Questions asked during the presentation:
Q: How is everyone dealing with pneumovirus? Especially once it goes to pneumonia.
A: Pneumovirus has gotten a lot of attention recently but it's actually not a new pathogen.
We just recently learned how to "see it" with diagnostic tests available. If you are seeing a
lot of dogs progress to pneumonia I would suspect there are other factors at play in addition
to pneumovirus (such as lack of isolation as you note). Pursuing some surveillance
diagnostics to identify if other pathogens may be contributing may be of value. Approaching
the problem from a capacity lens- If your shelter is crowded, dogs stay a long time (more
than 14 days on average), there's a lot of stress/barking, and/or the environment is
challenging (poor housing or air quality)- these are all factors that may be contributing.
Changes to these factors is likely to disrupt the pattern of dogs progressing to pneumonia.
Q: And when you have no isolation anywhere.
A: This definitely makes controlling CIRD much more challenging. If/when possible putting
space between sick and healthy dogs (e.g. 3-4 empty kennels) may help reduce
transmission.
Q: Do you place virus-ill dogs (not being treated with abx) in the same room as dog being
treated for bacterial pneumonia?
A: Many folks don't have enough space to separate animals with different types of
respiratory disease in different spaces. If you can, sure, but far more important is what Dr.
Aziz is mentioning right now- minimizing stress, providing enrichment, etc are probably
more important than separate spaces. I will add some personal experience here with
pneumovirus in a large and often over-capacity shelter that is is very difficult to achieve
true isolation and most dogs will be exposed, but only some will progress to severe
pneumonia-like signs and need advanced care. Anything you can do to minimize the dog's
length-of-stay in the shelter is helpful, so consider tactics such as making stable dogs
available for adoption with their medications and supportive home care plans, cultivate
foster homes specifically for CIRD dogs (in advance, before the crisis), and use a protocol
that describes stages of clinical signs so that you can catch dogs early on your daily shelter
rounds and get them on the right treatment pathway as soon as identified.
Q: How do we go about dogs/puppies coming in with mycoplasma? We tested a litter on
intake and the results came in as Bordetella and mycoplasma?
A: There are additional questions here that will be helpful in providing guidance. I'm
assuming you saw clinical signs. Would also be helpful to know the type of testing
performed (test type, on what material, location, etc.) as many of these answers change the
picture. In general, if you have the ability to schedule intake and can vaccinate before
dogs/puppies enter the shelter, that's ideal, otherwise right at intake and plan for foster or
isolation as needed. The longer they stay in the shelter the more likely they will show
increasing signs and have a chance to spread/contract pathogens, so planning ahead if
possible by asking history and scheduling intake is always advocated. Mycoplasma can be
normal flora or pathogenic, so use of antibiotic therapy would need to be considered based
on the clinical signs and the other factors listed above. I'll emphasize what Dr. Bennett said:
Mycoplasma can be normal flora or pathogenic. Many perfectly healthy dogs are carrying
Mycoplasma, so it's not something you can prevent. What we think it does (most of the
time) is make an infection by another pathogen (like Bordetella) worse, so targeting the
primary pathogen is probably your best bet.
Q: Our shelter animals are outdoors. Based in the Bahamas - we have a tropical climate.
Does this affect chances of outbreak ?
A: Yes, but I will admit I don't know enough about what diseases are common/endemic
there to be specific. Outdoor housing is going to dramatically reduce risks of airborne
transmission (but not direct/indirect contact). On the flip side, high humidity tends to
prolong how long pathogens remain infectious in the environment, and can affect how well
the respiratory tract can fend off pathogens.
Q: Does a clean break necessarily mean keeping a kennel empty between the healthy and
sick side?
A: Not necessarily. A clean break specifically means that newly arrived animals are
protected from exposure to an existing outbreak in the shelter. This resource from our
colleagues at UF might be of interest.
https://ufl.pb.unizin.org/shelteranimalphysicalhealth/chapter/create-the-clean-break/
Q: Do you have any opinions on using Next DNA Generation Sequencing (from MiDOG
animal diagnostics is the most common veterinary lab) for identification of bacterial
pathogens?
