Heartworm preventative for sensitive dogs

Bamm has the collie/herding breed sensitivity towards certain Heartworm treatments. The only one ive ever been able to give him was Interceptor but from what I've been hearing they closed their production down. Not sure if its a temporary or permanent discontinue of Interceptor, but now I have no clue what I can give Bamm and don't know much about other Heartworm preventatives. The one our vet uses has Ivermectin in it so he can't use that.

Do you guys know of any other brands that are ok for dogs that have that collie sensitivity towards Heartworm preventatives?

Have you had him tested for MDR-1?

Ya I had him tested a couple years ago when he reacted to a Heartworm preventative. I can't remember if he tested Normal/Mutant or Mutant/Mutant. I know he did test positive for at least one copy of the mutant gene. I have his older vet records in a file around here somewhere. I can find them and look through them to see what he for sure tested. I do remember they said he definitely had a sensitivity to drugs carrying Ivermectin. I do limited vaccines with him as well because he has gotten pretty nauseous with vaccines as well.

The Novartis plant they make Interceptor and Sentinel in has been closed down until the FDA can help them bring it back up safely... but they don't have an ETA.
My vet's office did get some more Interceptor in but I think it's just because Novartis had some existing stock that they shipped out after it was inspected and proved safe. I don't know how much they got though. =/ You might be able to check another vet's office and find some...

While we didn't have any, I was using Trifexis. Their pamphlet specifically talks about how they did testing in ivermectin sensitive dogs to make sure it was safe.

The amounts in heartworm preventatives are perfectly safe for *most* MDR1 dogs. Logan takes Heartgard during the summer and Trifexis in the winter with no problems (I have not had him tested yet). The dose of ivermectin in heartworm preventatives is so tiny that it doesn't matter - the problem usually comes when people try to do it the cheap way and use Ivomec instead of a a pre-prepared preventative, since dogs are almost always overdosed when you use Ivomec (and it doesn't usually matter, unless your dog has the MDR1 mutation).

Trifexis has the same heartworm preventative ingredient as Interceptor, and they have done collie-specific testing with actual Trifexis with no ill effects.

We have been completely out of Interceptor at the clinic for over a month, and it's not expected to be back until late summer at the earliest.

Yeah, the amount of Ivermectin in Heartgard is considered safe for MDR-1 mutants if used as recommended by the manufacturer for heartworm prevention by the people doing the testing (Washington State Univ.). Milbemycin (active ingredient in Interceptor) is the same class of drugs and can also cause problems in high doses.

What about something topical like Advantage Multi or Revolution?

Revolution (selametin) is on the drug list for MDR1 dogs, too. I haven't ever used it myself.

Since you mentioned that he'd had a previous reaction to Ivermectin in a heartworm preventive, I'd take it that perhaps even the most neglible amount allowed on the market could pose a problem? It sounds like he's pretty sensitive.

We switched to Trifexis when the whole Interceptor thing happened since we were told that Trifexis had the same heartworm preventive drug as Interceptor, just with other things added in for flea and worm too. So you might want to ask your vet if that could be recommended. It was kind of expensive for us to switch over though, especially given the budget we have, but we've been getting it here http://www.californiapetpharmacy.com/trifexis-heartworm-flea-prevention.html which has been helping with our budget (plus, our vet was awesome enough to give us the approval for ordering it online).

If not Trifexis, there's also the topical ones which others have already suggested, but Trifexis is the only one I can think of when your previous preventive is Interceptor.

we use Interceptor on all our herding dogs!

This is WSU's list of problem drugs. Ivermectin at doses used for heartworm preventative is generally safe for MDR1 dogs, but every dog is an individual... What kind of reaction did he have before to ivermectin?

Sad to say some people are starting to have trouble finding Trifexis, too.

You might not have that option before long if production doesn't resume soon. We've been out where I work for months, and every online place I've seen is also out.

I'm so pissed about Interceptor. Our vet is practically out too.

I guess I am going to go to Heartguard, even though he won't chew those ones. So I am going to have to break it up and wrap it in cheese or something.

I don't want to use Trifexis because it's also got flea stuff in it, and honestly we have no issues with fleas, and I don't want to add any other unnecessary chemicals into him he doesn't need.

I went to Revolution. It was between that or Trifexis (which is comfortis/interceptor combined) and since Revolution was cheaper...

I guess even though I don't have a BC, I feel it better to err on the side of caution since I grew up with BC's.

So far it seems to not bother anyone. Scout's sensitive to chemicals/vaccinations so I try to do as a little as possible of both on her.

Selamectin (Revolution) is on the drug list for sensitive dogs, too.

Yea I'm not sure how ivermectin got the "big bad" reputation in general (although obviously for the OPs dog who already had a reaction to it, it's a different story) since pretty much all of them are on there. It's all a matter of dose.