Dog Veterinary Care

Ulti-mutt Care For Your Dog

Our Dog Veterinary Services will keep your pet healthy and happy through both preventative and diagnostic medical care.

All services include Aftercare Support for our patients and clients.

Dog and Puppy Vaccinations

Vaccination Schedule: The Pittsworth Veterinary Surgery recommend vaccinations at 6, 9 and 12 weeks of age for your puppy, and 12 monthly thereafter.

We feel that this protocol allows your puppy to be old enough to avoid any antibodies from their mother’s milk from interfering with the vaccine, whilst also being the earliest time possible to ensure your puppy is able to get out and socialise quicker.

Recommended Vaccines: We recommend all dogs are vaccinated with a C5 vaccine which covers for Parvovirus, Hepatitis, Distemper and the 2 components of Canine cough.

Dog Vaccinations Available:

Canine Cough: Bordatella / Parainfluenza
C3: Distemper, Hepatitis, Parvovirus
C5 / 5 in 1: C3 + Canine Cough (Required for boarding kennels)
Rabies: Only available with special license following exposure to a bat

Vaccination products we use:

Companion MSD C3
Nobivac DHP MSD
Nobivac K (Canine cough) MSD
Nobivac Bb/Pi MSD injectable

Flea and Tick Treatments

Fleas can be a real pain to get under control, so like most things prevention is better than treatment!

Flea Treatment Schedule: The majority of flea control comes in monthly options but there are 3 and 6 monthly options also – here at the clinic we offer:

Tablets
Chewable forms
Spot-ons

Tick Treatment: Tick control is targeted at the deadly Paralysis tick. While we tend to be just too far West to have the tick at Pittsworth, we see plenty of cases from closer to Toowoomba as well as animals that have been on a holiday to the coast.

Wildlife also bring in many ticks and can just burden your dog. Treatment can be helpful in this instance also. Recently in WA and NT, introduction of Ehrlichia canis rickettsia from overseas (transmitted by the brown dog tick that we readily have here) can cause your pet to die if not properly treated so best to prevent when you can.

If you plan on taking your pet with you on a holiday please take this into consideration and consider some prevention. Tick Paralysis can be a deadly disease.

Products for Dog Flea and Tick Treatment

Advocate
Frontline Spray
Bravecto Chewables and spot ons
Simparica
Simparica Trio
Advantage

Dog and Puppy Worming

Worming Schedule: All puppies should be wormed every 2 weeks from birth until they are 12 weeks of age, then monthly until 6 months of age. From here on we recommend that dogs are wormed every 3 months.

Intestinal worms such as Hookworm and Roundworm can cause serious problems to you pets, as well as being a risk to you also. The younger the animal the more susceptible they are, hence the different worming protocols.

Heartworm prevention is recommended from 3 months of age. The two main options recommended are either monthly tablets which can be done at home, or the Proheart SR12 injection which lasts for 12 months in adult dogs. Please call us to tailor a Heartworm prevention program to your pet.

What to worm against:

Heartworm – Proheart, Milbemax. Components of Heartworm are in some flea / tick products
Roundworms
Tapeworms
Hookworms
Whipworms

Products for Dog Worm Treatments

Drontal Liquid for puppies
Milbemax
Endogard
Popantel
Biltricide

Ear Mites

If your dog is excessively scratching their ears, black discharge or shaking their head, they might have a case of ear mites. They are contagious and are best to get on top of early.

We can diagnose and treat dog ear mites before they become a more significant issue for your pet.



Dog and Puppy Microchipping

Dog Microchipping involves a small microchip being placed under your pets skin. Whilst it is a bigger needle, it is most commonly inserted whilst your dog is awake usually between 8-12 weeks of age.

It contains information that allows the owners to be contacted should the dog be lost. Microchipping laws have been in place since 2009 that state all animals, dogs and cats, need to be microchipped in Queensland to be given away or sold.

Microchipping is very worthwhile as registration of the microchip number helps to prove ownership as well as allowing your dog to be returned to you. Many local councils will have laws about having your dog microchipped too.

If you have any questions about having your dog or puppy microchipped, please ring and we can discuss this with you.

Dog Desexing

Desexing is a vital component of routine prevention for your pet. Some of the conditions that can be prevented by early desexing of male and female dogs includes;

Pyometra: a life threatening uterine infection
Mammary tumours: did you know the incidence of mammary tumours in female dogs is reduced to just 0.5% if speyed BEFORE their first heat.
Prostate disease
Prostate cancer
Testicular cancer
Unwanted litters: are you able to pay initial vaccination, worming and feeding costs for puppies, then find lifelong homes for each?
Pregnancy and whelping complications: did you know the cost of a caesarean is in excess of $1300.
Unwanted behaviours: For larger breeds where their adult weights reach greater than 25-30kg, we don’t recommend desexing them until they are over 1 year of age. This is due to being determined that early desexing of larger breeds can lead to joint abnormalities such as cruciate disease more readily.

