Speaker 1: You're listening to Petlifradio dot com.
Speaker 2: Well, hello, and thank you for joining me here on
pet Life Radio. Ask the Best with doctor Jeff, and
I am your host, Doctor Jeff Werber, here for another
half hour on this lovely Thursday afternoon, well at least
lovely here in southern California, close to eighty degrees. It's
in the mid to high seventies. Not complaining, of course.
And I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas vacation,
a little day off. Merry Christmas to everybody. And you know,
I always wonder after a big holiday like this, is
there such a letdown? How many of you were actually
going to work? I mean, I was amazing. They're doing
some construction on the street right in front of my office,
and literally I make a right turn on this very
major thoroughfair called Venice Boulevard, and I have to get
literally just two blocks to make a U turnaround an island.
There's a center island and they do reconstructive west of
my office on Venice, and literally that two blocks normally
takes If I tell you, I'm not lying, it could
take ten minutes. And it actually takes me longer to
go those two blocks to make that you turn around
the island than it does for me to get from
my home to that street to Venice Boulevard. Well, Tuesday,
when I came to it, the day before the holiday,
I turned the corner. There was nobody there. I could
have played football in the street. It was dead. And
talking to a lot of my clients and my employees,
of course I gave them off for Christmas Day, and
so we were closed and they're asking, well, te Doc,
and we have like are we gonna be open Thursday
and Friday? I said, uh, yeah, what do you think?
This is the post office? Of course we're going to
be open. And you know, it's pretty hard. I always
get nervous in general, even on a three day weekend
when I have to be closed, like you know on
the Memorial Day and the Labor days. When we're closed
on Sunday and then Monday, two days in a row
in a veterinarians calendar, that is frightening. So just curious
to know how many of you actually have to go
to work today and tomorrow. Why don't you drop us
a note. You can give us a call here on
our show at very easy phone call eight seven seven
three eight five eight eight A two, or you can
send me a little note do it live while we're
here at doctor Jeff at petlifefradio dot com. Speaking of
hearing from you, I really am curious to know what
you gave your pets for Christmas? What kind of treats,
what kind of gifts? What were you thinking when you
sort of started making this plan what you're going to
give your pets over the holidays? And do you think
by reading them? And I'm sure you all know your pets.
You all know makes them happy. You all know how
to tell whether they're Just take a dog and show
them your leash and before you know it, you know
they're going to get all excited. Were they excited with
what they got? Was it food? Was it treat? Was
it a new platetoy for your cat? I want to
know what we got in fact, like over this week,
because I know that to get you to stop on
vacation today if you're not working, I want you to
send me to Drjeff at Petlife radio dot com or
Drjeff at Drjeff dot com. That's doctor Jeff at doctor
Jeff dot com. It says, identify who you are, that
you listen to us here on pet Life Radio Ask
the Best with Doctor Jeff. Not only will we share
what you tell us on the air, but I mean
next week however, that'll be the day afternoon Year's However,
we're also going to send you a free prosens pet
product from our sponsor, Process, so that makes even more
worth it for you. So whatever gift you got your pet,
your dog or cat, or even if you forgot to
give them a gift, that's okay, because we're going to
get something from pet Life Radio and Process to make
it worth your while to go ahead and drop us
a line, send us a note, because I think we
all want to know. I think everybody wants to know,
and if nothing else, is going to give all of
our listeners some ideas of what to get for next year.
And also I want to know. I saw this news
piece this past week of a I'm trying thing where
it was it was obviously some more cold, because a
golden retriever was walking on a frozen lake that unfortunately
wasn't so frozen and fell into the ice and here
is this dog. Now, I got to tell you for
a person to have fallen through this icy cold into
the icy cold water, we'd be hypothermic like crazy. This
dog was just so casually swimming around. Fire departments came.
They had to go in with their gear on, all
sued it up, and they got the dog and they something.
They had a rope with them. They pulled both the
rescuer and the dog to safety. And the dog looked
totally fine. The dog looked like it was just going
for a nice winter swim. It was amazing to me.
It wasn't shivering, it wasn't shaking, it wasn't stressed. It
was unbelievable. And you know, it's funny when I think
about when I my dog swim during the winter in
an unheated pool. You know, everybody else know what else
swimming the unheeded pool. They go in like it's nothing,
and you think. You know, two of my dogs are Labradors,
and I have a Labordoodle, and they're so used to it.