A: I am not familiar with this company or their tests, and as employees of UC Davis we are
not allowed to recommend specific brands/companies. However, I did a very quick search
and it looks like the only published research so far is put out by the company itself. I would
be interested in more objective published research data before determining if/when to use
this testing.
Q: If we have a litter born here at the shelter - we should vaccine immediately?
A: Check out the neonatal vaccine recommendations here:
https://www.sheltermedicine.com/library/resources/neonatal-vaccination-
recommendations
Vaccination of neonates is safe but not necessarily effective, so it's a harm reduction
approach. The best option is get them out of the shelter as soon as possible.
Q: Hi, I am the GM of a dog boarding and daycare company in San Francisco. Although we
deal with a healthy vaccinated population, we sometimes see instances of CIRD come into
our facilities. For years we were lucky enough to have access to the Heroes for Healthy Pets
training materials provided by Merck, and all our staff, from dog handlers and customer
service agents, went through the training to learn about how to safely care for the pets in
our care. Unfortunately, to my knowledge they have since stopped that program. Do you
have any resources for staff training in the pet lodging/daycare industry?
A: I appreciate that you are taking proactive measures to protecting the dogs in your care in
this regard. Some of the resources developed for shelter and rescue settings are going to
still be relevant and have overlapping concepts for your setting. Since your housing is short-
term by definition, that is an advantage and also allows you to create breaks in scheduling
and cleaning, if needed. I would recommend you check out some of the shared resources (in
the chat and at the end of the talk) and compare to your current protocols to see where you
can make adjustments in areas like vaccination requirements, cleaning protocols and
housing, for starters. There are many good video trainings available for cleaning/housing
available through Maddie's University/Learniverse courses.
Take a look at the materials in our reference library at sheltermedicine.com.
Reply: Thanks Becky. We have even gone as far as histopath on necropsy as there have
been some that passed. I have worked with Dr. Crawford to get optimal testing. Had one
dog that had strep zoo but I was able to isolate him in the one kennel that was separate
from all the others. Stopped non-critical intake for 3 days and was able to use Convenia on
all exposed dogs. Was never able to do a clean break, isolate, or separate ill from well ones
for pneumovirus.
Q: When vaccinating DHPP in neonates what is the advised booster protocol to follow? In
our shelter we sometimes have puppies that stay for months on end.
A: Pups or kittens in a high risk environment should get revaccinated every 2 weeks until
they are at least 20 weeks old (5 months). But definitely do anything you can to chip away
at the real challenge- do anything you can to try to break the cycle of pups staying a long
time.
Q: Would you vaccinate 2 day old pups in a shelter with no active parvo cases but sees
parvo a lot? I work with a county shelter that takes in all dogs, does not have the physical
ability to isolate well, so mom and pups go in general population in any open kennel.
Cleaning protocols are there, but compliance is spotty…
A: Check out the neonatal vaccine recommendations here:
https://www.sheltermedicine.com/library/resources/neonatal-vaccination-
recommendations
Q: From this cart, do you isolate mild viral cases together with bacterial cases? If you do,
how do you keep the viral cases from becoming bacterial?
A: See the previous question submitted by Megan Keller. Secondary bacterial infections
(that develop after virus infection) are not transmitted between animals, these are bacteria
from the sick dog that are taking advantage of the compromized respiratory tract.
Q: What is the recommended length for the course of Doxycycline ?
A: Until signs associated with bacterial illness have resolved. Responsible antibiotic use
priniciples (in human and vet med) state that antibiotics should only be used a long as
needed, not for a set period of time. If you see a pattern- i.e. most dogs seem to clear by 7
days after starting doxy, then you can start them on a 7 days course, but try to adjust for
individuals as much as possible.
Q: Does the general stress of being in a shelter lower the immune system and cause
bacterial infections?
A: YES! Poor air quality, inadequate housing, excessive barking, inability to rest, emotional
stress, boredom, etc. are all common sources of stress in the shelter environment that we
have the ability to improve.
Q: Thank you. Do you think that for foster puppies and kittens starting vaccines at 4 weeks
of age is appropriate?
