Is Your Pet Bugged?
You may get more than you bargained for when you cuddle your new puppy or kitten. Many pets are born with intestinal worms transmitted from their mother, while in utero or through milk, or they pick up parasites in their environment. Since resisting adorable puppy or kitten kisses is impossible, South Shore Veterinary Hospital wants your family to know that they can be at risk for zoonotic parasitic infections until your furry new pal is dewormed appropriately for parasites.
Intestinal parasites also can affect your adult cat or dog, who can pick them up in unsanitary outdoor areas, or from wildlife. But, monthly heartworm preventives can protect your pet from most intestinal parasites, because heartworm prevention medication includes parasite preventives.
Common zoonotic parasites that can be transmitted from pets to people include:
- Roundworms — Roundworms live in the intestines of cats, dogs, and many wildlife species. Their hardy eggs can survive sunlight and freezing temperatures for years in the soil, while they wait to infect people or animals. When a person ingests roundworm eggs, by handling their pet or contaminated soil, without immediately washing their hands, the eggs hatch in their intestines, burrow through the body and create cysts.
- Hookworms — Hookworms live in dogs’ and cats’ intestines, and can be transmitted when people contact fecal-contaminated soil. The larvae burrow under the skin, causing itching and infection, and can penetrate the eyes if a person rubs them with their infected hand.
- Tapeworms — Tapeworms must pass through fleas to continue their life cycle, and can infect people who touch their pet who has fleas, and then eat without washing their hands. Small children, who put most things in their mouths, are at the highest risk for developing a tapeworm infection.
- Toxoplasma — Toxoplasma is an intestinal parasite found in cats that can spread through contaminated soil, by eating meat from an animal who lived on contaminated soil, or from contact with infective feces in a litter box. People also can get toxoplasmosis from petting their cat, and then eating without hand-washing. A person infected with the Toxoplasma parasite may experience sore muscles and flu-like symptoms, and a pregnant woman’s baby can suffer brain damage.
Before snuggling your furry friend too close, contact us to drop off a fecal sample for us to examine, so we can determine whether your pet is “bugged,” and prescribe the appropriate treatment.