VETERINARIANS AND ONE HEALTH .

THE ROLE OF VETERINARIANS IN ONE HEALTH. Happy one health day!!!One Health. Such a significant movement—and veterinarians are a vital part.Happy One Health Day! Every year on November 3, International One Health Day is observed around the world. Veterinarians and their teams are involved in many of the areas that fall under the One Health umbrella. You provide veterinary care for cats, dogs, horses and exotic pets to prevent zoonoses from spreading to their human families and to preserve the human-animal bond for as many years as possible. Vets know a lot about vector-borne and parasitic infections and how to prevent them, perhaps more than their counterparts in human medicine. Vets strive to ensure food safety and are at the forefront of combating antimicrobial resistance. Veterinarians work on technology and procedures that one day may translate to human medicine, or the converse; veterinarians also are working to adapt human medical advances to the veterinary field. The One Health connections is everywhere you look. When you see science bulletins such as “Flying Insects Are Disappearing at Huge Rates, And We Should All Be Worried,” you’re knowledgeable enough to understand the implications—and you see the connections. Or when you see news articles such as “Pollution linked to 9 million deaths worldwide each year,” you’re concerned about pollution’s effects on animals, as well as humanity—and you see the connections. Or when you read about current events like the deadly black plague outbreak in Madagascar, you know Yersinia is usually transmitted through flea bites and rodents are involved—and you see the connections. Should you ever doubt the importance of the role of veterinarians in One Health, please take just 13 minutes to watch this;

VETERINARY MEDICINE: 4 Key Steps To Detect Rabies In Dogs.

VETERINARY MEDICINE: 4 Key Steps To Detect Rabies In Dogs. Step 1. Recognize the first signs, the first stages of the illness usually last a week. During this period the sick dog will present some general symptoms. These signs are: muscle pain, irritability, weakness, agitation, discomfort, photophobia (intolerance to bright lights), loss of appetite, vomiting, diarrhea, fever, chills, inability to swallow normally and cough. Step 2. Look for symptoms of the paralytic form of the disease, this is the most common form of rabies in dogs, and lasts about 3 to 7 days after the first general symptoms. It is called this way because it causes paralysis of some areas of the body of the infected canine, which can start on the hind legs until reaching the facial muscles. Step 3. Look for symptoms of the aggressive form of the disease, this form of rabies also lasts about a week, and happens when the dog has symptoms of aggression and irritation. This type of rabies in dogs often causes a change in behavior. VETERINARY MEDICINE: 4 Key Steps To Detect Rabies In Dogs. It will make them act abnormally, and the foam in the mouth so characteristic of this condition makes them look even more dangerous. Although many think that this is the only form of the disease, it is not, and is much less common. The signs that will help you detect this furious form are excessive salivation with the appearance of foam, hydrophobia or panic to the water, aggression for no apparent reason, uncontrollable desire to bite things and people, restlessness, loss of appetite, irritability, playful attitude that changes Drastically to an aggressive one with just a caress or some other sign of affection. Step 4. Look for any open wounds or any bite marks on your pet's body: usually this disease is transmitted through saliva, which can reach the body of the can through a direct bite or other underlying injury. Contagion is usually carried out when an uninfected dog is bitten or scratched by one that is in the aggressive form of the disease. In very rare cases the virus travels through the air or stays in contaminated objects until it reaches the mucous membranes of its victim. These symptoms will progressively worsen, which greatly increases the risk of death and contagion to other animals and humans. Also, keep in mind that children are primarily affected by the bite of a rabid dog, because they are the least able to defend themselves both physically and biologically.

Trigger points: What prompts pet owners to take action?.

Trigger points: What prompts pet owners to take action? Pet Owner Paths research looks at clinical signs, client reactions.Have you ever wondered what it is that finally gets that pet owner to pick up the phone and call your veterinary hospital? Or what makes the difference between a question, appointment request and sheer panic? Researchers asked pet owners about specific clinical signs they might observe and what their response would be—the results are at right. Shades of blue represent those responses where you’re not involved; shades of red and pink mean you are involved—the darker the red, the more intense the response seeking a veterinary team’s involvement. Some interesting highlights: For dog owners, a gut feeling that something is wrong or vomiting or diarrhea more than once in 24 hours drives the most intense response—in other words, dog owners are most likely to take their pet to an emergency clinic in these scenarios. For cat owners, limping is the most likely thing to trigger a trip to the ER or get a veterinarian involved. And finally, notice how wide those medium-blue “Research online” bars are for cat owners compared with dog owners?

What do MDs know about zoonoses?

