When Flea Preventatives Fail

You’re frustrated. You’ve bought your pet’s flea medications, but your pet still has fleas! It’s possible your flea preventative didn’t work for the following reasons:

All pets in the house were not treated with flea preventatives

• Fleas will undoubtedly attack all animals in the house.
• Use a topical flea spray to immediately kill fleas, or consider Capstar which quickly works to kill adult fleas.

Your home and yard were not treated to kill fleas

• Use a fogger, spray, or powder to treat furniture, carpet, and hard to reach areas inside the home.
• Use a yard spray to treat outdoor areas.
• Wash all pet bedding and blankets.
• Vacuum all flooring.

Pet’s skin is too dry

• When using topical flea preventatives, adding a fatty acid supplement with Omega 3 may help improve your pet’s skin health by restoring its softness and flexibility.
• Healthy skin helps flea medication easily spread throughout the skin and increases effectiveness.

Topical flea preventative wasn’t properly applied to pet’s skin

• Do not put topical flea preventatives on your pet’s coat hair because this does not allow the medication to work through the skin.
• Make sure you apply the medication to the skin on your pet’s back in between the shoulder blades.
• New flea preventatives are moving away from topical application and can instead be administered orally. It’s less mess with improved effectiveness! Learn more about the benefits of oral flea preventatives.