Holistic Care : Heartworm in Dogs : Prevention Options

We recommend using daily Filaribits (Diethylcarbamazine Citrate) as your heartworm preventative. Daily Filaribits has a longstanding reputation for being one of the safest heartworm preventatives on the market and is one of the only ones recommended for use in pregnant females. Filaribits acts by killing L3 and L4 larvae before they develop further and begin their migration into the blood vessels.

Please note: we do *not* recommend using Filaribits Plus as it contains oxibendazole which is known to cause liver damage in dogs.

If your pet has not been on any heartworm medication before, it is very important that you do a blood test to see if there are any existing microfilariae in the blood prior to starting on Filaribits Daily. Filaribits need to be given every day during heartworm season. Please refer to our section on "Calculating Risks" to get an idea of when heartworm season is in your area. No matter which prevention option you use, make sure you test your dogs yearly for heartworm, just to be on the safe side.

Herbal Protocol: The following is a herbal protocol for heartworm prevention for dogs over 50 lbs, that some folks have been using with a lot of success. I have included it here for your reference.

The first week (seven days) of every month:
AM: 2 capsules of Artemisia on an empty stomach
PM: 1 capsule of Artemisia on an empty stomach
Feed these as close to twelve hours apart.

All year long:
5 days out of each week (Mon-Fri): 1/2 capsule of Black Walnut, with food.

Homeopathic Nosode: This is another option for those of you interested in an all-natural option to heartworm prevention. The purpose of a nosode is to prime the immune system, i.e. to recognize a pathogen and mount an immune response when challenged.

Homeopathic remedies are prepared from any substance that in its original form can have a toxic effect or exert a chemical change on the body. A homeopathic tincture is an alcohol or water and alcohol solution of an animal, vegetable, or mineral compound. Soluble substances are prepared directly into tinctures; insoluble substances are first diluted with an inert substance such as lactose, triturated (ground), and then suspended in the solvent (water or water and alcohol).

A nosode is an isolate of a disease organism that starts as a tincture and then is “potentized” or potentiated by making serial dilutions and then “succussed” (a specified type of shaking that adds kinetic energy to the dilutions). The final product is dried and pelleted for oral administration.

For further information on nosodes and to purchase the Heartworm Nosode, please visit the Natural Rearing website run by Marina Zacharias.