This week’s podcast is a fan request about the concerns one breeder has about the “corporate takeover” of veterinary medicine and how that is affecting her puppy owners:
“What information and resources do you use to help your puppy buyers, especially new/first time dog owners, screen and select a veterinarian?
In the past couple of years, and seems like more lately, I get these questions from my puppy buyers that their vet told them something that ranged from harmless but not really accurate to so aggressively incorrect it felt like a scam and even a danger to the puppy. I know stuff can get lost in translation, I know some medical professionals are better than others, and I know vets and their staff are stressed and overworked. But I also fear the rise in this issue is related to venture capital takeovers and it's going to get worse…
Since it feels like a trend, and especially because I have a breed suitable for first-time dog owners, I would like to be more organized and proactive in providing information on how to vet a vet. I appreciate everyone's thoughts and suggestions.
PS - maybe this would be a good podcast episode?”
In this episode I explore:
- How the corporatization of vet medicine affects puppy owners
- Coaching puppy owners to advocate for their puppies at the vet’s office for routine care
- Finding a good vet when there’s a major veterinary problem with a puppy or dog.
Visit our website, madcapradio.com for further reading.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
I'm Jane Messineo Lindquist,
and this is a Puppy Culture
Potluck podcast.
You bring the topics,we bring the conversation.
(00:21):
Today's topic is a fan request,
and I'm going to go aheadand just read you the post.
What information and resourcesdo you use to help puppy buyers,
especially new and first-time dog owners,
screen and select a veterinarian?
In the past couple of years,
(00:43):
and it seems like more lately,I get these questions for my puppy buyers
that their vet told themsomething that ranged from harmless
but not really accurate,to so aggressively incorrect.
It felt like a scamand even a danger to the puppy.
I know stuff can get lost in translation.
(01:04):
I know some medical professionalsare better than others
and I know vets and their staffare stressed and overworked.
But I also fear the rise inthis issue is related
to venture capitaltakeovers, and it's going to get worse.
I provide information about food,
(01:25):
core lifestyle vaccines,
flea and tick,advocating for your puppies.
All of those things.
I am not wildly out of the mainstreamwith my recommendations.
I am gratefulmy puppy people check in with me
about things that seem weird to themso we can talk through it.
But I worry about what's happeningthat I'm not hearing about too,
(01:50):
since it feels like a trend,and especially
because I have a breed suitablefor first time owners.
I would like to be more organizedand proactive
in providing informationon how to ‘vet’ a vet.
I appreciate everyone's thoughtsand suggestions. P.S.
Maybe this would be a good podcastepisode?
(02:14):
Okay. This is me again.
I think you have to separate thisquestion out into two parts.
Part one
is how do we empower our puppy owners
to advocate for themselveswhen it comes to routine
veterinary care?
(02:34):
And the second part is
how do we help our puppy owners find
a competent veterinarianfor true medical needs?
If there's something wrongwith the puppy or the dog,
how do we find a good veterinarianthat's competent for this?
So let me take part one of this first,
(02:55):
which is teaching our puppy ownersto advocate
in routine situations.
I don't think this poster is wrong
that there is an increase in
veterinarians in a corporate setting
kind of selling stuffa lot more than they used to.
(03:19):
And I know this because from my insideconversations with vets
who've been in these corporate situations,they're given quotas.
They're given all kinds of metricsthat they have to meet.
And indeed, they are, a lot of times,
recommending things because they've beentold to recommend those things.
So that is definitely a concerning trend
(03:43):
where profit centres are dictatingwhat your veterinarian
is recommending morethan what the veterinarian
would normally recommend.
But, you know, that's not really
a difficult problem to solve as a breeder.
This is where and why I wrote the ‘Be
(04:04):
Your Puppies Advocate’ booklet.
And I give specific
direction to breeders as well as to puppyowners there that you need
to have your routine protocols in writing;
how you want that puppy fed,what vaccinations you want
the puppy to have, the worming protocols,whatever peculiarities of your breed.
(04:29):
You want that all in writingand you want to put that in the hands
of your puppy owner so that when yourpuppy owner goes into the vet,
they can just say, look, I don't know,this is what my breeder said.
And wow,I signed a contract with my breeder.
I'm sorry.
I mean, I, I'd love to consider whatyou're suggesting, but I really can't.
It would be in violation of my contractand, well, here it is.
(04:51):
Here's, here's the protocol.
Takes the heat off the puppyowner puts it on you.
And I also encouragemy puppy owners to give the veterinarian
my phone numberif they want to discuss it with me.
Any time there's going to be
any major suggestionof anything for this puppy,
(05:15):
I make it very clear to my puppy ownersthey need to call me.
Any medical procedure.
I mean, a lot of peoplewrote in in response to this
that as breeders,they'd gotten phone calls
from puppy owners, where the puppy ownershave been told all kinds of wacky stuff
that needs to be done to their dogthat were completely unnecessary.
(05:38):
So with routine veterinary care,
I do think that we can sidestepthese issues.
