Topical Treatments

Topical flea-control treatments

Like practically all other veterinarians we found online, vet Bob Judd recommends topical anti-flea medications as a first line of defense, which are smeared once per month on a pet's back (on its neck or between its shoulder blades) and remain effective even after bathing and exposure to rain. There are three main topical flea control brands -- Advantage, Revolution and Frontline -- all of which are available in formulations for cats and dogs. These medications are meant to be used for short-term flea control; if your pet is susceptible to fleas and you'd like to keep him pest-free for his natural life span, experts say you should look into internal flea medications (see below).

For dogs, Advantage Once-a-Month Topical Flea Treatment for Dogs & Puppies (*Est. $50 for 4-month supply) is recommended by veterinarians, pet experts and pet owners more than any other anti-flea remedy. Advantage kills all fleas on a dog within 12 hours, and prevents re-infestation for a period of four weeks per application. According to a helpful chart on the Doctors Foster and Smith website, Advantage can be used in conjunction with internal medications like Program or Sentinel (described below).

Although Advantage for Cats receives many recommendations, we were swayed by the preference of some professionals for Revolution for Cats (*Est. $40 for 3-month supply) (*est. $40 for a three-month supply, depending on the cat's weight). Like Advantage, Revolution is applied once a month to the nape of the cat's neck -- but unlike Advantage, this topical flea-control medication will also control ear mites, heartworm, hookworm and roundworm. A veterinary assistant posting on Helium.com makes a convincing case that Revolution is "the best bet for economical parasite control" in cats, but is more expensive when used in its formulation for large dogs.

One popular topical flea-control medication that we chose not to include in ConsumerSearch Fast Answers is Frontline TopSpot (*Est. $50 for a three-month supply, depending on the pet's weight) . In this assessment, we were swayed by the opinion of PlacervilleVet.com, which concedes that Frontline is slightly more effective than Advantage, but also more expensive. More worryingly, the author of this article says that "we are starting to see resistance" to Frontline's active ingredient, and recommends a beefed-up (and more expensive) formulation called Frontline Plus (*Est. $55 for a three-month supply) . Unlike the case with Advantage and Revolution, veterinarians warn against bathing pets (or allowing them out in the rain) for a few days after applying Frontline, because this topical is spread by natural oils in a pet's skin.

You should be aware that one source ranking high up in our review chart -- Main Street Pet Care Animal Hospital -- is fairly negative about topical flea control in general, compared to internal medications like Program, Sentinel and Capstar. Editors say that topical treatments are a stop-gap, short term solution that shouldn't be your only approach toward permanent flea control.

In this light, it's interesting to see the reaction to a new version of Advantage, Advantage Multi, which is designed to control fleas and heartworm in both dogs and cats. In the summer of 2007, the Food and Drug Administration issued a warning to Bayer (the maker of Advantage), taking it to task for not mentioning Advantage Multi's possible serious side effects in its TV commercials. Needless to say, Main Street Pet Care is even more disparaging about this topical, saying that they expect problems. We did not yet find evidence either way on this new product other than the FDA warning about side effects.