Flea and worm treatment

[janji]

I have a 9 month old cat and initially did treatments every month for the first few (vet recommended) but have forgotten when to next do the treatment again. So how often should I treat my cat and any recommended products please?

[thecatneuterer]

Fleas: Stronghold, Advantage or Advocate every 4 to 6 weeks (it's supposed to be four weeks but sometimes you can stretch it a bit).

Worms: Drontal or Milbemax - every three months.

[lljkk]

But if they have Advocat they may not need the Drontil, right?

My vet said 3-4x a year for worming, depending on how good hunters they were. So I've interpreted that as every 4 months for the non-hunting cat.

Non-hunting cat is very difficult to worm, anyway.

[Lonecatwithkitten]

If you are using Advocate it kills roundworm so you need to worm with Drontal or milbemax at least once every 6 months to kill tapeworm.

[cozietoesie]

Out of interest, Lonecat, how do you view spot-ons for worm treatment? Seniorboy had a spot on last time (I think it was something called Profender) because getting anything down him orally is a hopeless task - and trust me, I've tried all the stratagems.

Are spot ons effective or are they the med of last resort?

[Lonecatwithkitten]

The spot-ons are great as long as they are applied properly,

[cozietoesie]

Thanks for that.

[Irishmammybread]

Any worming treatment will just get rid of worms the cat has in it's system at the time, it's not like a flea treatment which once applied should last and continue to kill fleas for a month. How frequently you worm the cat depends on the risk of reinfestation, some worms can go through their life cycle in under a month so in theory the cat could have worms again that soon, but normally it's recommended for adult cats to worm at least every three months unless worms are seen sooner. It is safe to worm sooner eg. in hunting cats if worms are seen.
We use milbemax, drontal cat is good too and profender seems to work well especially if it's difficult to tablet the cat.
There's a new flea treatment coming out which you could ask your vet about called "comfortis" ,a tablet you give once a month and which kills fleas quicker than any of the spot ons, otherwise frontline combo is a good choice too.

[Lonecatwithkitten]

Irishmammy Comfortis has been out for over a year now for dogs and really we haven't been that wild about it. The real problem is that it has to be given on an empty stomach - hard enough persuading a reluctant dog to take it, but not great fun with cats.

[cozietoesie]

Irishmammy

I'm afraid that my Seniorboy will simply not take a pill. Spot ons are really my only option.

[TomArchersSausage]

Stronghold has so far been excellent for us. Two cats no fleas at all. One of our cats has a lot of white on him so any flea evidence would be noticable but I've never seen anything on him. I buy it online.

Milbemax for worms every few months. Tried Drontal once but the pill seemed quite a bit bigger than Milbemax and the cats found in hard to swallow.

[lljkk]

Since we're talking fleas, don't make my mistake:
I didnt' realise that bigger cats need higher dosage (duh).
So make sure you have right amount of flea med for the weight of cat.