Tick borne diseases and spot-on preventatives / long

I probably should have posted this a long time ago. Apologies.
My boy has tested mild positive for lyme once, mild positive for ehrliciosis once, and high positive for lyme once (requiring treatment).
All this while he was on Vectra-3D, faithfully and carefully applied. I've applied spot-ons to hundreds of dogs here at the kennel, so it's not like I don't know what I'm doing. Have never forgotten one of his doses. I don't get him wet for 48 hours before or after a dose.
So I called the folks at Vectra-3D and told them I was not a very happy customer. Immediately they questioned me about his swimming and bathing habits. I told them that he swims and/or gets a bath about 2-3 times per week.
WELL
They said that the eficacy of ALL of the spot-ons declines to less than 80 percent by 3 weeks with that level of water exposure. I pointed out that their literature says that it's still effective after swimming or bathing, and was told that the assumption is that the dog baths/swims a couple of times a month, not a couple of times per week. I was told to talk to my vet about "alternative treatment schedules" because they are not allowed to recommend anything that would be considered "off-label" but that "vets are aware that a different treatment schedule is necessary for dogs with high water exposure".
So I talked to my vet. Yep. If your dog has that much water exposure, you need to appy the spot-on treatments every 3 weeks, not once per month. At the end of 3 weeks, only 4 out of 5 ticks are being killed, to put it in different terms.
I called and confirmed this with both Frontline Plus and Advantage. It's true for all of them.
SO....you may think your dog is protected.....but he may not be.
We have gone to an every 3 week dose during tick season here, and in his most recent blood panel he tested negative for all the TBS (we send out a full panel, not an in-office read panel) for the first time in a long time.
BTW, the folks from Vectra gave me 9 free doses because he contracted the TBDs while on Vectra.

Good to know, Barb. Thanks for posting.

I've applied FL every 3 weeks during tick season for quite a while now. My vet has told people that for probably the last 7 years at least, that I know of, and it's been posted on here before as well. Some boxes of FL that I must have gotten online and were from outside the US a couple years ago even had the directions to apply every three weeks under certain circumstances. Not sure why the manufacturers here can't give the same info right on the box but having used FL for 10+ years now, and having tried other products, FL works the best for me for ticks, applied at 3 week intervals. I don't believe any topical is 100% prevention however, so I don't expect my dogs are never going to get a TBD, living where we do, regardless of what I put on them, and use doxy prophylactically.

I was pretty annoyed at the fact that their literature says that swimming and bathing are okay, and told them so. They really need to change that statement to reflect the fact that "nominal" swimming and bathing don't change the effectiveness.

Good thread, Barb. The product people need to know that...there are some dogs that hardly ever touch water and probably seldom bathed either. Then there is kind of a middle ground..maybe just bathing or some swimming here and there...bathing and swimming as you say, maybe 2-3 times a week.

However, they need to also consider working retrievers (or any breed) that do a lot of training, trialing...or hunting (whether in wet conditions upland, or on the ocean etc) that really are not out of water for 48 hrs before and after application.and are in water nearly daily and probably bathedas well due to the water they are inand advise differently if needed.

They are not on the same page as the dog's needs...when it comes to different needs of dogs..and the application of the product. Wish they would look at that carefully. Hope Vectra is after your contact with them..that it might be a head's up for them?

That would be a good thing.

Judy

Bayer is coming out with a new collar that will be a better alternative to the topical treatments, I am not sure if it is out now or just when it will hit the shelf. At the 2012 Fall Grand they talked a lot about ticks, infact it was just about the grossest thing I heard in a long time..... right before dinner too ;)

Anyway the out come of this was this new collar that is very effective. I will probably be looking into it for the girls.

Thanks Margo, if you hear any more about it please let us know!!
ETA--I did a google search, and apparently it is available in Europe and Australia, under the name Seresto.
http://www.seresto.com/en/splash.php

The active ingredients in Seresto are imidacloprid and flumethrin, very similar to Advantix (flumethrin rather than permethrin) in a different delivery system. Currently available is Preventic collar which has Amitraz as it's active ingredient, they last about 3 months and are very effective.

Thanks for the info. I think that this means that all of our retrievers need more than what the label says. BTW, I also use Vectra and like it.

I use Fl and because the ticks were so bad this year I also went to applying every 3 weeks and it has been very effective.