This book makes an excellent and detailed companion to ‘Shelter Medicine For Veterinarians and Staff’ (Blackwell Publishing), for helping the shelter vet best minimise the risk and impact of infectious diseases in shelter dogs and cats.
The veterinary surgeon's guidance, for shelter management and husbandry, together with optimal treatment and control of infectious disease can be invaluable not just to ensure the appropriate progress of animals in shelters from rescue/relinquishment enabling them to be fit and available for rehoming, but also to ensure suitable integration into new home environments, to help safeguard their future health as well as the health of others in the area.
Shelter medicine is a growing field of study in the United States with a number of State veterinary colleges offering shelter medicine residency programmes and undergraduate training, often in collaboration with local animal shelters. The editors of ‘Infectious disease management in animal shelters’ are both world renowned for their work in practical shelter management and research, and it is hard to imagine any more suited to the production of such a book.
The early chapters address the principles of disease management, covering wellness, outbreak management, sanitation and disinfection, vaccinations and immunology, pharmacology and necropsy. This section is thought-provoking and also details some other useful shelter medicine resources. The 117 pages make easy reading in one sitting and challenge the shelter vet to consider herd health principles for disease control while also addressing the welfare of the individual animal. The editors point out that ‘ethical considerations aside, a modest investment in vaccination, diagnostic testing or sanitation will be amply repaid if more animal lives are saved and more animals are adopted as a result …. Many of the practices that enhance shelter animal health are no more costly than less effective practices’. The section clearly highlights that infectious disease management is dependent upon population control, facility and pen design, management of stress, disease screening, preventative measures, and awareness and attention to transmission dynamics.
The point, which seems to commonly encountered by the shelter vet, is made that ‘problems may arise when shelter staff consult with local practitioners who are uninformed about the differences between private practice and shelter medicine and are therefore critical of practices recommended by shelter vets, especially when taken out of context … different recommendations regarding vaccinations, treatment, neuter, etc, for this population are based on a different set of risk factors, assessment tools, circumstances and resources. This different standard of care should not be interpreted to be lower, but rather to be shelter specific, just as there are different but effective standards of care for large animal herds’.
The remainder of the book focuses on specific infectious disorders seen in feline and canine shelter animals, with detailed descriptions of epidemiology, clinical signs and disease course, diagnosis, treatment, and shelter prevention and control strategies for each pathogen. While it would be of benefit for these sections to have been read and well-digested by the shelter vet, with suggestions discussed and implemented where appropriate, prior to being presented with such disease outbreaks, it seems likely these slightly more technical chapters will be dipped into following the occurrence of cases. Some relevant black and white images are included, though not abundant through the text.
Section two covers the respiratory diseases, with a chapter dedicated to feline upper respiratory diseases and three chapters on canine disorders. Section three is devoted to the gastrointestinal diseases, with chapters on feline and canine parvoviruses, a chapter on internal parasites, and another on bacterial and protozoal gastrointestinal disease. Section four – dermatological disease – features chapters on dermatophytosis and ectoparasites. Finally, section five – ‘Other diseases’ covers rabies, feline leukaemia virus, feline immunodeficiency virus (FIV), feline infectious peritonitis, vector-borne diseases, heartworm disease and zoonoses.
Both editors and all 27 contributors are based in the USA, which brings some limitations to the application or relevance of some of the recommended preventative measures and treatment strategies in the UK. Firstly, shelter set-ups and management practices are often very different in the US. The use of larger communal housing facilities appears to be more common in the United States and there are no national ‘chains’ of centrally-managed shelters in the US for either single or mixed-species rescue animals; whereas the UK has a number of national charities – Cats Protection, Dogs Trust, RSPCA, SSPCA and Blue Cross – as well as a number of other multi and uni-centre animal rehoming organisations, many of which collaborate and share information and ideas through the Association of Dog and Cat Homes (ADCH). The availability of vaccines (eg, FIV, feline coronavirus) differs, as does the availability of some treatment modalities (the reformulation of veterinary and generic compounds is more common in the US). Some diagnostic options also differ, and interpretation of serology may be more complicated in the light of vaccine availability. Finally, some infectious agents vary in their prevalence or behaviour in the US compared with the UK, for example rabies, while important and notifiable, is not usually a primary concern to the UK shelter veterinary surgeon.
That said, the book provides some excellent guidance on a large number of issues which universally affect animals in shelters worldwide. For example, the chapter on dermatophytosis is excellent at highlighting the issues this fungal infection can cause the shelter. Often of relatively limited concern to the general practitioner, ringworm can be a huge issue to shelters housing cats.
The final chapter ‘Zoonosis’ is also well presented. Zoonotic disease is an increasingly emerging issue for all those in-contact with animals, with increased media attention and public concern. Ensuring the control of zoonotic diseases in shelters is important not just to protect shelter staff and volunteers, many of whom may have become involved in animal welfare, unaware of the risks to themselves, but also to avoid the rehoming of animals with zoonotic disease to vulnerable new owners. An animal is likely to be quickly relinquished back in to the care of a rescue charity if there is a perceived health risk to a new owner, when he has not yet bonded with his pet, putting the animal through further stresses of relocation. The chapter provides general guidelines for zoonotic disease prevention and hand hygiene, and then focuses on short but balanced discussions of the more frequently-encountered specific pathogens which can cause human infection. The text suggests that animals which have been infected with certain zoonotic infections should not be adopted by high-risk members of the public. However, being able to establish the health status of potential adopters, is neither easy nor necessarily appropriate, especially by non-medical staff and volunteers. Where this is not possible, an alternative approach would perhaps be to counsel those interested in rehoming particular animals, ensuring they are fully informed of the animal's known health status, stating those members of the public who are more likely to be at high risk and advising them to seek more specific veterinary and/or medical advice prior to making an informed decision whether or not to adopt.
Veterinary undergraduates, new graduates and experienced shelter veterinary surgeons are all likely to derive benefit from this book. There are very few texts in this discipline which is practised by so many. It will also be of use to vets dealing with those (perhaps more fortunate) owned pets which present with infectious disease, especially those which live in multi-pet households. It should stimulate to think beyond the individual and apply herd heath principles next time the ‘shelter-run’ is undertaken, or a shelter animal is presented to the practice, potentially representing the tip of the ‘shelter iceberg’.