A: The vaccination recommendation for young animals is always dependent on
environmental risk. So, for example, if the foster home commonly has young animals or
hosted animals who previously had parvo or another preventable disease, or the humans in
the home come in contact with other dogs of unknown vaccination history, etc., then the
foster home is still considered high-risk and I would follow the newly updated neonatal
vaccination recommendations. You will need to evaluate each foster home for individual
risk to determine a vaccination strategy outside the shelter environment, or make a
protocol that covers for your most common foster home situations.
Q: Bordetella vaccine - do you need more than one ?
A: I'm assuming you're asking if you should repeat it after a first vaccine given at intake, say
at 2 weeks. No you do not need to repeat it (assuming you are giving intranasal or oral.
Injectable- follow vaccine directions, but injectable is not recommended so switch to
intranasal as soon as possible)
Q: Do you have any suggestions for managing dogs who have been exposed to exposed
dogs? To provide more context, we have a situation currently where we have been asked to
take in dogs from another facility. They had a distemper positive dog in their facility on July
18th who was redeemed a few hours later. While there, 3 other dogs were exposed. Since
then, a few more dogs have come in and they didn't have the ability to keep these dogs
separate from the exposed dogs. I figure with the exposed dogs (adult but vaccination
history unknown), we could do the following - quarantine for 14 days from date of
exposure, PCR test day 14 to ensure negative. However, with the dogs who have come in
since then, would it be reasonable to quarantine them but clear once the exposed dogs have
completed their quarantine and are PCR negative?
A: Quarantines for CDV aren't easy or helpful, so instead of quarantines we recommend you
do a careful risk assessment and use titers to assess which exposed dogs are at risk for
infection (it's often far fewer than we initially think). We have some great resources about
risk assessment for CDV shared with a previous webinar (you may need to create a free
maddie's university account to access them)
https://university.maddiesfund.org/products/mmpc-learniverse-curbing-disease-as-
intake-rises-prevent-fight-and-win-today#tab-product_tab_resources
Q: Are there any air sanitation systems you think are better vs anything else?
A: We've got details about that here!
https://www.sheltermedicine.com/library/resources/clear-the-air-practical-methods-for-
assessing-and-improving-indoor-air-quality-in-animal-shelters
Q: How is everyone dealing with pneumovirus? Especially once it goes to pneumonia.
A: Pneumovirus has gotten a lot of attention recently but it's actually not a new pathogen.
We just recently learned how to "see it" with diagnostic tests available. If you are seeing a
lot of dogs progress to pneumonia I would suspect there are other factors at play in addition
to pneumovirus (such as lack of isolation as you note). Pursuing some surveillance
diagnostics to identify if other pathogens may be contributing may be of value. Approaching
the problem from a capacity lens- If your shelter is crowded, dogs stay a long time (more
than 14 days on average), there's a lot of stress/barking, and/or the environment is
challenging (poor housing or air quality)- these are all factors that may be contributing.
Changes to these factors is likely to disrupt the pattern of dogs progressing to pneumonia.
Q: And when you have no isolation anywhere.
A: This definitely makes controlling CIRD much more challenging. If/when possible putting
space between sick and healthy dogs (e.g. 3-4 empty kennels) may help reduce
transmission.
Q: Do you place virus-ill dogs (not being treated with abx) in the same room as dog being
treated for bacterial pneumonia?
A: Many folks don't have enough space to separate animals with different types of
respiratory disease in different spaces. If you can, sure, but far more important is what Dr.
Aziz is mentioning right now- minimizing stress, providing enrichment, etc are probably
more important than separate spaces. I will add some personal experience here with
pneumovirus in a large and often over-capacity shelter that is is very difficult to achieve
true isolation and most dogs will be exposed, but only some will progress to severe
pneumonia-like signs and need advanced care. Anything you can do to minimize the dog's
length-of-stay in the shelter is helpful, so consider tactics such as making stable dogs
available for adoption with their medications and supportive home care plans, cultivate
foster homes specifically for CIRD dogs (in advance, before the crisis), and use a protocol
that describes stages of clinical signs so that you can catch dogs early on your daily shelter
rounds and get them on the right treatment pathway as soon as identified.
