Treatment
Pet animals
Treatment requires both systemic oral treatment with most of the same drugs used in humans—terbinafine, fluconazole, or itraconazole—as well as a topical "dip" therapy.Because of the usually longer hair shafts in pets compared to those of humans, the area of infection and possibly all of the longer hair of the pet must be clipped to decrease the load of fungal spores clinging to the pets hair shafts. However, close shaving is usually not done because nicking the skin facilitates further skin infection. Twice-weekly bathing of the pet with diluted lime sulfur dip solution is effective in eradicating fungal spores. This must continue for 3 to 8 weeks.Washing of household hard surfaces with 1:10 household sodium hypochlorite bleach solution is effective in killing spores, but it is too irritating to be used directly on hair and skin. Pet hair must be rigorously removed from all household surfaces, and then the vacuum cleaner bag, and perhaps even the vacuum cleaner itself, discarded when this has been done repeatedly. Removal of all hair is important, since spores may survive 12 months or even as long as two years on hair clinging to surfaces. Cattle
In bovines, an infestation is difficult to cure, as systemic treatment is uneconomical. Local treatment with iodine compounds is time-consuming, as it needs scraping of crusty lesions. Moreover, it must be carefully conducted using gloves, lest the worker become infested.
Fungal spores may be viewed directly on hair shafts. This technique identifies a fungal infection in about 40%–70% of the infections, but cannot identify the species of dermatophyte. Culture test: This is the most effective, but also the most time-consuming, way to determine if ringworm is on a pet. In this test, the veterinarian collects hairs from the pet, or else collects fungal spores from the pets hair with a toothbrush, or other instrument, and inoculates fungal media for culture. These cultures can be brushed with transparent tape and then read by the veterinarian using a microscope, or can be sent to a pathological lab. The three common types of fungi which commonly cause pet ringworm can be identified by their characteristic spores. These are different-appearing macroconidia in the two common species of Microspora, and typical microconidia in Trichophyton infections.Identifying the species of fungi involved in pet infections can be helpful in controlling the source of infection. M. canis, despite its name, occurs more commonly in domestic cats, and 98% of cat infections are with this organism. It can also infect dogs and humans, however. T. mentagrophytes has a major reservoir in rodents, but can also infect pet rabbits, dogs, and horses. M. gypseum is a soil organism and is often contracted from gardens and other such places. Besides humans, it may infect rodents, dogs, cats, horses, cattle, and swine.