Lyme disease caused by Borrelia burgdorferi is a significant tick-borne illness in dogs, requiring prevention, monitoring, and prompt treatment.
Dogs with Lyme disease experience genuine pain from joint inflammation, fever, and malaise. Lyme nephritis causes severe kidney damage and is often fatal. Prevention - through tick control, vaccination, and tick checks - dramatically reduces suffering. Prompt treatment of clinical disease limits duration of illness. In endemic areas, year-round tick prevention is a welfare imperative.