Q: How do we go about dogs/puppies coming in with mycoplasma? We tested a litter on
intake and the results came in as Bordetella and mycoplasma?
A: There are additional questions here that will be helpful in providing guidance. I'm
assuming you saw clinical signs. Would also be helpful to know the type of testing
performed (test type, on what material, location, etc.) as many of these answers change the
picture. In general, if you have the ability to schedule intake and can vaccinate before
dogs/puppies enter the shelter, that's ideal, otherwise right at intake and plan for foster or
isolation as needed. The longer they stay in the shelter the more likely they will show
increasing signs and have a chance to spread/contract pathogens, so planning ahead if
possible by asking history and scheduling intake is always advocated. Mycoplasma can be
normal flora or pathogenic, so use of antibiotic therapy would need to be considered based
on the clinical signs and the other factors listed above. I'll emphasize what Dr. Bennett said:
Mycoplasma can be normal flora or pathogenic. Many perfectly healthy dogs are carrying
Mycoplasma, so it's not something you can prevent. What we think it does (most of the
time) is make an infection by another pathogen (like Bordetella) worse, so targeting the
primary pathogen is probably your best bet.
Q: Our shelter animals are outdoors. Based in the Bahamas - we have a tropical climate.
Does this affect chances of outbreak ?
A: Yes, but I will admit I don't know enough about what diseases are common/endemic
there to be specific. Outdoor housing is going to dramatically reduce risks of airborne
transmission (but not direct/indirect contact). On the flip side, high humidity tends to
prolong how long pathogens remain infectious in the environment, and can affect how well
the respiratory tract can fend off pathogens.
Q: Does a clean break necessarily mean keeping a kennel empty between the healthy and
sick side?
A: Not necessarily. A clean break specifically means that newly arrived animals are
protected from exposure to an existing outbreak in the shelter. This resource from our
colleagues at UF might be of interest.
https://ufl.pb.unizin.org/shelteranimalphysicalhealth/chapter/create-the-clean-break/
Q: Do you have any opinions on using Next DNA Generation Sequencing (from MiDOG
animal diagnostics is the most common veterinary lab) for identification of bacterial
pathogens?
A: I am not familiar with this company or their tests, and as employees of UC Davis we are
not allowed to recommend specific brands/companies. However, I did a very quick search
and it looks like the only published research so far is put out by the company itself. I would
be interested in more objective published research data before determining if/when to use
this testing.
Q: If we have a litter born here at the shelter - we should vaccine immediately?
A: Check out the neonatal vaccine recommendations here:
https://www.sheltermedicine.com/library/resources/neonatal-vaccination-
recommendations
Vaccination of neonates is safe but not necessarily effective, so it's a harm reduction
approach. The best option is get them out of the shelter as soon as possible.
Q: Hi, I am the GM of a dog boarding and daycare company in San Francisco. Although we
deal with a healthy vaccinated population, we sometimes see instances of CIRD come into
our facilities. For years we were lucky enough to have access to the Heroes for Healthy Pets
training materials provided by Merck, and all our staff, from dog handlers and customer
service agents, went through the training to learn about how to safely care for the pets in
our care. Unfortunately, to my knowledge they have since stopped that program. Do you
have any resources for staff training in the pet lodging/daycare industry?
A: I appreciate that you are taking proactive measures to protecting the dogs in your care in
this regard. Some of the resources developed for shelter and rescue settings are going to
still be relevant and have overlapping concepts for your setting. Since your housing is short-
term by definition, that is an advantage and also allows you to create breaks in scheduling
and cleaning, if needed. I would recommend you check out some of the shared resources (in
the chat and at the end of the talk) and compare to your current protocols to see where you
can make adjustments in areas like vaccination requirements, cleaning protocols and
housing, for starters. There are many good video trainings available for cleaning/housing
available through Maddie's University/Learniverse courses.
Take a look at the materials in our reference library at sheltermedicine.com.
