The AAHA/AVMA preventive healthcare guidelines are joint canine and feline sheets, copyright 2011, that describe what a thorough preventive visit should cover. AAHA’s June 18, 2019 owner article condenses them into ten points. The short version: a preventive visit is a conversation plus a physical exam that produces a plan fitted to your pet, not a vaccine appointment and not a fixed calendar. Read the points below as a checklist for that conversation.
Check the dates before you rely on the numbers
The guidance you will see cited comes from several documents with different dates, so it helps to sort them first:
- AAHA–AVMA Canine Preventive Healthcare Guidelines (copyright 2011)
- AAHA-AVMA Feline Preventive Healthcare Guidelines (copyright 2011)
- AAHA’s owner article, published June 18, 2019, which summarizes the ten points
- AAHA’s statement on frequency of veterinary visits, adopted June 2008 and last revised November 2014
- AAHA’s wellness article, published March 13, 2025
AAHA’s guideline index, accessed October 7, 2026, still lists the joint sheets as 2011 materials alongside newer focused guidance on senior care, vaccination, nutrition and weight management, life stage, and dental care. For a specific question such as a particular vaccine or a senior-pet screening protocol, the focused document or your veterinarian’s current guidance is the better authority. The joint sheets are best read as a broad framework.
The sheets also say they are not an exclusive protocol or course of treatment, and they state that “These guidelines are not intended to be an AAHA or AVMA standard of care.” They are not laws, they do not guarantee outcomes, and they are not a one-size-fits-all schedule.
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The ten points, explained
1. Plan at least annual exams
The joint sheets recommend at least annual exams for dogs and cats and allow more frequent visits based on the individual animal. AAHA’s frequency statement says visit frequency should reflect age, species, breed, health, and environment. The 2019 owner article adds a practical rule of thumb: senior pets benefit from visits every six months. Treat that as the article’s advice rather than a universal requirement, and ask your veterinarian what interval suits your pet.
2. Bring up lifestyle and life stage
Tell your veterinarian how much time your pet spends indoors and outdoors, what it meets there (other animals, wildlife), what it eats, and what life stage it is in. These answers change the plan. A young outdoor cat and an older indoor cat rarely need the same parasite, vaccine, or screening approach.
3. Mention behavior changes
The 2019 article encourages owners to raise concerns such as inappropriate urination, aggression, or separation anxiety. Many of these have a medical component, so a veterinarian may check whether a physical problem is contributing before treating the behavior alone. Bring specifics: when it started, how often it happens, and what seems to trigger it.
4. Ask which tests fit your animal
According to the 2019 article, dogs and cats should have annual heartworm and internal-parasite tests, and cats should have at least one test for feline immunodeficiency virus and feline leukemia virus. For older pets, the article mentions possible blood and urine tests, blood pressure monitoring, radiographs, or ultrasound. These are the article’s examples, not an order. Which tests your pet needs, and how often, is a decision for your veterinarian based on the animal in front of them.
5. Track weight and body condition
The 2019 article says owners should ask what their pet’s target weight should be. The joint sheets also include body and muscle condition scoring as part of the physical exam, so ask for a body condition score as well as a scale reading. The article states that “an estimated one out of every two pets is overweight or obese,” attributing the estimate to the Association for Pet Obesity Prevention in a footnote. It does not give the estimate’s original year or underlying study, so cite it as a figure from AAHA’s 2019 article rather than a fresh measurement.
6. Include dental health
The joint sheets include dental assessment in the physical exam, and routine visits let your veterinarian track oral health over time and recommend professional care when it is needed. AAHA’s March 2025 wellness article notes that professional dental care can include cleanings and dental X-rays under anesthesia. Ask your veterinarian what home dental care is appropriate for your pet. Home care supports an exam and professional cleaning; it does not replace them.
7. Discuss parasite prevention year round
Both joint sheets call for year-round broad-spectrum parasite control. The canine sheet specifies efficacy against heartworms, intestinal parasites, and fleas, and the feline sheet describes the same broad coverage. Tick control and other steps are customized after assessment, so the product, schedule, and exposure-based additions should come from your veterinarian rather than from a general rule.
8. Tailor vaccines
Both sheets call for core vaccination in line with existing guidance, combined with customized non-core vaccination. The sheets list the core diseases, but that list is not a universal schedule. Vaccine timing and product choice change with the animal, its risk, and current vaccine guidance, so use the list as a starting point for the conversation.
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9. Keep identification current
Both sheets include identification, including microchipping. The 2019 article suggests asking your veterinarian to scan the chip and checking that the registry contact details are current. A chip with an outdated owner record is of little use if your pet is found far from home.
10. Discuss reproductive planning
The sheets cover reproductive and genetic counseling, and they include spaying or neutering unless breeding is specifically intended. The 2019 article recommends discussing timing with your veterinarian. There is no single best age for spaying or neutering that applies to every dog or cat, so ask how breed, size, and health bear on your pet’s timing.
What a preventive visit can cover
The joint sheets describe a structured visit. Your veterinarian is expected to:
- Take a history covering lifestyle, life stage, behavior, and diet.
- Perform a comprehensive physical exam, including dental and pain assessment and body and muscle condition scoring.
- Assess medical conditions, infectious and zoonotic disease, parasites, dental care, genetic, breed, and age considerations, behavior, and nutrition.
- Agree on diagnostic, therapeutic, and prevention plans, with client education, follow-up, and documentation.
The feline sheet also specifically includes environmental enrichment and dietary and feeding recommendations. These are components of the framework, not a promise that every visit includes every test.
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AAHA’s March 2025 wellness article describes routine visits as an opportunity for vaccination, parasite prevention, screening, dental monitoring, weight assessment, discussion of behavior and changing life-stage needs, and microchip verification. In that article, Mark Thompson, DVM, MBA, CCRP, is quoted: “Preventive care is the cornerstone of keeping pets healthy and happy.”
Questions to bring to the visit
The 2019 article offers these ready-to-use questions:
- What’s the best way to protect my pet from parasites year round?
- What vaccinations do you recommend to keep my pet healthy?
- How is my pet’s weight? What should my pet’s ideal weight be?
- Is there anything special I should do to help my pet in his current life stage?
- Can you please scan my pet’s microchip to make sure it’s still reading properly?
Adjust the wording for your pet’s species and sex, and add your own questions about behavior, diet, and any change you have noticed since the last visit.
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The guidelines do not compare competing products or competing guideline sets, so there is no head-to-head ranking to draw from them. Instead, the sheets show which factors should change a plan: species, age and life stage, breed, health, environment and lifestyle, exposure risk, and the veterinarian’s assessment. If two pets differ on any of these, expect their plans to differ too.
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Two of the ten points rest on figures that need careful handling. The weight estimate is attributed to AAHA’s 2019 article, which cites the Association for Pet Obesity Prevention without giving the original estimate’s year. The 2019 article also describes dental disease as common by age three, citing dental references rather than a single named organization and year, so it should not be quoted as an independently verified statistic. Where your veterinarian gives you a figure for your own pet, that is the number that matters for your plan.
Finally, the joint sheets are from 2011. Where a newer focused AAHA guideline covers the same topic, such as senior care, vaccination, or dental care, follow the newer document and your veterinarian’s current advice.
The Bottom Line
Use the AAHA/AVMA framework as a checklist for a planning conversation. The ten points tell you what to raise, while your veterinarian decides which tests, vaccines, parasite controls, and visit intervals fit your dog or cat at its current age and in its current environment.
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