Just thought I'd post my thoughts on ticks and tick prevention - I work in an emergency after hours centre in Sydney, and we see quite a few tick cases each week.
Tick paralysis is caused by the Ixodes species of tick - these ticks normally live on wildlife, and unfortunately our domestic pets (dogs and cats) have no natural resistance to the tick toxin. The Paralysis Tick starts out as a small "seed" tick which goes through 3 growth stages, so depending on the stage of tick at the time it attaches to your dog, it may be very small (the size of a pin head) and difficult to see or feel on the dog's body, especially if they have a long or dense coat.
Ticks usually take 3-7 days to suck enough blood to be engorged - they can get up to 1cm diameter when fully engorged and are normally a greyish white colour, with a small brown head and 8 brown legs. At the same time they suck blood, the tick salivary glands at the attachment point on the skin are injecting the toxin, and the toxin goes via the bloodstream to the end of the nerves and blocks the nerve messages from getting to the muscles - so the dogs gets paralysed.
The paralysis is usually ascending - that is, it starts with wobbly back legs, which then progresses to front legs, then the muscles of breathing, swallowing, barking and urination all get progressively affected. If a tick is attached near the neck or eye, local paralysis can result - I've seen several cases now that the tick attached near the eye had caused an eye ulcer to develop because the dog can't blink and moisten the eye. Megaoesophagus (a large dilated floppy oesophagus) or laryngeal paralysis is common when the tick is near the neck area.
If you find a tick, remove it without crushing its body if possible. It is a good idea to use nail scissors or tick pullers to wedge in between the dog's skin and the tick to ensure the mouthparts are removed, as this is where the toxin is. The tick "crater" is like a mosquito bite, caused by the skin irritation where the tick has been attached. Sometimes a crater is all that is left of the tick - the tick has already fallen off by the time the dog is showing symptoms. Some people like to kill the tick first, but this has not been proven to change the recovery rate. A dab of Aeroguard or knock down fly spray on a cotton bud would do the trick to kill the tick -please don't douse your dog in kerosene or metho! Once a tick is removed, the dogs often worsen over a 24-48hr period, because toxin in the bloodstream continues to bind to the nerve endings; this is why early treatment is essential for a speedy recovery.
Your dogs need to see a vet if you have found and removed a tick, or you have been in a tick area, and the dog is showing the following symptoms: the dog can't swallow properly, cannot stand with support or are lying on their side, having difficulty breathing, gagging/retching, coughing, vomiting, or bringing up fluid from the throat without vomiting -this is called regurgitation and is due to the oesophagus being floppy when it is paralysed and fluid pooling there. Sometimes regurgitation, stomach acid leaks back into the oesophagus and causes oesophagitis (heartburn).
The "gag" reflex protects the airways from inhaling food, water or saliva, and this reflex is often very slow or absent in dogs with tick paralysis, so they are at high risk of aspirating (breathing in) food and water, and can develop nasty aspiration pneumonia. The paralysis of the back legs is less of a concern to vets than the respiratory paralysis, because most dogs will improve their muscle strength over 2-3 days and be back to normal by 2-3 weeks.
Tick treatment involves clipping the dog's coat short, performing several tick searches to find and remove any other ticks, bathing the dog in a tick rinse (Permoxin) or applying a top-spot treatment to kill ticks that can't be found, and administering Tick Anti-Serum (anti-toxin)
The Tick Anti-Serum is made by attaching ticks to blood donor dogs, then collecting the donor blood and using the serum which has antibodies against ticks to "mop up" the tick toxin in the affected dog's bloodstream. The antitoxin has NO effect on nerve-bound toxin - that is why dogs are not given repeated antitoxin if it has been more that 48hrs since the last tick was removed. The dogs have to make new nerve-muscle connections to improve from their paralysis, which can take up to several weeks. If your dog has been treated with Anti-Serum previously for tick paralysis, they are more likely to have a bad reaction to the Anti-Serum next time, so alert the treating vet of this - although hopefully there won't be a next time, if you improve your preventative care.
If dogs are severely paralysed, they may need assisted breathing on oxygen support, be intubated or put on a ventilator until the breathing is improved -this can only be achieved at a 24 hr vet facility. Ventilatory support is very expensive - in the thousands of dollars - because it is so labour intensive. We need a dedicated nurse and vet just for your dog. By the time pets go on a ventilator they have a guarded to poor prognosis; we are successful when the dogs just need us to breathe for them until the muscle strength comes back to breathe on their own, and when they are referred to us early.
Symptomatic and supportive care at your vet is necessary for all tick paralysis cases until the dogs have a good "gag" reflex and are able to stand, walk, eat/drink and urinate normally.
Tick prevention is achieved by:
Daily (or as one post has suggested TWICE daily) tick searching to find and remove ticks
Use of a tick preventative product
- Frontline Plus top spot or Advantix top spot (for dogs only, cannot be used on cats) - every fortnight
- Frontline Spray - every 3 weeks
- Proban oral tablets - every other day, 1 tablet per 10kg bodyweight -cannot use on pregnant or lactating bitches, elderly or young animals -it is an organophosphate, and so side effects can be seen with some animals. For more information, ask your local vet.
- Permoxin rinse - weekly
Revolution, Advantage and Advocate DO NOT contain an active ingredient that is registered against paralysis ticks, but Advocate and Revolution are both very effective against fleas and heartworms (Advocate will also do intestinal worming); Advantage is for flea control only. Think about combining Frontline or Advantix with your current top-spot for even better flea control in summer if your currently use Revolution or Advocate for the heartworm control.
The main reason why the tick preventatives fail to work is -
1) Inadequate size pack for the size of dog - ie splitting one vial between two dogs, not weighing the dog before choosing the appropriate size tablets or top-spot
2) Not re-applying at the correct interval - for Frontline Plus and Advantix, this is every 2 weeks for paralysis ticks. The Frontline spray has a label recommendation for use every 3 weeks for paralysis ticks.
3) Relying on the tick products alone and not tick searching -you need to check your dog from top to tail including their eyes, ears, mouth (yes, inside the lip fold), chin, neck (under the collar), feet and around the penis/vulva and anus - ticks can attach anywhere, but 90% of ticks are found forward of the shoulders. Think about clipping long haired dogs off short to be able to search right down to the skin (sorry for the show dogs! I guess that would be my only exception)
4) Frequent bathing in between top-spot applications - they are designed to bind to the oil layer of the dog's skin, so swimming should be okay, but washing in shampoo will remove this oily film and the product will wash out too.
You need to commence tick prevention at the start of the tick season - ask your local vet when to start, as each region is different - and continue until the end of the season. If you are just visiting a tick area, start prevention 1 week before you go, keep it up while you are away and continue 2 weeks after you return. Remember to search and treat all other household dogs and cats for ticks; even if only one dog goes on holidays, they can bring back a hitchhiker tick that can jump ship to the stay-at-home pets.
Beware cats and tick preventatives - cats are NOT small dogs. The only safe tick prevention for cats is Frontline Plus topspot or the Frontline spray - DO NOT USE PERMETHRIN CONTAINING COLLARS, SPOT ONS OR RINSES ON CATS - cats cannot break down the chemical and often have neurological signs, liver disease, tremors, seizures and can die from permethrin toxicity.
Hopefully this information helps you and your dog wage war against ticks!
Dana Pollock
Veterinarian.