Their coat, their skin is so thick that we feel
sorrier for them than they feel for themselves because it
doesn't seem to bother them one bit. It's actually amazing.
So because I'm so spoiled here in sunny I mean
really unseasonably sunny Los Angeles where it's been in the area,
we have some cold days. I'm still hoping for more
snow up in the mountains because I can't wait to
take off and go snowboarding, which I'm planning to do
next weekend. But I want to know what precautions are
you taking with your pets during this icy cold weather,
and some good ideas that we might be able to
share with other people, because I think that's really important
that all of our listeners know kind of what's in
store for them and what we can do to help
them and their pets brave the icy cold winters, especially
in places like Minnesota where it is icy cold. So anyway,
I also want to talk to you about some of
the strange cases I have last couple of weeks. And
one of the things that comes to mind in understanding
and recognizing our pets is that I have had two
cases of animals that have eaten really weird things and
didn't present interestingly with the typical blockage. One of them
we ended up going into surgery and the diagnosis was
not made. Typically, when a dog eats something and has
an obstruction, the problem that we see is a very
tender painful abdomen and a particular gas pattern that we
might see on an X ray, and of course a
history of having eaten something. Often the owner will come
in and say, I saw my dog chewing on blank,
or we are missing you know blank. Sometimes, for example,
we had a dog that really liked to eat batteries
and have an unbelievably clear X ray of two double
A batteries sitting inside this dog's stomach enough to make
the energizer bunny jealous. And so that's those are easy.
Those are the easy ones. I'm talking. Thing is that
the animals comes in presenting with just as we say,
kind of half jokingly in the veterinary terminology, ADR ain't
doing right, Doc, And so the dog was ain't doing right,
and nothing specific. The belly wasn't that bad, the blood's
were normal, the X rays were okay, and it wasn't
until an ultrasound that we just saw something very unusual
in the intestinal track. So we decided that, for lack
of anything better to do, and the dog hadn't been
eating and the dog was vomiting, let's go ahead and
take a look at the very least we figured we'd
get some intestinal samples, but we were highly suspicious there
was something in there. Sure enough, this dog was blocked
at the Iliosco colic junction, and what it was was
a huge clump of hair. It almost looked like if
you ever had a stucked drain in your house. The
kitchen sink is just blocked up, and you get that
rotor ruta guy coming in and they're trying to clean
up all this stuff, and all that comes out is
just muck, nothing really specific. Was an accumulation of all
these things. That's what was in this poor dogs intestine,
and it was causing other problems well because it was
not bone material, it was not metallic, and it really
didn't show up on X ray because it wasn't a complete,
non movable obstruction where gas couldn't get through. That's why
it didn't present with a typical gas pattern. And because
it had been moving up to a certain point, it
explains why the dog's belly was an extremely tender like
out I got something inside of me, please be careful,
And that's what it was. And the iloc Colach junction
is a really weird spot and a lot of times
that's where we will catch a problem, something going on
in that particular area, and it's very challenging because it's
a very difficult area to determine, Oh, is what is
causing the plug now going to create more problems or not,
and we just don't know. So sometimes you're just gonna
have to go. You gotta trust your intuition, you gotta
trust your veterinarian if there's any doubt, anyone with really
good ultrasound skills often help make a determination. Obviously, you
don't want to go in to explore unless you have to,
because that's sort of what we call an invasive way
to find out what's going on. But with the help
of the ultrasound, it might, you know, sort of guide
us to making the correct decision. The second case somewhat
similarly in that it was so bizarre having two similar cases,
where again it was not your classic presentation of an obstruction.
It was a dog who was not doing well and
would vomit, but sometimes we'ld eat not wouldn't vomit all
the time, didn't have the classic gas pattern, et cetera.
And this dog too had it looks like it ate
wood and it may have even been like a wreath
or something. And again dogs like this kind of crud
and it was all sitting there in the intestine, and
according to our surgeon, what it looked like. He said,
it would block and then it would move. It would
block and then it would move, because there were areas
of the intestine that were very irritated. But it didn't
act what we call perforate. It didn't make a hole
in the intestine. So that explains why we had We
didn't have that classic signs. But this dog was one
sick dog. And what happened then what got us to say,
you know what, we really got to move on this
is the dog started showing signs of what we call toxicity,
where the eyes, the white parts of the eyes called
the sclarer, were beat red and injected, the eyes were
sunken in. The dog was extremely dehydrated despite being on
ivy fluids, and it was becoming what we call septicemic.