Give us a call to discuss your castration or spaying needs.

Dental Care for Dogs

Preventative care for tooth disease in dogs is highly recommended so brushing your dogs teeth is not as silly as it sounds. Did you know that brushing your dogs teeth can reduce plaque by 90-95% using a special brush and paste? We offer advice on dog dental hygiene for prevention of tooth disease, as well as full mouth examinations to look for issues such as:

Root Exposure
Fractured, Loose and Painful Teeth
Tooth Abscesses

Following the dental examination, we offer

Professional Dog Teeth Cleaning using our specialised machine
Tooth Polishing
Dog Teeth Removal as required

Dog Dental Disease Preventatives: We stock the following dental preventative products for dogs:

Hills T/D Food
Advance Dental
Whimzees
Oxyfresh
Oravet
Pigs Ears

You can read more about canine oral health with our Pet Dental Care Article or give us a call.

X-Rays and Ultrasounds

X-Rays: We take high quality Radiographs, and send them to other clinics such as referral practices easily with our digital X-Ray machine. We offer:

Ava Hip and Elbow Scoring Radiographs
Common Dog x-rays for Limbs, Stomach, Head, Hip and Pregnancy.

Ultrasounds: We have an ultrasound machine allowing for bladder ultrasounds, abdominal issue scans and pregnancy checks.

Dog and Puppy Vet Health Checks

Regular dog check ups are a great way to stay on top of any issues that may be on the way. The age of the dog will determine how often you should get them checked.

We’ll ask a few questions around the dogs diet, exercise, bowel movements and routine to get a better understanding of them, before conducting a thorough physical examination. We’ll check a range of areas that can show early signs of issues including:

Alertness
Behaviour
Body and coat condition
Eyes, ears, nose, mouth and teeth health
Heart, lungs, abdomen, locomotion and musculoskeletal assessment

Orthopedic Surgery

We offer basic dog orthopedic surgery for common surgeries such as:

Basic Plating / Pinning Fractured Bones
Amputation
Femoral Head Ostectomy
DeAnglis Cruciate Surgery

For complex procedures, we have a mobile specialist surgeon available for consultations and surgeries. Read more about our Clinic Surgeries here or give us a call.

Dog Grooming

We offer limited dog grooming services with a local pet grooming service available in Pittsworth. Our service includes:

Nail Clipping

Dermatology

Excessive scratching, licking, red or irritated skin or loss of hair are some of the common symptoms of dog skin conditions. We diagnose and treat common conditions such as:

Fleas
Mange
Demodex
Ringworm
Hotspots

Opthamology

Your dog requires healthy eyes just like you and unfortunately, they can develop various eye conditions. We diagnose and treat common eye issues such as:

Ulcers
Keratitis
Pannus
Dry Eye

Reproductive and Canine Artificial Insemination (AI)

We offer the following reproductive services for dogs so you can get the most out of your stud animals:

Canine Artificial Insemination (AI) with fresh collected semen only
Progesterone Testing

DNA Testing

All that’s involved is taking a simple swab of your pets cheek to send away. Please call us to discuss further.

Genetic testing of your dogs DNA is a great way to get a better understanding of your dogs makeup. An individual breed will generally have their own susceptibilities to particular diseases, as well as physical and personality traits.

Once known, it can be used for better preventative care and diagnosis, and improved diet and wellness plans.

Blood Tests

We can run blood tests and get the results within 30 minutes with our in house haematology and biochemistry machines to get the diagnosis and treatment sooner. Commonly we use blood tests for:

Complete health profiles
Pre anaesthetics
Thyroid test
Progesterone test
Renal testing

l

Dog Prescriptions and Medications

We issue a range of Dog Prescription Medication to help manage and relieve a range of issues we see in dogs of all ages. Scripts are available to fill at the clinic pharmacy. Some of the common medications we issue for dogs includes:

Dog Anxiety Relief (Prozac, Clomicalm)
Dog Antibiotics
Anti Inflammatories
Arthritis Relief (Zydax, 4cyte Gel, 4cyte, Antinol) – Read more about Dog Arthritis
Antihistamines
Allergy Relief (Apoquel, Cytopoint, Cyclosporin, Niralone)
Dog Epilepsy
Dog Dementia
Sleep Medication

Nutritional and Behavioural Advice

Nutritional Advice: Dog obesity can cause a range of issues for your pet including issues such as Osteoarthritis, Skin Disease, and Type 2 Diabetes among others. We can ensure your pet gets a balanced healthy diet to aid in prevention of the issues associated with obesity.

Behavioural Advice: Behaviours such as barking, chewing, digging and scratching may be completely normal for dogs. However they can quickly become destructive behaviours.

We’ll help you to understand why they might be doing those behaviours with recommendations to their routines and interactions to restore behaviour to an acceptable level.