It is vet recommended, actually should be required! But you cannot get heartguard off the counter from your local pet shop, you must have a full blood test done for your pup even adult dogs and they will provide you the right one for his/her size. Blood tests should always come out negative for everything before the vet gives you a prescription for heartguard.

Yes, only it will run a lot cheaper, but you should not and really DO NOT want to feed your dog heartguard without knowing if he/she has any problems with their health. Heartguard comes in different color boxes for different size and aged dogs.

Here’s the one I feed my Bambi, but as I said, all dogs are different so you might have a different box.

You feed them once a month, they actually have stickers that you put on the back of the box for the month that you have fed it to them. It has a flavor that your dog will love and will eat as a treat.  It is possible that your dog will have a hard time eating or even chewing on it since it is about almost an inch long so you might want to break it apart into 3-4 small pieces.  The best way to feed them heartguard is to put it in their food bowl or just simply feed it to them as a rewarded treat once a month.

So there you go, heartguard, it protects them against the following article portion I found:

For use in dogs to prevent canine heartworm disease by eliminating the tissue stage of heartworm larvae (Dirofilaria immitis) for a month (30 days) after infection and for the treatment and control of roundworms (Toxocara canis, Toxocaris leonina) and hookworms (Ancyclostoma caninum, Uncinaria storocepala, Ansylostoma braziliense).

So I HIGHLY recommend that you get blood work done as soon as possible and ask the vet about heartguard. =) Take cares everyone! See you guys back all soon! Good night~ Time for bed =P