That means that it was starting to get signs of infection.
The white cell count was going high, and this poor guy,
despite the fact that everything else was normal, was not
getting better but was actually getting worse, which and then
after an ultrasound clear indication that at the very least
this dog needs to be explored, and if we found nothing,
then we'd at least we'd have to take some biopsy
samples of the stomach of the intestine, looking for possibly
intestinal lymphoma, looking for possibly an inflammatory at bowel disease,
and things like that. So anyway, I just want to
caution you that you don't want to wait too long,
even though your pets signs aren't going to be extremely
clear and textbook, if you will, don't wait too long
if things aren't right. If your dog is as we say,
adr ain't doing right and it's going on for more
than a day or so, go to see a veterinarian.
Let's get an answer. There are some things that can
be checked out that might help us determine whether or
not this is something that needs to be addressed. Anyway,
we are here at the halfway point of our show.
What I want to do is think once again our
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Speaker 2: So welcome back to Ask the Mets with Doctor Jeff.
I am your host, Doctor Jeff Werber here on pet
Life Radio and we are a live, catchup, live program,
so we want to hear from you. Don't be shy,
don't be embarrassed. You can give us a call at
eight seven seven three eight five eight eight eight two.
Or if you are shy, and god there are a
lot of you out there other are shy, just go
ahead and send me a note Doctor Jeff, Dr Jeff
at petlifradio dot com or Drjeff at Drjeff dot com.
And if you are just joining us, once again, want
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we will also go ahead and give you a free
count it free pro Sense pet products, so you can't
go wrong anyway. So we just talked about some weird presentations.
When we talk about cases like this, I really want
you to all learn because what I hate happens is
when something happens on the negative where somebody was not
prepared for something somebody didn't know not. I always think
it's somewhat the veterinarian's fault, but to a degree that
we can't think of everything that we're going to talk
and teach our clients in one exam. Sometimes we have
to wait till poop happens, as we like to say,
so we can then educate you. So really take advantage
of hearing stories that we could share with you that
might help you in the future. Or if you're talking
to friends and your friends it's got my dogs hasn't
been doing right, he's been doing XYZ. You could say,
wait a second. I heard doctor Jeff on Pet Life
Radio talking about that you know what you need to
see your veterinarian. Another area that I don't think we've
talked about in a while, and I know we've covered
because it's sort of near and dear to me and
as we are, I get more and more questions and
I see, you know, I love rescue groups, and we
have a lot of rescue groups. Unfortunately, a lot of
you out there are adopting dogs from rescues. But one
of the things that I commonly see in question there
are a lot of experts out there, and I'm kind
of using that term half in ingest. The experts are
some of these breeders, some of these pet rescue people
that seem to know, at least in their own minds,
more than the veterinarians. So they are, for example, they
are giving the adopterors information that is a bit antiquated,
and I want to caution you that when you are
in a situation like that, I would make sure to
regardless of what the paperwork says, regardless of whether or
not the paperwork says, oh no, you don't need to
see your veterinarian for another x weeks or the next
shots are due. Whenever, don't believe them see your veterinarian.
They may be right. Hopefully they are. I'd see more
and more are actually kind of picking up on this
and doing a better job. But there are still a
lot of experts, and again using the term loosely out
there that have not updated their information. And one such
area is as far as vaccines, I am still seeing
way too many pets that the vaccine series is being
started at six weeks. That is way too early. One
has to wait at least seven, preferably eight weeks. And
then I had a lady come in, and you know that,
like when your veterinarian gives vaccines, I'll often put a
sticker either in your little pamphlet or on the record
from the vaccine. There were stickers. The dog was only
twelve weeks old, and there must have been six or
eight stickers on that thing already. That is, oh my god,
talk about overkill. That is way too much. Not only
is it unnecessary, giving vaccines too frequently or too early
can actually be detrimental, as can counting the number of
vaccines instead of the spread between the vaccines. In other words,
two vaccines given four weeks apart can be more effective
than threeaccines given two or three weeks apart. And you
really need to know that. That is very important to
know when to start vaccines, how frequently to give them,
how many vaccines to mix together and give it one
time and what vaccines to give. So here are some guidelines.