Okay.
Yes, they are sellingmaybe more things than they used to, but
it's kind of harmless
because you can head it off at the passas a breeder
as long as your puppyowner has their core protocols
(06:01):
in writing from you and also understandsand will call you if there's
any kind of major medical procedurethat is suggested to them.
But I think the point here is
that you do have to be involvedin this process with your puppy people.
And I think that
(06:22):
the questionthat the original poster had was,
how can we help them find vets wherewe won't have to be involved in this way?
And I don'tI don't think that's really possible.
I think this is part of the serviceyou provide being a breeder.
And I think it's really important
that you be part of that advocatingfor that puppy.
(06:44):
And, you know, that's,that's regardless of this whole corporate
takeover of the veterinary industry,it's always been that way.
You've always had to help your puppy owneradvocate for themselves.
I remember my first own puppythat was mine and I was 30 years old.
I mean, I wasn't a young woman.
(07:04):
I was an attorney.
I was certainly an assertive person.
And I went to a vet, an avuncular,
sweet manwho was so nice to me and kind to my puppy
until I got to the part where he wanted
to give rabiesand a five way vaccine at the same time.
(07:25):
And I said, oh, yes my breeder said,don't give those together,
so we'd like to do this and this
and the man turned on me.
He said, Oh, I'm glad to know thatthe breeder is no better than the vets
now. And I was horrified to this day,
and I'm quite a bit older than that now.
(07:48):
I remember the moment.
It was just terrible.
I had the gumption to stand up for myself,but it's difficult.
And that was way beforethere was any kind of corporate anything.
So look, you've just, as a breeder,
this is part of what we have to take on.
So we have to be involved in this processand helping the puppy owners advocate
(08:08):
for themselves.
There is a
whole psychology to thisfor the puppy buyer.
That's why I wrote the ‘BeYour Puppies Advocate’ booklet.
But at the end of the day,we do have to be there as breeders
to help be the puppy ownersbackbone in this situation.
The second part of this problem
(08:31):
is more difficult to address
because there just
aren't a lot of competentanythings in this world.
I mean, when you get a good plumber,doctor, dentist, carpenter,
you hold on, you cherish those,those great tradesmen and professionals.
(08:52):
It's not anything to do with the corporatetakeover that's causing incompetency.
It's just that there aren'ta lot of really good anythings,
particularly when it comesto being a good diagnostician.
That's something that requiresintelligence
and experiencethat not every vet is going to have.
(09:14):
So my
situationis different than the original poster.
I get the original postersis, is placing a breed where,
she's probably placing themgeographically far from where she lives.
And they're also first time puppy owners.
That's almost never the case with us.
We tend to place puppiesin our immediate geographic area
(09:38):
and they tend to be not just experienced
dog owners but experienced in our breed.
So for my puppy owners,
I got no problem with theirgoing to their very local vet
for things like vaccinationsor routine veterinary care.
But if there's ever anything,
(09:58):
even a question of anythingwrong with that puppy,
I want them to make the drive upto my vet doctor
Lovell here in Sussex Animal Hospital.
I had a situationjust recently with a puppy.
He was a year old at this point.
They kept saying to me,
he's got allergies, and they would send mepictures of him and I saw that
he had red skinand they took him to the vet.
(10:20):
The vet didn'twant to give allergy medicine to the puppy
because he's too youngand it was going back and forth.
And I kept asking and they kept saying,well, it's getting a little better.
Finally, I went down to see the dog
to train him for show training,and I was horrified.
The dog was bald.
I said, forget it, game over.
You're coming up to doctorLovell, did not take
(10:42):
doctor Lovellfive seconds to say this dog has mange.
Okay. One pill, it was gone.
But meanwhile, these puppy owners,this dog had been suffering
and they'd spent hundreds of dollars.
Not to mentionall the unnecessary allergy medication
and antibioticsthat the dog had been taking.
(11:03):
I have had puppies die
because the ownertook them to an emergency vet
and the emergency vet
did not run basicdiagnostics on the puppy.
I have saved the lives of puppies
(11:24):
where the puppy owner went to the vetand the vet
sent them home with anti-nausea medication
and I told the puppy owner, Turn around,go back to the vet,
demand these diagnostic tests.
I think to be fair,
you're askinga lot of these emergency vets
(11:45):
to understand breed differences
and to understand, for instance,that if it's a bull terrier
and it's not taking treatsand it's nauseous, it's
not a teething issue or a little somethingthat the dog's going to get over.
There's something profoundlywrong with this puppy.
In another breed,
(12:06):
it may be a very reasonable course
of actionto wait and see, but not in our breed.
But again, this points up the
idea that the breederalways, always, always has to be involved.
Any timethere's any kind of medical question
(12:27):
involving the puppy.
I don't think there's any way that you'regoing to educate a first time puppy owner
to navigate this situationand find a good veterinary.
And I think it's something that you haveto use your network of breeders
in your breed, preferably, and help them
(12:49):
find a veterinarian in their neighborhood.