Reply: Thanks Becky. We have even gone as far as histopath on necropsy as there have
been some that passed. I have worked with Dr. Crawford to get optimal testing. Had one
dog that had strep zoo but I was able to isolate him in the one kennel that was separate
from all the others. Stopped non-critical intake for 3 days and was able to use Convenia on
all exposed dogs. Was never able to do a clean break, isolate, or separate ill from well ones
for pneumovirus.
Q: When vaccinating DHPP in neonates what is the advised booster protocols to follow? In
our shelter we sometimes have puppies that stay for months on end.
A: Pups or kittens in a high risk environment should get revaccinated every 2 weeks until
they are at least 20 weeks old (5 months). But definitely do anything you can to chip away
at the real challenge- do anything you can to try to break the cycle of pups staying a long
time.
Q: Would you vaccinate 2 day old pups in a shelter with no active parvo cases but sees
parvo a lot? I work with a county shelter that takes in all dogs, does not have the physical
ability to isolate well, so mom and pups go in general population in any open kennel.
Cleaning protocols are there, but compliance is spotty…
A: Check out the neonatal vaccine recommendations here:
https://www.sheltermedicine.com/library/resources/neonatal-vaccination-
recommendations
Q: From this cart, do you isolate mild viral cases together with bacterial cases? If you do,
how do you keep the viral cases from becoming bacterial?
A: See the previous question submitted by Megan Keller. Secondary bacterial infections
(that develop after virus infection) are not transmitted between animals, these are bacteria
from the sick dog that are taking advantage of the compromized respiratory tract.
Q: What is the recommended length for the course of Doxycycline ?
A: Until signs associated with bacterial illness have resolved. Responsible antibiotic use
priniciples (in human and vet med) state that antibiotics should only be used a long as
needed, not for a set period of time. If you see a pattern- i.e. most dogs seem to clear by 7
days after starting doxy, then you can start them on a 7 days course, but try to adjust for
individuals as much as possible.
Q: Does the general stress of being in a shelter lower the immune system and cause
bacterial infections?
A: YES! Poor air quality, inadequate housing, excessive barking, inability to rest, emotional
stress, boredom, etc. are all common sources of stress in the shelter environment that we
have the ability to improve.
Q: Thank you. Do you think that for foster puppies and kittens starting vaccines at 4 weeks
of age is appropriate?
A: The vaccination recommendation for young animals is always dependent on
environmental risk. So, for example, if the foster home commonly has young animals or
hosted animals who previously had parvo or another preventable disease, or the humans in
the home come in contact with other dogs of unknown vaccination history, etc., then the
foster home is still considered high-risk and I would follow the newly updated neonatal
vaccination recommendations. You will need to evaluate each foster home for individual
risk to determine a vaccination strategy outside the shelter environment, or make a
protocol that covers for your most common foster home situations.
Q: Bordetella vaccine - do you need more than one ?
A: I'm assuming you're asking if you should repeat it after a first vaccine given at intake, say
at 2 weeks. No you do not need to repeat it (assuming you are giving intranasal or oral.
Injectable- follow vaccine directions, but injectable is not recommended so switch to
intranasal as soon as possible)
Q: Do you have any suggestions for managing dogs who have been exposed to exposed
dogs? To provide more context, we have a situation currently where we have been asked to
take in dogs from another facility. They had a distemper positive dog in their facility on July
18th who was redeemed a few hours later. While there, 3 other dogs were exposed. Since
then, a few more dogs have come in and they didn't have the ability to keep these dogs
separate from the exposed dogs. I figure with the exposed dogs (adult but vaccination
history unknown), we could do the following - quarantine for 14 days from date of
exposure, PCR test day 14 to ensure negative. However, with the dogs who have come in
since then, would it be reasonable to quarantine them but clear once the exposed dogs have
completed their quarantine and are PCR negative?
A: Quarantines for CDV aren't easy or helpful, so instead of quarantines we recommend you
do a careful risk assessment and use titers to assess which exposed dogs are at risk for
infection (it's often far fewer than we initially think). We have some great resources about
risk assessment for CDV shared with a previous webinar (you may need to create a free
Maddie's University account to access them)
https://university.maddiesfund.org/products/mmpc-learniverse-curbing-disease-as-
intake-rises-prevent-fight-and-win-today#tab-product_tab_resources
Q: Are there any air sanitation systems you think are better vs anything else?