And again this is my opinion, this is my show,
so I get to be on my soapbox. However, I
absolutely encourage you to check with your veterinarians as well.
So firstly, puppies typically if started around eight weeks of
age or go to eight three sets of vaccines. That's eight,
twelve and sixteen is ideal. Six' eight ten is not ideal.
Still three vaccines, but totally ineffective. You don't want to
complete your series that which is meant to go for
an entire year much before fifteen weeks of age, preferably
sixteen or even seventeen. So nine and thirteen seventeen is perfect.
Eight twelve, sixteen is perfect, seven eleven fifteen okay. If
you have a dog, a rest for example, that you
don't know for sure if they've ever had vaccines, you
can't prove it regardless of age. My recommendation would be
at least if it's under a year of age, to
give it at least a set of two again a
month apart. One is priming the immune system, the other
one is providing what we call an amnemnistic or a
memory response, which is that response which is going to
take us long term? Now what is long term? This
is where there is even some I would say disagreement.
That's a harsh term, just some opinions by a couple
of the other experts out there. These are experts that
at the university level or have the advanced degrees that
have been studying immunology that have different opinions. One says,
after the long term, after that vaccine, the last one
of a series, you're probably good for two to three years,
maybe even three. Another one says, well, I think that
after the puppy series, meaning sixteen weeks of age, give
the first booster at a year, and then go every
three So that's the one I follow. Just to be safe.
You know, a lot of la dogs lifestyle is such
that they're running around. There's a lot of potential for
exposure and contagion. So I prefer to be a little
bit more careful. That's kind of my take on it.
But again you want to check with your veterinarian. Rabies.
Rabies vaccine is required by law, depending on your state
and or municipality. It's either going to be every year.
Sometimes the first one if given to a dog or
a cat under a year of age is only good
for a year. After that it's good for three years.
There are many states that continually want them once a year.
As far as witch vaccines to consider, I recommend again
you speak to your veterinarian and determine what is core
in your area. Core are diseases that are prevalent that
you know exists that should be vaccinated against some of
the vaccines that are also add one more thing. Core
means lifestyle. For example, I have cats. I have a
lot of cats eight to be exact, They're all indoors.
Do my indoor cats indeed leukemia vaccine to my indoor
cats need Raby's vaccine. Let me add that in California,
rabies is not required in cats. In states where it
is required, regardless of whether your cat is indoor outdoor,
you'll probably have to do it because it's required by law.
I'm a big fan of that, but it is what
it is. But in California, since it's not required by
law and my cats are indoors, I have not invited
any rabid animals into my home in quite a while.
From bats to raccoons to you name it, to squirrels,
to skunks. So I think I'm pretty safe. And the
only vaccines that I give to my cats and a
very infrequent basis, are the upper respiratory vaccines, because of
course those can be introduced into the home via open windows,
cats that are roaming outdoors, et cetera. But rabies obviously
requires the bite of a rabbit animal. Fila leukemia requires
prolonged direct contact with the leukemia positive carrying cat, and
again that's not going to happen in my household. Let's
talk some dog diseases porttella. The late term we call
it is kennel cough. In LA, I call it take
your dog for a walk cough, go to the dog
park cough. Take a walk on Melrose cough, Go to
the vet cough, go to the gloomer cough, go to
the dog you daycare cough. It is everywhere. So therefore
I recommend the border tele vaccine as one of our
core vaccines. Now lepto leptosprosis, for example, I don't consider core.
Now if I have a patient that frequents hikes up
in the mountains and things like that where lepto might
be a problem, then for that dog, yes I will
give a lepto vaccine. Likewise, the lime disease vaccine, that's
just not a huge problem here in southern California, so
it is not part of my core vaccines, nor is
they rattlesnake vaccine. However, again, if one of my patients
does a lot of hiking with the owners and they
say they've identified and know they're in a rattlesnake area,
and then of course we are going to give the
rattle stake vaccine. So it's very important to treat your
pets as individuals and check with your veterinarian, and that's
what we want to do, because we want to make
sure that we only give them that which they need. Now,
cats are a little different. There is again some discussion,
i wouldn't say argument, some opinions about whether or not
you need to give cats a series of three vaccines,
because many have shown and proven that most cats at
twelve to thirteen weeks of age have developed their immune
system enough to wait the year at least before their
first adult booster. So I'd say for a cat, if
you wanted to do nine and thirteen weeks, that's probably
going to be fine, especially for an indoor cat. An
indoor cat because it's not going to be challenged that
much by what's out there.
