Who doesn’t like seeing their lovable, adorable creature hopping and wagging their tails joyfully across each corner of the house? As a dog parent it is obvious to love your dog’s energetic nature but on the contracting side, this very habit exposes your dog to various health risking threat, one of them being, parasitic attack. But how do we discover it? Well! Has your dog lost appetite lately? Does he vomit out anything that it eats throughout the day? Or is his potty appearing belly like? In either of the situation, you dogs need a medical attention and an immediate visit to the vet because these are the possible signs of presence of worms in your dog.

We understand your concern toward your beloved pet as a dog parent!

CONFIRMING THE WORMS IN YOUR DOG’S BODY

If you see any such sign that may be a symptom of worms in your dog, you need to consult your vet at the earliest. There are various possibilities to confirm the presence of worms in its body. The most preferred test that your vet performs is the fresh stool check-up where he checks the stool of your dog under a microscope to discover probable worms in it. In case of heartworm (a type of worm found in the dog’s blood), it gets transferred from the blood of one dog to another and can be tested in the clinic by taking the blood sample of your dog. In either of the cases, it is important to diagnose your dogs at the earliest to save him from major threats that a worm can cause.

WHAT ARE THE TYPES OF WORMS FOUND IN A DOG’S BODY?

Now that you know about probable threats of worms in your dog, it is also important to have a clear cut insight on the types of worms and the scenarios, whereby these can affect your dogs:

1) Tapeworm

This tiny rice-like, nutrition sucking worm is the most common one found in the dog’s body. In fact, they are inevitable! Tapeworm starts developing in the intestine of your dog after a span of every 3 months (no matter how safe you keep him), where deworming is the only solution (consult a vet before you choose to do something).

2) Roundworms

These round shaped warms are the nutrition sucking worms that enter the intestinal tracts of the dog through licking its egg found on the feces of insects such as earthworms, roaches, and birds (that might be there in your garden).

3) Whipworms

As a matter of fact, these 2 inches whip-like parasites are comparatively less harmful to your dog’s health. On the contradicting side, these worms enter the dog’s body through consumption of contaminated soil and it is nearly impossible to remove them from the soil. The best you can do is, plan a monthly check-up of your dog to specifically focus on the parasites or keep a dose of dewormer intact.

4) Hookworm

The deadliest of all, hookworms are a blood-sucking parasite which can be fatal for young puppies. These teeth looking worms are usually developed from the egg, passed in the feces on infected animals which mature in the warm and damp environment. They usually stick to the paws of the dog and enters the body when the dog licks itself. These are the possible worms that might have entered in your innocent dog’s body, if he is showing the above-mentioned symptoms. The parasite infection can be minor to fatal depending upon the time period of the infection. In this scenario, it is important to take your dog through a deworming process after consulting the vet.

WHAT IS DEWORMING?

Deworming is the process of eliminating the ghost parasites from the body of the dogs that enter through feces of larvae and through swallowing their eggs that come in contact with your dog’s body (also develops on the skin on the dog and cause allergy). They stick to the intestine of the dog’s body and extract nutrition’s from the tissue. You can opt for deworming your pet by medicating him the best available dewormers after consulting your vet.

HOW TO DEWORM YOUR DOG?

The parasitic infection in a dog is inevitable and hence, all we can do is prepare for the best. You should always schedule a quarterly to monthly check-up of your dog, depending upon its health, to ensure it is free from any such attack. Further there are various oral medicines that can be given to the dogs with proper check-up and consultation of the vet. Following are the oral medical treatment options that can be used to deworm your dog:

Oral Liquids: Oral liquid comes in various packaging and size.
- Savavet kiwof dewormer for puppy oral suspension 15 ml
- Cipla Mexam oral suspension 32 ml
- Cipla Clinvet Clindamycin Hydrochloride Oral Solution 20 ml

Tablets: Comparatively, it’s quite difficult to feed tablet to your dogs and are usually dissolved into its food consumption. They are as follows
- Virbac Ipraz Ivermectin and Praziquantel Tablets 2 Tabs
- Savavet Kiwof Dewormer for Dogs 4 Tablets
- Bayer Drontal Plus Dewormer 20 Tablets
- Zoetis Alfanil 2 tabs

XL Tablets: The recommendable XL tablets are as follows
- Savavet kiwof Dewormer for Dogs 4 Tablets for XL
- All4Pets Wormtek XL Dewormer 12 Tablets

You can buy these oral treatments, tablets and XL tablets for your dogs and feed it the right dosage according to the chart given below.

As a precaution, deworm your dogs every three months and if you spot symptoms even before three months, re-dose the dewormer and continue to treat your dog.

Note: Please use these treatments for your dog only after a vet consultation.

CREATE A PERFECT BALANCE OF DOSE

Treating your adorable dogs with delicacy is important because they are not just lovable but can’t really vent out their pain to you. Even when giving them the dewormer, there is a certain dosage limitation that you should maintain for your dog’s well-being. Consult the dosage chart below to limit the consumption according to the body weight of the dog (applicable to dogs across all breeds).

ORAL TABLET SOLUTION
• ½ -2kg bodyweight = 1/4 tablet*
• 2-5 kg bodyweight = 1/2 tablet*
• 6-19 kg bodyweight = 1 tablet*
• 11-15 kg bodyweight = 1 ½ tablets*
• 16-20 kg bodyweight = 2 tablets*
• 21-25 kg bodyweight = 2 ½ tablets*
• 26-30 kg bodyweight = 3 tablets*
• 31-35 kg bodyweight = 3 ½ tablets*
• 36-40 kg bodyweight = 4 tablets*

*Applicable on all the available tablets for deworming.

ORAL LIQUID SOLUTION
• 2-4 kg bodyweight = 1 ml*
• 4-6 kg bodyweight = 2 ml*
• 6-9 kb bodyweight = 3 ml*
• 9-11 kg bodyweight = 4 ml*
• 11-13 kg bodyweight = 5 ml*
• 13-15 kg bodyweight = 6 ml*
• 15- 18 kg bodyweight = 7 ml*
• 18- 20 kg bodyweight = 8 ml*
• 20- 22 kg bodyweight = 9ml*
• 22-24 kg bodyweight = 10ml*
• 24- 27 kg bodyweight = 11ml*
• 27-30 kg bodyweight = 12ml*

*Applicable on all available syrups for deworming.

WHAT ARE THE POSSIBLE SIDE EFFECTS OF DEWORMING IN DOGS?

As much as these medications are useful in giving relief to your dog, there are chances of some unusual behaviour in it after the deworming dose. But the good news is, these behaviours or the effect of deworming is self- limiting, that can be controlled with required time and it’s usually not serious. The average effect time last for not more than 12-24 hrs and eventually the worms get detached from your dog’s tissue. Meanwhile some common side-effects of deworming can be:
- Vomiting
- Stomach-ache
- Fatigue
- Gastro issues

You might notice, dead worms appearing into your dog’s vomit or stool (as the affect the medication).

Congratulations! After this scenario, your dog is out of danger. Keeping your dog medically fit is important for its well-being. As far as deworming is concerned, keep your dog’s hygienic and take good care of the food they eat to avoid such situation in future. After all, the free-flow of constant barking and over-loaded cuteness should never stop! Here is wishing happy dog parenting to you and a healthy life to your cute and mischievous dog.