A: We've got details about that here!
https://www.sheltermedicine.com/library/resources/clear-the-air-practical-methods-for-
assessing-and-improving-indoor-air-quality-in-animal-shelter
Q: How is everyone dealing with pneumovirus? Especially once it goes to pneumonia.
A: Pneumovirus has gotten a lot of attention recently but it's actually not a new pathogen.
We just recently learned how to "see it" with diagnostic tests available. If you are seeing a
lot of dogs progress to pneumonia I would suspect there are other factors at play in addition
to pneumovirus (such as lack of isolation as you note). Pursuing some surveillance
diagnostics to identify if other pathogens may be contributing may be of value. Approaching
the problem from a capacity lens- If your shelter is crowded, dogs stay a long time (more
than 14 days on average), there's a lot of stress/barking, and/or the environment is
challenging (poor housing or air quality)- these are all factors that may be contributing.
Changes to these factors is likely to disrupt the pattern of dogs progressing to pneumonia.
Q: And when you have no isolation anywhere?
A: This definitely makes controlling CIRD much more challenging. If/when possible putting
space between sick and healthy dogs (e.g. 3-4 empty kennels) may help reduce
transmission.
Q: Do you place virus-ill dogs (not being treated with abx) in the same room as dog being
treated for bacterial pneumonia?
A: Many folks don't have enough space to separate animals with different types of
respiratory disease in different spaces. If you can, sure, but far more important is what Dr.
Aziz is mentioning right now- minimizing stress, providing enrichment, etc are probably
more important than separate spaces. I will add some personal experience here with
pneumovirus in a large and often over-capacity shelter that is is very difficult to achieve
true isolation and most dogs will be exposed, but only some will progress to severe
pneumonia-like signs and need advanced care. Anything you can do to minimize the dog's
length-of-stay in the shelter is helpful, so consider tactics such as making stable dogs
available for adoption with their medications and supportive home care plans, cultivate
foster homes specifically for CIRD dogs (in advance, before the crisis), and use a protocol
that describes stages of clinical signs so that you can catch dogs early on your daily shelter
rounds and get them on the right treatment pathway as soon as identified.
Q: How do we go about dogs/puppies coming in with mycoplasma? We tested a litter on
intake and the results came in as Bordetella and mycoplasma?
A: There are additional questions here that will be helpful in providing guidance. I'm
assuming you saw clinical signs. Would also be helpful to know the type of testing
performed (test type, on what material, location, etc.) as many of these answers change the
picture. In general, if you have the ability to schedule intake and can vaccinate before
dogs/puppies enter the shelter, that's ideal, otherwise right at intake and plan for foster or
isolation as needed. The longer they stay in the shelter the more likely they will show
increasing signs and have a chance to spread/contract pathogens, so planning ahead if
possible by asking history and scheduling intake is always advocated. Mycoplasma can be
normal flora or pathogenic, so use of antibiotic therapy would need to be considered based
on the clinical signs and the other factors listed above. I'll emphasize what Dr. Bennett said:
Mycoplasma can be normal flora or pathogenic. Many perfectly healthy dogs are carrying
Mycoplasma, so it's not something you can prevent. What we think it does (most of the
time) is make an infection by another pathogen (like Bordetella) worse, so targeting the
primary pathogen is probably your best bet.
Q: Our shelter animals are outdoors. Based in the Bahamas - we have a tropical climate.
Does this affect chances of outbreak ?
A: Yes, but I will admit I don't know enough about what diseases are common/endemic
there to be specific. Outdoor housing is going to dramatically reduce risks of airborne
transmission (but not direct/indirect contact). On the flip side, high humidity tends to
prolong how long pathogens remain infectious in the environment, and can affect how well
the respiratory tract can fend off pathogens.
Q: Does a clean break necessarily mean keeping a kennel empty between the healthy and
sick side?