Speaker 3: Now.
Speaker 2: One thing that we've seen a lot of and I've
been doing what's called tiers. I have a lot of
clients that really don't like to give vaccine unnecessarily and
unfortunately though the rules have changed in the animal world
for both dogs and cat as to how often how
frequently we need to booster our dogs and cats. What
would once be every year now for most of them
that many of the vaccines is every three years. Rabies
is three, just Zempra parvo is three FBRCP, the feline
vaccine for rhino'calisi neumanitis is three foror to tell it,
I still think one or even believe it or not
six months. If your dog frequents travels a lot, goes
to the doggy daycares, goes to the groomer facilities, often
goes to boarding facilities. Often it's really not that great
a shot, so you might want to give it every
six months. Again, I would check with your veterinarian. Now.
I had a question recently. I was presented with a
nine year old, ten year old cat indoor only had
not had any vaccines for several years. Cat was healthy
as can be. My cat should be so healthy. And
the subject came up of oh my god, we noticed
we hadn't give vaccines in a long time. The owner
was a little bit hesitant to give vaccines because of
what she's been reading. So I called one of my
gurus who's here based in southern California, imnologist. It's her
lead that I often follow when it comes to vaccines,
and I called her up and I asked her. I said,
I have this patient in front of me, nine and
a half ten year old cat, healthy as can be.
I hasn't had vaccines in several years indoor. Only do
I need to vaccinate? And her answer was not even
a moment, a split seconds, hesitation was absolutely not. So again,
we really feel many feel that once our pets hit
a certain age, they are so immune, their own immune
systems are so well developed, have been primed for so
many years with low levels of whatever, and they do
not need our vaccines any longer. And again I can
only share that with you. You need to check with
your vets. But I've seen a lot now. I have
been doing tighter testing, as I mentioned earlier, and with
the tighters. It is a test that we run that
measures antibody, measures existing antibody. And I have some animals
that some owners I should say that really just don't
like to give vaccines if not necessary. And I give
a deal to my clients, and I think it's a
great deal. You know, sometimes I'm they thank me for it.
I say, I'll tell you what. I know it costs
money to do the test, and I know it costs
money to vaccine, and I know as a consumer you'd
feel like being ripped off if you have to pay
for both. Actually, I'll tell you what. I think that
tight ring is a better way to go, because if
we show that your pet is amply protected, then why vaccinate,
Why throw more antigen at him to stimulate the immune system.
Just let him be. He's got enough an he's got
enough protection already. Anybody protection already. So I'll tell you what,
do the test. I think it's a better way to go.
If that test comes back low, meaning we don't have
enough protection, which by the way, I rarely get. I
get it a few times, I'll throw in the vaccine
for free, so that way they can't lose and I'm
paying twice. I sound like it's a great way to go,
and I think I'm doing the pet a service and
I'm certainly making my clients happy because they don't feel
like they're being ripped off having to pay twice both
for the test and then for the actual vaccination injection. Well,
I could tell you that in years and years I've
been doing tighter testing. I can count on two hands
and now I'm talking hundreds and hundreds of animals that
I've ended up having to vaccinate. So there you have it. Anyway,
we love to hear your veterinarian say send me a
little note to doctor Jeff at petlfradio dot com. Next
week on our show, call us at eight seven seven
three eight five eight eight eight two. I want to
know what your doctors vaccine protocols are. Do they agree?
Do they disagree. I'd love to have a little active
discussion about this. I think it's really important because I
do believe we as a profession have been and sometimes
still are over vaccinating. Well, thank you for joining us
here on pet Life Radio. You're on with doctor Jeff
where we're asked the bets with doctor Jeff, and once
again want to thank our sponsors, pro Sens Pet Products,
and our retailers for carrying process pet products. And we
want to wish you a very very happy New Year.
And we'll be here next Thursday live here on pet
Life Radio.
Speaker 1: Let's Talk Beets every week on demand only on petlife
radio dot com. Thirteen