How do inside cats get worms?
The most common worm of indoor cats is the flea tapeworm.Cats get infected by swallowing fleas. This occurs during self-grooming, when they catch a flea in their coat and swallow it.Worm segments appear in the cat's dropping 1-2 months later as small white worms about the size of a match head.They are easily treated with a drug called praziquantel, found in most commercial all-wormers.
Can a inside house cat get worms?
Even if your pet is an indoor pet, they are susceptible to and exposed to parasites. You could even be the one bringing them in on your clothes or shoes or produce or plants (leaves or the dirt they grow in.) If you have other pets they can also be exposing your cat. Indoor or outdoor, a fecal should be done by your vet at least once a year. The treatment is simple and inexpensive and well worth keeping your cat healthy. If left untreated parasites can drain your pet's health and cause expensive vet bills to get him or her healthy again.
How does my indoor cat keep getting worms?
It is possible that she did not completely get rid of them. Sometimes pets need more than one dose of medication Also, cats are notorious for not taking their medicine. My cats have usually need multiple treatments because they will spit out their medicine when I’m not looking. Also, there are different types of worms so make sure you are using the correct medicine for the type she has.You also need to clean everything she touches. Throw out the cat litter, wash the litter pan and used new litter. Mop floors, Steam clean carpets, beds. Wash any fabric or toys that she uses.If there are any other animals in the house, make sure they don’t have any parasites or they will just give it back and forth to each other. You might also treat your yard for fleas. It is possible that they could jump on your clothes while you are outside and then you carry them into the house. Cats may ingest these infected fleas and that can cause worms.If these suggestions don’t work or you don’t know what type of worms she has, please take her to the vet.
How do indoor-only cats get worms?
Worms live in and lay eggs in grass and meat, among other less likely places. This means that just by walking through your yard or bringing a honking pork hock (yes, there are more parasitic worms in pork) into your home, you bring in a statistical risk for parasitic worm eggs. Eating flies will cause "maggots", not parasitic worms! lol! Don't worry about that. The digestive system is inhospitable to them. Here's the most likely reason: they caught worms from fleas. Fleas transmit tapeworms to indoor cats, and fleas can more easily cling to you and your loved ones than worms can. Your pets could have caught worms this way even from places like the vet's office, or from rodents carrying fleas that snuck through your home. Rat fleas, especially, are disease vectors. At one point, rat fleas carried the plague across Europe -- and they still carry it under the streets of Boston! To explain better than I could why the two are related, I dug up this nifty "fleas and worms" Q & A: http://www.peteducation.com/article.cfm?...
How did MY indoor cats get worms? No fleas?
do the worms look like rice? (i couldn't tell if you meant 1/4 inch worms?) if so, it sounds like tapeworms, which are transmitted by fleas. the cat eats a flea, which then infects the cat. all it takes is one flea for this to happen, and fleas can be inside all year round or it may have come in on a mouse or other animal which may have gotten in under eaves or made a nest in a hole or opening somewhere. it could even have come in on you if you were at another place which had fleas. if they are more like spaghetti, then you're probably looking at roundworms, which are transmitted thru infected feces. again, eggs can be carried into the house just by you walking in a yard that an infected animal had gone poo in. there are very few parasites a cat will get from flies or meat. the method of transmission for most worms is thru infected poo or fleas. your vet will probably want to check a stool sample to make sure no other little buggies are lining in the kitty's intestines. where one type was found, there may be others. and more often than not, you won't see worms in poo when a cat is infected. the vet will look for microscopic eggs to see what exactly the cat has. droncit (pill or injection) will take care of tapeworms, pyrantel (liquid) will take care of roundworms. but a pill named DRONTAL (praziquantel/pyrantel pamoate) will take care of BOTH at once, along with hookworms too. don't bother with most over-the-counter stuff, get it thru the vet. then get something like revolution, advantage or frontline to make sure any other fleas lingering are taken care of.
Can a cat catch tapeworm from feline raw food?
There are two kinds of tapeworm - one comes from fleas, the other from eating an animal infested with tapeworms (like a rodent). Tapeworm larvae *can* be found in raw meat - but the freezing process will kill them. The frozen raw food you are feeding will not infect your cat with tapeworms. Either they ate a mouse with tapeworm, or they did get bit by a tapeworm infected flea. Not finding evidence of fleas doesn't mean they didn't get bit - even indoor cats can get fleas as we bring them in on our shoes and clothing. I'd get the tapeworm taken care of - and for all the cats. Get a safe and effective flea treatment for them like Frontline or Advantage, or whatever your vet prescribes. Getting a brand of frozen raw food from a reputable pet store or source will not cause tapeworm. The type of tapeworm from eating an infected rodent *is* communicable between cats who share litter boxes. That is why it's always best to treat all cats in the household for both fleas and the tapeworms when one is found. You can't really determine (unless your cats are flea-infested which clearly yours are not) which type of tapeworm it is, and it's better to be safe and treat everyone.
