24 HOUR EMERGENCY AND CRITICAL CARE FOR YOUR PET

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What We Recommend for Puppies

 The following services are considered routine for a new puppy.

*Refills on heartworm preventative, other medications, or further diagnostics or treatment for problems found on the exam will involve additional charges.

Physical exam:  Just like people, pets should have an annual physical to look for problems that may have arisen since the last visit.  In addition, many owners have specific areas of concern  they want addressed at the physical, including masses or lumps they’ve felt, itchy skin, ear infections, or other problems.  Estimates can be prepared for the further diagnosis or treatment of problems found.  Often, the doctor can detect a problem on the annual exam before it is bad enough for the owner to notice anything is wrong.  In this way, potentially serious problems can be controlled or cured before the pet has even begun suffering or showing symptoms.  The importance of an annual physical exam cannot be overstated.

Fecal test:  We also have a big problem with intestinal parasites here in the South.  All dogs should be tested yearly for intestinal parasites, which include roundworms, hookworms, whipworms, and coccidia among others.  All of these parasites can cause serious health problems for dogs.  Tapeworms are one parasite that can be hard to detect with this test, but usually this can be diagnosed other ways. The client can bring in a fresh stool sample from their dog(s) as long as it is less than six hours old.  Otherwise, we can usually retrieve a sample here.     

DHLP-P  Vaccine:  A combination vaccine that helps induce immunity against distemper, hepatitis, leptospirosis, parainfluenza, and parvo. Dogs should be vaccinated annually for these diseases.  All of these diseases can be very expensive to try to treat, and in some cases can be fatal despite treatment.  Several of these diseases are very common, and unvaccinated dogs are at high risk for contracting them.  Corona vaccine is added to this combination for certain ages of dogs (<2 and >10 years of age).

Rabies vaccine:  Vaccination for this disease is required by law.  More importantly, there still is no cure for rabies,  even in humans. We also recommend boostering this vaccine any time a dog current on rabies  vaccine gets in a fight with an unknown animal.

Bordetella:  This vaccine helps provide protection against the bacterial component of the respiratory tract infection that used to be called “kennel cough”.  Dogs do not have to be boarded to be exposed to the bordetella bronchisepticum bacteria.  The vaccine comes as either a spray that is administered  into one or both nostrils, or an injection for dogs that will not tolerate the intranasal spray.  The  injection may take two weeks to induce an immune response, while the spray may take as little as  two days.  Dogs that get this disease often cough continually for a month or even two, and may suffer permanent scarring in the respiratory tract.

Lyme vaccine:  Lyme disease is spread by ticks.  Incidence of this disease in dogs is increasing.  We do not  recommend vaccinating for Lyme disease if the dog is never exposed to ticks (i.e. strictly indoor dogs) but do recommend it for all others.  Lyme disease is insidious in that often major damage is done in the body before clinical signs even appear. 

 ***The list of services above are our best recommendations for the routine annual visit.  If you do not wish one or more of these services to be performed, we ask that you clearly inform the attending staff member.  Thank you choosing Two Notch Road Animal Clinic, and on behalf of your pet, thank you for giving him or her the best possible care!***

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Copyright © 2006 Palmetto Regional Emergency Hospital for Animals
Last modified: 04/29/08