What do MDs know about zoonoses? Research indicates that human physicians are unaware of and uncomfortable discussing zoonotic diseases. But veterinarians can help fill the knowledge gap.If you visited your doctor and asked her to fill you in on zoonotic disease risks, how much do you think she’d be able to tell you, and how comfortable do you think she’d feel talking about it? Most likely not very comfortable at all, says Audrey Ruple, DVM, MS, PhD, DACVPM, MRCVS, assistant professor of epidemiology at Purdue University’s College of Veterinary Medicine and speaker at a recent Fetch dvm360 veterinary conference. When it comes down to it, zoonosis is the purview of veterinarians, Dr. Ruple says. First, let’s look at what the average human patient knows about zoonosis, according to research compiled by Dr. Ruple. In a survey conducted in 2009, only 54% of respondents said they knew they could get intestinal helminths from dogs.1 People just don’t know what they don’t know. Here are some more findings: 98% of respondents had heard of rabies (that’s good!), but only 58% knew that rabies exposure could be deadly (that’s bad). 83% of respondents would go to the ER if exposed to rabies, and 89% of respondents knew you could get rabies from bats. But wait. It gets better. When asked where they got their information about zoonotic disease: 49% of respondents thought TV, newspaper or the internet was the most important source of information about zoonotic diseases. 35% of respondents thought veterinarians were the most important source of information about zoonotic disease. Only 6% of respondents thought doctors were the most important source of information about zoonotic disease.

Aggression is not a diagnosis for your veterinary patients.

Aggression is not a diagnosis for your veterinary patients. According to behavior expert and Fetch dvm360 speaker Dr. John Ciribassi, many clients (and veterinary professionals!) fail to recognize aggression for what it really is—a clinical sign. According to Dr. John Ciribassi, the most common behavior misconceptions he hears from clients and fellow veterinarians is the view that aggression is a diagnosis rather than a sign of an underlying problem. Dr. Ciribassi makes an analogy to vomit—presumably so you can get a nice mental picture: "You don't say the diagnosis is vomiting. You say the symptom is vomiting. Now we have to find out, why is that occurring? Same with aggression," he says. According to Dr. Ciribassi, thinking of aggression as a clinical sign forces us to dig deeper to determine its causes, such as fear, territoriality or a maternal problem. “Your goal as a practitioner is to diagnose why that symptom is occurring and then address the cause,” he says. This paradigm applies to both dogs and cats, though Dr. Ciribassi says the range of causes of aggression as a clinical sign is wider in dogs than in cats. “But it’s the same idea,” he says. “Cats display aggression for a few different reasons—fear and territoriality are probably the biggest. And then we can see pain as well in both species.”

No hoof, no horse: Ending the scourge of laminitis.

No hoof, no horse: Ending the scourge of laminitis. With a little less than three years to go, will equine researchers meet the ambitious goal of Vision 2020—to conquer laminitis? Laminitis—the painful, crippling disease from damage to the hoof’s sensitive laminae—has been a scourge for ages, but it may soon … finally … be overcome. It is estimated that 15 percent of horses in the U.S. are afflicted by laminitis in their lifetime. Up to 75 percent of those affected eventually develop severe or chronic lameness and debilitation. An estimated $13 million annually is associated with the evaluation and treatment of laminitis and the loss of horses after a diagnosis. Now in 2017, there is reason for hope. Veterinarians at major universities worldwide are working on and inching closer to a cure. We’re on the verge of being able to treat the early stages of laminitis and perhaps reverse its devastating course that leads to the demise of so many horses.

Pet insurance : When is it a good time to buy pet health insurance?.

When is it a good time to buy pet health insurance?. As with anything you own and want to protect, the time to buy insurance is when you do not need it. Pets are part of our family, but we also own them. We plan to have enough money to cover their feeding, housing, and entertainment needs. 

 We also plan for routine medical care and wellness needs such as for vaccinations and parasite preventatives. It is the unexpected need for medical care that catches people unprepared. For some owners, having an insurance policy for their pet could make the difference between getting the needed medical care done or having to choose from another, less favorable option. Pet health insurance needs to be purchased ahead of need and before your pet develops any lifelong conditions that would be considered pre-existing and not covered.

Veterinary staff like to discuss pet health insurance with owners of puppies and kittens as enrolling them at such a young age means they have not had time to develop lifelong conditions. Allergies, chronic ear conditions, arthritis, and inflammatory bowel disease are just some of the chronic illnesses that take time to develop. Also, puppies and kittens tend to get into mischief and injure themselves. Puppies tend to explore their world via their mouth and swallow many things they should not such as socks and plastic items. 

Kittens sometimes swallow strings or other parts of fabrics. Surgeries to remove foreign objects would often be covered by insurance. Adult dogs and cats also can benefit from health insurance. As pets age, some will develop cancer. There are more options now than ever before in diagnosing it. Cancer treatments are also improved with targeted radiation therapies and chemotherapy. 

Veterinary bills for specialty cancer care can range easily from $5,000 to $10,000, and pet health insurance may pay for a significant chunk of it. Hip and knee problems tend to plague older dogs and high-energy, active dogs. They may need costly knee operations or hip replacement surgery. Multiple alternative and complementary therapies such as chiropractic care for animals, acupuncture, and therapeutic laser for chronic pain are available and covered by many insurance policies.