If my cat eats a dead flea or a flea egg, will she still get tapeworm?
It's possible the tapeworm are INSIDE the fleas. First off, ask your vet for 2 flea pills. These should only be about $5 each. Give the cat one pill then immediately clean EVERYTHING. Vacuum the floors, even under the beds. After that, empty the vacuum and do it all over again. The WHOLE HOUSE! clean all the sheets, dust everything. It's important that you do this. After you give the cat the pill, within a couple of hours all the fleas will die and fall off. You need to make sure you get all the live ones that you can out of the house too that aren't on the cat when you give it the pill. Then, 2 or 3 days later, give the cat the second pill to ensure that if any fleas survived the cleaning and reattached to the cat, that they are dead as well. As for the worms, tapeworms require what is referred to as an intermediate host. Cat fleas are that intermediate host. So, while the cat is getting the tapeworm from the flea, it's not technically the flea that is "turning into" a tapeworm. Following? Anyways, the doc should have something for the worm to give to your cat but you should have a scan done on the cat to ensure that there is not a larger worm attached to the intestine. Make sure that you follow the medicinal regime closely as well. Also, keep in mind, there are other worms that your cat an get other than a tapeworm.
Should I worry about getting worms from my indoor cats?
I'm in no ways an expert, just trying to remember what was I told this by my veterinarian:PrevalenceUnlike dogs, cats are almost certainly infected by the mother during lactation. The worm eggs are small enough to be passed thru with the milk. Virtually all puppies are infected with multiple worm species. They tolerate worms much better than dogs, their immune system suppresses them well, they're mostly asymptomatic.ManagementCompletely killing the worms is almost impossible, however with regular administration of worm killer drugs the infection is easy to manage. My doc recommended that the drug be administered in every 3 months, then 14 days later again, then next one after 3 further months etc... The reason is that the drug kills the mature worms only, the developing eggs/larvae are unaffected. After 14 days later they mature and get susceptible to the drug. Waiting too long would allow them enough time to lay further eggs, maintaining the infection. With this technology the worm load can be greatly reduced.Dead worms might be spotted in feces after drug administration. I've never seen anything special. My cat might be clean or I might be looking for the wrong thing?)I'm using Vitaminthe paste on my cat. (Niclosamid + Oxibendazol) Usually it's administered by the veterinarian during the regular visits, but it can also be purchased and administered by the owner. I opted for that.Human infectionIt's possible and the consequences can be disastrous like losing eyesight, brain damage or even death. Humans are not definitive host for the cat worms, they're not able to multiply in us. That makes wiping them much easier with similar drugs. (Same active ingredient but different form and name)But they can make a lot of trouble. The risk is very low especially with a well maintained home cat. We're sleeping with her and not afraid of worms at all. However I'm scared to death by Toxoplasma ;)
How frequently should we deworm indoor cats?
That's a decent question. I am a veterinarian, and will try to give a decent sensible answer. Indoor cats can occasionally show up with intestinal parasites such as roundworms, hookworms or tapeworms, and occasionally with a very serious disease - heart worms - which is often fatal. Tapeworms are almost always acquired from fleas. So, if there are fleas, and the fleas go untreated, there is a possibility for constant reinfection with tapeworms, in which case you could deworm as often as every 3 months. There are some good products for this that are safe, including a topical medicine called Profender. But it is probably best to deal with the fleas. If you use a topical monthly product such as Revolution, you can help to prevent fleas, heartworms, and some intestinal parasites all with one monthly topical application. Cats can get roundworms through various ways - even though they are strictly indoors. Mice and other critters can carry the roundworm inside them, and when cats eat them, they get transferred. Also, some potting soils are contaminated with roundworm eggs. Flies, cockroaches and other insects can carry them also - so they can contaminate the house with them, or spread them if cats eat these bugs. You can deworm cats with very safe medicines such as pyrantel pamoate, but it makes sense to bring in a fecal sample to your vet once or twice a year and have it checked. If there are no parasites, then there isn't a need to treat for them (although admittedly, these fecal tests are not 100% accurate, and occasionally will miss parasites). I am a big believer in using Revolution though, because it will help to prevent all of these problems. Hope that is helpful.