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Review
. 2023 Apr 28;16(1):148.
doi: 10.1186/s13071-023-05690-8.

Heartworm adulticide treatment: a tropical perspective

Filipe Dantas-Torres  1 , Jennifer Ketzis  2 , Gabriela Pérez Tort  3 , Andrei Daniel Mihalca  4 , Gad Baneth  5 , Domenico Otranto  6 , Malaika Watanabe  7 , Bui Khanh Linh  8 , Tawin Inpankaew  9 , Pablo Borrás  10 , Sangaran Arumugam  11 , Barend Louis Penzhorn  12 , Adrian Patalinghug Ybañez  13 , Peter Irwin  14 , Rebecca J Traub  15
Affiliations
Review

Heartworm adulticide treatment: a tropical perspective

Filipe Dantas-Torres et al. Parasit Vectors. .

Abstract

Dirofilaria immitis (the canine heartworm) is widespread in the tropics, with prevalence surpassing 30% in high-risk areas. In addition to the suitable climatic conditions that favour mosquito abundance and filarial larva development, there is low compliance with the recommended year-round use of preventives in these transmission hotspots. This represents a major concern, considering that melarsomine (first-line heartworm adulticide) is unavailable in several tropical countries, resulting in the so-called slow-kill protocol being the only available adulticide treatment option. In this article, the members of TroCCAP (Tropical Council for Companion Animal Parasites) review the current distribution of heartworm in the tropics and the availability of melarsomine, and discuss alternatives for the management of heartworm infections in dogs.

Keywords: Dirofilaria immitis; Doxycycline; Ivermectin; Melarsomine; Mosquitoes; Moxidectin; One health; Prevention.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors are members of the Tropical Council for Companion Animal Parasites (TroCCAP), a not-for-profit public company founded to independently inform, guide and make best-practice recommendations to veterinarians and allied health professionals for the management of companion animal parasites in the tropics and subtropics. TroCCAP is sponsored by Elanco, Boehringer Ingelheim, Idexx. The authors declare the sponsors played no role in the writing or decision to publish the current review. The first author (FDT) is Editor-in-Chief of Parasites & Vectors, but the peer review process and final decision was handled independently by Adnan Hodžić, Subject Editor of the section Parasites of veterinary importance.

Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1
World distribution of Dirofilaria immitis. This map was built using QGIS and publicly available shapefiles [84]. Sources of information include several review and research papers [, , –27, 31, 32, 34, 35]. The red colour does not mean that D. immitis is present in the whole country, particularly for countries lying outside the tropics. Countries where Immiticide® (Boehringer Ingelheim) is currently registered are indicated with a yellow star. In some countries (e.g. United States), melarsomine may also be available as Diroban™ (Zoetis)
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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