Animal Welfare Professionals

We recently hosted a clinic offering free heartworm testing thanks to the Maddies Fund grant. We had 59 families sign-up, 57 actually attended and all of them tested negative!  

What type of services do you offer in your community to help educate your community about heartworms, how they are spread and how to prevent infection?

Most recently, we partnered with mobile clinics to reach people where they are, especially those with barriers to transportation.  We utilized the mobile clinic staff and our staff to spend time with pet families, communicating with them in terms that were easily understood.  Thanks to Maddies, we offered Proheart 12 (an injectable year of heartworm prevention) after heartworm testing, and explained when it would be due again.  We are tracking families to ensure we call them again around the same time next year.  

I think once people understand how deadly heartworms can be and receive financial support with an option that is convenient and is 100% compliant for the full year, it helps tremendously.  Additionally, using props like 3D models, pictures (even some that aren't so warm and fuzzy) always helps in education efforts.  

That is awesome! We also saw similar results with minimal pets testing positive! (though that is not what the most current research is showing)

Thank you for this post! It is so encouraging.  We recently launched our mobile clinic for heartworm testing & preventative Thanks to Maddie.  We host our clinics as a drive-thru. We had 59 pet families register, 57 were tested and treated with the ProHeart preventative. I am pleased to report that they all tested negative!

I agree 100% that education is the key. We have been struggling to get dogs tested for 2 years. We invited veterinary students to the clinic to help draw blood & test, it was amazing! We could not have made this type of impact without the help of Maddies Fund.