Why do dogs get heart murmurs?

A heart murmur may be discovered when a veterinarian listens to your dog’s heart with a stethoscope. It is an abnormal sound that may or may not cause heart problems.

Heart murmurs can be caused by different things such as valvular disease, hereditary defects existing at birth and anaemia to name a few. Physiological heart murmurs also exist and these are normal.

In order to find out what the murmur is caused by the best thing to do is to book your dog in for a heart scan (heart ultrasound). That way the vet can see what the cause of the heart murmur is, decide whether or not the dog requires treatment as well as determine the prognosis.