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Veterinary Information Service
Please do not use our site to attempt to diagnose or treat your pet. Your veterinarian is the best source of health advice for an individual pet. Please do use our site to become better informed about the medical problems your pet may have. We will do our best to ensure that information presented is accurate and up-to-date. The most current information will be at the top of each page. Remember that veterinarians often disagree about the best treatments for pets. There are often several perfectly acceptable ways to treat the same condition. Just ask a lot of questions!
If you find our site to be a valuable resource, please consider supporting it by making a donation to help support vetinfo, vetinfo4dogs and vetinfo4cats. All of our income goes to keep our veterinary information websites online.
3/27/2007 - Please Note...I have taken the old Cat and Dog pages out of www.vetinfo.com
A number of search engines still refer to those pages and not to the current cat and dog domain pages that are updated with new information. We left them originally because there were so many links from other websites to them . You will find all of the same pages with more current information in the dogs and cat domains.
The current pages are found in www.vetinfo4cats.com and www.vetinfo4dogs.com
We are no long accepting subscribers but the subscriber website is available to current subscribers.
If you are a Vetinfo Digest Subscriber Click Here to go to our Subscriber Area! Password necessary.Otherwise please use the many resources of our vetinfo.com websites freely. See side panel or below for links to find information.
How to find information
Dr Mike is Blogging - What is he thinking about, reading about, what's bothering his veterinary clients?
Keep checking the blog for thoughts, ideas and odds and ends of current veterinary thinking , musing and information. Dr Mike's Blog
The most detailed and up to date information on our website can be found in this section of Vetinfo and not in dog and cat encyclopedia.
Use our Vetinfo indexes.
Dog index - an index to our Dog domain. All topics related to canine health and behavior can be found here. Please also double check using the search engine on the dog site and check general topic pages as well for related information. We may have a large amount of information on a topic or just a very small amount. Please also see the sidebar for main domain pages and other links. The indexes are in no way complete but are a good general aid so please us the search engines as well.
Cat index - an index to our Cat domain with all of our information on feline health and behavior issues. some subjects have entire pages some may just have had one or two questions asked regarding the problem listed. The indexes are not complete but are a good aid so please also try the search engine found in each domain.
Vet index Vetinfo domain index. The vetinfo domain has general topics for pets as well as
the link pages, Yourturn page and the pages that provide information about becoming a Veterinarian, About a veterinarians life, Vet Tech info and a list of Vet schools. There are links on the sidebar that will lead you directly to some of these pages.
Encyclopedia of Canine Veterinary Medical Information - Concise Disease and disorder information.
Encyclopedia of Feline Medical Information - Concise Disease and disorder information
Creepies and Crawlies - Nasty looking creatures your vet talks about that may share space with your dog or cat.
About Vets - what it's like on the other side of the table
Zoonotic Disease - Some diseases you can catch from your pet and some you can't.
Methicillin Resistant Staphylococcus aureus infections of cats and dogs
Veterinarians have been lucky over the last decade or so in not having to deal with methicillin resistant staphylocccus aureus (MRSA) infections very often. It is likely that this situation will change over the next few years as MRSA infections are being reported more commonly in pets. In most cases these infections are thought to be contracted by the pet due to association with an infected human but it also appears that pets can be a reservoir for the infection in households and much more rarely a source of infection for previously uninfected humans.
There are two forms of MRSA that are recognized in people, community acquired MRSA and hospital acquired MRSA. In general, hospital acquired MRSA is much worse and can lead to organ failure and death fairly rapidly, despite treatment, in some patients. So far, the pet cases that have been reported appear to be the community acquired form of MRSA.
Cats infected with MRSA may have difficult to treat abscesses or lymph node swelling not explained by other diagnoses. Dogs have more of a tendency to have inapparent infections affecting the nasal passages but can have severe abscesses or other signs of an infectious process.
