial vaccine, it does have to be started over. And so you have to do the initial series of two vaccines a month apart. The immune system must get that initial boost to provide the full immunity that we want.

If your cat has never had vaccines before, most of the vaccines require a booster. The one notable distinction is the rabies vaccine, which does not need a booster right after. In Tarrant County, Texas, the law states the first vaccine given for rabies has to be one year. After that, it can be every three years if we have a documented record of a one-year rabies vaccine. So that's how rabies works. The initial FVRCP vaccine—which is the other core viral vaccine in cats—is typically boostered a month later. As an adult cat, it's been shown that the FVRCP vaccine produces a robust immune response. With cats with a history of at least a vaccine previously with FVRCP as an adult cat, we give that vaccine every three years. The non-core leukemia vaccine, which is given based on the cat’s lifestyle, has to be boostered a month after the initial vaccine and then annually after that.

That's a great question because there is a vector for heartworm disease. If we could get rid of mosquitoes, that would get rid of heartworm disease. As you’re likely aware, mosquitoes transmit all kinds of diseases. And if we could eradicate mosquitoes, there would be lots of diseases that we would be able to get rid of. Unfortunately, that's just not the case. So even a strictly indoor dog, which is rare, that never steps foot outside is still going to be at risk in Texas because mosquitoes fly. They can get into the house, bite your dog, and transmit heartworm disease. You can do things in the environment to reduce your mosquito exposure, which I think is helpful and useful. Still, it in no way makes it okay for your dog to not be on heartworm prevention because you can never guarantee there won't be a mosquito in the environment.

At this point, no. There is not anything effective for treating heartworm disease. And so the simple answer to that is no, there's not.

Yeah, that's a great question. If you get on the internet, you're going to see many talks about heartworm preventions being a slow kill heartworm treatment. Unfortunately, that is not the case. There has been some recent research with one topical product, as the ingredient moxidectin was shown to at least shorten the adult heartworm lifespan. But it's still not considered an adulticide or something that kills or treats the heartworms. Heartworm prevention is part of the treatment in the sense of preventing further infection, but it's not a treatment for adult heartworms. That is a different treatment that needs to be done that has a much higher likelihood of clearing the infection of the adult worms.

That's always the question because heartworm preventions are so effective. The answer to that is yes because, especially in Texas, we have one of the highest incidences of heartworm disease in the entire country. And heartworm prevention is not 100% effective, so even if you give it consistently, I have had dogs come back positive. And this is true even when we were sure that the owners were giving it consistently. So that happens rarely, but it can. And realistically, many dogs, if not most dogs, are not on the prevention 100% accurately and on time all the time. These little lapses can turn into an issue as well.

Most, if not all, FDA-approved heartworm preventions are incredibly effective—in fact, over 99% effective. That's very fortunate because, again, in Texas, heartworm disease is such a big deal. Having prevention that we can be very confident in is a very good thing.

Every dog, especially in Texas, should start heartworm prevention by eight weeks of age. If your pet's over eight weeks of age, then get them on prevention as soon as possible. Mosquitoes, which transmit heartworm disease, will bite a young puppy and an adult dog, so we need to start them by eight weeks.

The big categories to think of are the monthly oral preventions, such as a chew or tablet that you give monthly. There are a couple of topical options that you put on with a little liquid directly on the skin that get absorbed systemically to act as heartworm prevention. Then, there is one injectable heartworm prevention that's given under the skin that lasts for six or 12 months, depending on which product it is.