A: Not necessarily. A clean break specifically means that newly arrived animals are
protected from exposure to an existing outbreak in the shelter. This resource from our
colleagues at UF might be of interest.
https://ufl.pb.unizin.org/shelteranimalphysicalhealth/chapter/create-the-clean-break/
Q: Do you have any opinions on using Next DNA Generation Sequencing (from MiDOG
animal diagnostics is the most common veterinary lab) for identification of bacterial
pathogens?
A: I am not familiar with this company or their tests, and as employees of UC Davis we are
not allowed to recommend specific brands/companies. However, I did a very quick search
and it looks like the only published research so far is put out by the company itself. I would
be interested in more objective published research data before determining if/when to use
this testing.
Q: If we have a litter born here at the shelter - we should vaccine immediately?
A: Check out the neonatal vaccine recommendations here:
https://www.sheltermedicine.com/library/resources/neonatal-vaccination-
recommendations
Vaccination of neonates is safe but not necessarily effective, so it's a harm reduction
approach. The best option is get them out of the shelter as soon as possible.
Q: Hi, I am the GM of a dog boarding and daycare company. Although we
deal with a healthy vaccinated population, we sometimes see instances of CIRD come into
our facilities. For years we were lucky enough to have access to the Heroes for Healthy Pets
training materials provided by Merck, and all our staff, from dog handlers and customer
service agents, went through the training to learn about how to safely care for the pets in
our care. Unfortunately, to my knowledge they have since stopped that program. Do you
have any resources for staff training in the pet lodging/daycare industry?
A: I appreciate that you are taking proactive measures to protecting the dogs in your care in
this regard. Some of the resources developed for shelter and rescue settings are going to
still be relevant and have overlapping concepts for your setting. Since your housing is short-
term by definition, that is an advantage and also allows you to create breaks in scheduling
and cleaning, if needed. I would recommend you check out some of the shared resources (in
the chat and at the end of the talk) and compare to your current protocols to see where you
can make adjustments in areas like vaccination requirements, cleaning protocols and
housing, for starters. There are many good video trainings available for cleaning/housing
available through Maddie's University/Learniverse courses.
Take a look at the materials in our reference library at sheltermedicine.com.
Reply: Thanks Becky. We have even gone as far as histopath on necropsy as there have
been some that passed. I have worked with Dr. Crawford to get optimal testing. Had one
dog that had strep zoo but I was able to isolate him in the one kennel that was separate
from all the others. Stopped non-critical intake for 3 days and was able to use Convenia on
all exposed dogs. Was never able to do a clean break, isolate, or separate ill from well ones
for pneumovirus.
Q: When vaccinating DHPP in neonates what is the advised booster protocols to follow? In
our shelter we sometimes have puppies that stay for months on end.
A: Pups or kittens in a high risk environment should get revaccinated every 2 weeks until
they are at least 20 weeks old (5 months). But definitely do anything you can to chip away
at the real challenge- do anything you can to try to break the cycle of pups staying a long
time.
Q: Would you vaccinate 2-day-old pups in a shelter with no active parvo cases but sees
parvo a lot? I work with a county shelter that takes in all dogs, does not have the physical
ability to isolate well, so mom and pups go in general population in any open kennel.
Cleaning protocols are there, but compliance is spotty…
A: Check out the neonatal vaccine recommendations here:
https://www.sheltermedicine.com/library/resources/neonatal-vaccination-
recommendations
Q: From this cart, do you isolate mild viral cases together with bacterial cases? If you do,
how do you keep the viral cases from becoming bacterial?
A: See the previous question submitted by Megan Keller. Secondary bacterial infections
(that develop after virus infection) are not transmitted between animals, these are bacteria
from the sick dog that are taking advantage of the compromised respiratory tract.
Q: What is the recommended length for the course of Doxycycline ?
A: Until signs associated with bacterial illness have resolved. Responsible antibiotic use
priniciples (in human and vet med) state that antibiotics should only be used a long as
needed, not for a set period of time. If you see a pattern- i.e. most dogs seem to clear by 7
days after starting doxy, then you can start them on a 7 days course, but try to adjust for
individuals as much as possible.