At the present time the main thing to remember about MRSA and pets is that they are usually infected by a family member who has the disease but that it may be difficult to clear it from the household without treating pets who are infected. So if you or someone you have close contact with is diagnosed with MRSA and it is hard to eliminate, you may want to be sure that a pet is not harboring the Staph bacteria and keeping the infection going in the household. It is also important to keep in mind that most Staph infections in dogs and cats are caused by Staphococcus intermedius, so just the word "staph" should not set off alarm bells immediately.
Dr Mike Richards, DVM
9/06/2006
Traveling with your pet to the UK is easier now. The US and Canada have been added to the List of accepted counties In The PETS agreement. There are still some very specific guidelines to be met and you and your vet need to strt the process six months before you plan your trip with your pet or you may have a quarantine problem anyway.
You have to travel into the UK by commercial carrier, either plane or boat. Pets traveling on a private plane or boat are not allowed to enter the UK.
Certain procedures are required before your pet can travel. Prepare at least seven months in advance: It may take at least 7 days , sometimes longer, for a vaccination to build a titer unless the pet was previously vaccinated. Vaccinations do not protect instantly.For more details and advice: The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, Animal Health Division, 1a Page Street, London SW1 4PQ. Telephone: 020 7904 6577
- Have your pet micro-chipped - so that it can be identified
- Have your pet vaccinated against rabies
- Have a blood test to ensure that the rabies vaccination has worked and obtain the appropriate certificate to prove this (your pet cannot enter the UK until six months after the blood sample was taken)
- You must then obtain a PETS certificate from a government-authorized vet
- Before your return trip to the UK all pets have to be checked for ticks and tapeworm by a local vet - and a certificate issued.
A list of all member counties and procures involved are found at the above website. Everyone who travels with a pet outside of their country might want to bookmark the site.
Michal
3/20/2006
Do your part in maintaining the health of your pet!
You are an important part of the health care of your pet. Your dog or cat can not speak for itself and is dependent on you to make sure the vet knows the symptoms and history of an illness. Your pet is also dependent on you to ensure that medications are given correctly and that follow-up care or testing is done. Your pet may be in pain which you can determine but your vet can not. Make sure you tell your vet if you believe that your pet is in pain.
1) Make a list of the problems. Try to note when they started and anything unusual that might have occurred around the time the problems started. The more complete this list is, the less likely you are to miss an important clue your vet needs.
2) Make a list of all medications your dog is currently taking. This
includes aspirin if you are using it for arthritis, heartworm preventatives,
flea control products, prescription medications, food supplements and herbal or homeopathic medications. Drug interactions and drug side effects occur in pets, too!3) Make a list of other things you have questions about or that your pet
needs. It is frustrating to get home and realize you forgot to buy the
heartworm preventative or special diet your pet needs.4) If you have to drop your pet off at the vet's or if it is necessary to
allow someone else to bring your pet to your vet, make sure you send contact information so that your vet can reach you by phone.5) If your pet has a chronic intermittent problem with seizures, respiratory
difficulty, behavioral quirks or other problems that may not be seen during a routine exam it is a good idea to bring a videotape of these episodes if possible. It really is true that a picture is worth a thousand words,
sometimes.6) If you can not give a pill, do not take pills home from your vet. Most
medications come in liquid form and if a medication is important enough to
prescribe it may be necessary to hospitalize a patient to ensure that it is
given if you can not give it at home.7) Do not leave your vet's without a clear understanding of your
responsibilities in continuing the care. If your pet has a bandage or
stitches you must know what care is necessary at home. If you will be
administering medication you must understand the directions. Do not be
embarrassed to ask directions again. If your vet's explanation is difficult
to understand ask if the veterinary technician can explain them to you. Many
times the support staff is better at explaining directions for after-care
than the vet.8) If you get home and find that you are still confused or forgot to ask a
question, call your vet's office and ask for help.Your vet wants your pet to get better. Veterinarians understand that they
are part of a health care team that includes you. In order to "win the
game", teamwork is necessary. Do your part.
Information on Dr Mike can be found at http://www.vetinfo.com/bio.html and http://www.vetinfo.com/aboutvets.html
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Please note: The information on our site is for everyone to read. Please use it as often as you like. Please use the search engine or one of the indexes to access the information you need on our website.
Last edited 02/25/08
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