[JuneBugs Momma]

Very surprised that when we went to our vet for his yearly well visit, he said JB has a grade 3 heart murmur. It seems kinda odd since all these years since I have had him (since 2013) nothing showed and he has always had a clean bill of health (except that he has bad teeth..the rescue where I got him pulled all of his teeth except for 6 of them). He is very active, playful, eating fine, etc.

At this point I do not know what to think. I have heard that it is hard to diagnose if a dog has a murmur or not depending on his stress level and heart rate at the time he is at the vet. JB hates riding in the car so he was stressed and panting the whole way..and he was uncomfortable and still stressed during the vets actual examination. So, does he really have a murmur?

Secondly, I have read and heard that a level 3-4 murmur is serious enough that symptoms are occurring (lethargy, hard to breath, no energy, coughing, loss of appetite, etc). JB has no symptoms.

My vet just told me to look for the above symptoms or if anything seems not right, bring him in and we will do xrays and go from there. He also told me that he has diagnosed tons of dog with murmurs where no treatment was ever needed and they were fine.

Any/all advice is appreciated.