Pet Flea Medicine

The best approach to pet flea medicine and managing fleas is prevention. New, safer, and more effective pet flea medicine products aimed at controlling fleas on the pet have made flea management without pesticide sprays feasible in many situations. Management of fleas on the pet must be accompanied by regular, thorough cleaning of pet resting areas indoors and outside. Once fleas infest a home, control will require a vigilant program that includes cleaning and treating infested areas indoors, eliminating fleas on pets, and cleaning up and possibly treating shaded outdoor locations where pets rest. Several types of products are available to control fleas on dogs and cats. The most effective and safest products inhibit normal growth or reproduction of fleas. Use of these products must be supplemented with good housekeeping in areas where the pet rests. Contact your veterinarian for advice and assistance in selecting the best flea control product for your situation. Several flea control products are internal medications that are administered on a regular basis in the form of a pill or food additive. Older types of medications contained insecticidal materials, mostly organophosphates, that were transported to all skin areas through the animal's blood. Newer pet flea medicine products contain insect development inhibitors that do not have the toxicity of the older materials and are much safer to use. The insect development inhibitor lufenuron (Program) can be given as a pill (dogs) or as a food additive (cats) once a month to suppress flea populations. It can also be administered as an injection every 6 months. While this compound does not kill adult fleas, it does prevent flea reproduction. If its use is initiated early in the year before flea populations begin to build, it can prevent the establishment of a flea population in the home, though an occasional adult flea may be sighted on the animal.