Q: Does the general stress of being in a shelter lower the immune system and cause
bacterial infections?
A: YES! Poor air quality, inadequate housing, excessive barking, inability to rest, emotional
stress, boredom, etc. are all common sources of stress in the shelter environment that we
have the ability to improve.
Q: Thank you. Do you think that for foster puppies and kittens starting vaccines at 4 weeks
of age is appropriate?
A: The vaccination recommendation for young animals is always dependent on
environmental risk. So, for example, if the foster home commonly has young animals or
hosted animals who previously had parvo or another preventable disease, or the humans in
the home come in contact with other dogs of unknown vaccination history, etc., then the
foster home is still considered high-risk and I would follow the newly updated neonatal
vaccination recommendations. You will need to evaluate each foster home for individual
risk to determine a vaccination strategy outside the shelter environment, or make a
protocol that covers for your most common foster home situations.
Q: Bordetella vaccine - do you need more than one ?
A: I'm assuming you're asking if you should repeat it after a first vaccine given at intake, say
at 2 weeks. No you do not need to repeat it (assuming you are giving intranasal or oral.
Injectable- follow vaccine directions, but injectable is not recommended so switch to
intranasal as soon as possible)
Q: Do you have any suggestions for managing dogs who have been exposed to exposed
dogs? To provide more context, we have a situation currently where we have been asked to
take in dogs from another facility. They had a distemper positive dog in their facility on July
18th who was redeemed a few hours later. While there, 3 other dogs were exposed. Since
then, a few more dogs have come in and they didn't have the ability to keep these dogs
separate from the exposed dogs. I figure with the exposed dogs (adult but vaccination
history unknown), we could do the following - quarantine for 14 days from date of
exposure, PCR test day 14 to ensure negative. However, with the dogs who have come in
since then, would it be reasonable to quarantine them but clear once the exposed dogs have
completed their quarantine and are PCR negative?
A: Quarantines for CDV aren't easy or helpful, so instead of quarantines we recommend you
do a careful risk assessment and use titers to assess which exposed dogs are at risk for
infection (it's often far fewer than we initially think). We have some great resources about
risk assessment for CDV shared with a previous webinar (you may need to create a free
maddie's university account to access them)
https://university.maddiesfund.org/products/mmpc-learniverse-curbing-disease-as-
intake-rises-prevent-fight-and-win-today#tab-product_tab_resources
Q: Are there any air sanitation systems you think are better vs anything else?
A: We've got details about that here!
https://www.sheltermedicine.com/library/resources/clear-the-air-practical-methods-for-
assessing-and-improving-indoor-air-quality-in-animal-shelters
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Mandy Newkirk
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Original Message:
Sent: 07-07-2025 10:28 AM
From: Elise Winn
Subject: 7/25 Webinar - Breathing Space: Controlling Canine Respiratory Disease Amid Shelter Crowding
Join us Friday, July 25 from 10-11 a.m. PT to learn steps you can take today to prevent and manage Canine Infectious Respiratory Disease (CIRD) in your shelter. If you're facing increasing intake numbers and the constant threat of infectious disease, or it seems like dogs keep getting sick no matter what you do, this webinar is for you!
Presenter: Dr. Chumkee Aziz (Outreach Veterinarian, UC Davis Koret Shelter Medicine Program)
With proven isolation and quarantine protocols, your team can create crucial room to breathe, ensuring more dogs stay healthy and ready for adoption. By the end of this webinar, you'll be ready to:
Pinpoint key risk factors that fuel CIRD spread and severity in shelters, and know when and how to use isolation, quarantine, and foster care strategies to effectively manage CIRD.
From RVTs and DVMs and beyond, everyone in the shelter has the power to have a big impact on animal health. CIRD doesn't have to be status quo!
#AccesstoCare
#AdmissionsandIntake(includingIntake-to-placement)
#Conferences,WorkshopsandWebcasts
#EducationandTraining
#Medicine,SurgeryandSterilization
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Elise Winn
UC Davis Koret Shelter Medicine Program - www.sheltermedicine.com
California for All Animals - www.californiaforallanimals.com
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