Equine Tapeworm Treatment

Tapeworms are members of the flatworm family, and may affect any animal. As parasites, tapeworms live indefinitely inside an animal's body, living off the nutrition they find there and causing serious physical symptoms if they go untreated. In horses, tapeworms are both treatable and preventable.

  1. Tapeworm Facts

    • According to a University of Kentucky Fact Sheet, three types of tapeworm affect horses in America: Anaplocephala perfoliata, Anaplocephala magna and Paranoplacephala mamillana.These tapeworms invariably move through a horse's system to take up residence in the gut. There, they latch onto the walls of the intestines and take nourishment from the matter passing by. Tapeworms reproduce asexually, and may live in a horse's system for many years.

    Effects

    • Tapeworms are not necessarily fatal to horses, but they do cause some complications in the horse's health. The site of the tapeworm attachment becomes inflamed and ulcerated, which sometimes affects the function of any valves in the area. A horse infected with tapeworms may lose weight regardless of a healthy diet, become dehydrated and demonstrate interrupted digestion.

    Treatment: Deworming

    • The most common treatment for equine tapeworms is dewormer, sold over the counter in feed stores. Dewormer is a paste, and comes in containers designed for injecting the medication into a horse's mouth. Although vets often undertake this process as part of a horse's yearly checkup, it's simple enough that horse owners can do it on their own. The dewormer poisons any parasites in the horse's system, and allows the horse to eliminate the worms through its waste.

    Treatment: Prevention

    • Horses who are at risk for parasites like tapeworms often receive preventative medicine to keep infections from occurring. Many horse owners feed their horses dewormer once a year to immediately kill any tapeworms or larvae ingested by the horse.

    Treatment: Environment

    • One important aspect of tapeworm prevention is controlling the horse's environment in regard to its exposure to unwormed horses and their manure. Horses almost always pick up tapeworms from eating grass or grain in communal situations. If pastures have housed horses who were unwormed, and potentially horses that had tapeworms, the grass may contain both tapeworms and their larvae, which puts new horses at risk. Horse owners should keep their horses in supervised areas, with horses whose medical histories are known, to prevent the spread of tapeworms.