I think you have to give themas much as possible in writing
regarding routine care,feeding and medication.
You have to teach themto stick to their guns
or at least call youbefore they do anything
that's at variancewith your recommendations
(13:10):
and I think you have to be really clearwith them
that they need to call youany time of day or night
if they truly thinkthere's something wrong with their dog.
And apropos of that, if you have ‘donot disturb’ on your phone,
make sure that it's setso that any of your puppy owners
(13:31):
will come through
and your phone will ring if they call youin the middle of the night.
Because that tragic situationwhere we lost a puppy
because an emergency vet sent homethe puppy with nausea medicine,
when the puppy had something going oninside that needed surgery.
(13:51):
I never got that
call becauseI had do not disturb on my phone.
Very hard way for us to learn that lesson.
So there was a lot of great conversationaround this post.
Let me read you some of these comments.
This poster said, Thanks.
This is pretty much what I'm doing now.
(14:13):
Getting referrals from other people workedwell until about 2020
and now I keep running into placesthat aren't taking new clients.
So we're left looking for someone who is.
A number of people did write that in that
the good vets oftenare not taking new clients.
I do think that's changing now.
(14:35):
Things are opening up a little bit more,but you know,
all the more reason to be proactiveand help your puppy owners.
I know with my own vet,
I have my puppy owners when they call,tell my vet it's one of my puppies
so that I know that my puppy ownerwill be accepted as a client.
(14:55):
Ah, now here'ssomething from the other side.
And it's it's a good point.
This woman says,This is an excellent question.
As a general practicing vet,some breeders have crazy recommendations.
But I try to find a common groundand really hear what the breeder is saying
and respect that in most cases.
(15:17):
Yeah, you know, it's an interesting thingbecause when I wrote the Puppy
Advocate booklet, I did not wadeinto the debate of what is reasonable
as far as breeder recommendationsbecause I was writing the booklet.
From my point of view, it's the bookletthat I want to put in the hands
of my puppy owners and I knowmy recommendations are reasonable.
(15:40):
But so noted,
you know,sometimes the breeders recommendations
are not reasonable.
Okay, so here's a breeder writing in.
I'm pretty rural, but luckily we have twoold farm vets here that are really good.
But when I have puppiesgoing out of the area, it's tough.
We wean onto raw, so I tell them to finda vet that supports that.
(16:03):
And we don't do lepto vaccinebecause mom had a reaction
and my breed tends to be sensitive to it.
So that gives a couple of things for themto see if a vet's
willing to listenand work with them or not.
All right.
So now here's another one.
On the other hand,
(16:23):
this is so interesting to me becauseI've seen the other side of this issue.
Been a vet tech for two decades.
And we definitely see breederrecommendations that range from just
weird and unnecessaryto flat out dangerous.
My vet is relatively modernand up to date.
For instance,delayed spay neuter and accepts
(16:45):
things that might bea little out of mainstream within reason.
The thing is that there are changesand updates
that vets are aware of thatbreeders might not be for example,
in my region, lepto is a seriousbut under-recognized issue.
I've seen too many lepto deathsin the past two years and also the vaccine
has been changed and is unlikely to causereactions like the old version.
(17:11):
But on the other hand,I definitely see and hear of vets
that are not practicing medicinethat I would be able to support.
So I understand that aspect as well.
Yeah, I think that,
you know, again, it raises a good point
about having a good local vet if you can,because
I am always in contact with my local vet.
(17:33):
He's a resource for me.What's going around?
Do I need the flu vaccine for real?
Do I need a klepto vaccine?
Like what is what are you seeing?
What's coming in?
You do need a local vetbecause the risks can be very local.
And like Dr.
Leo would always say to me,we live kind of in a bubble here with
(17:55):
with very low parvo risk where we are.
But, you know, down in Oklahoma,
it's, they have parvo all over the place.
So what my vet feels is
a reasonable course of actionis rightly not going to be
the same as a good vetsomewhere else in the country.
(18:17):
So in sum,
you have to be involved.
I'm sorry for the original poster.
I do think maybe some of the problems
that we're seeing are exacerbatedby the corporate takeover
of veterinary practices and the pushingof protocols for profit margins.
(18:39):
But, you know, really,the game has not changed.
You know, it all comes down to us.
This is part of the vast experiencethat we have as breeders.
We experiencewhat the puppy owner is going through,
if not scores of times,hundreds of times in our lifetimes.
There's no way that
(19:00):
a first time puppy owner is ever goingto be able to assimilate that.
And this is part of what we offeras breeders.
We have to stay involved.
If you like this podcast,
you'll love our new booklet;Be Your Puppies
Advocate available at puppyculture.com.
(19:22):
And while you're there,check out our puppy course;
With Open Arms and a Level Head: How to Welcome a Puppy into Your Life. (19:25):
undefined
Also available through puppyculture.comBreeders, check out our bulk
discounts on multiple copiesof our puppy course for your puppy owners.
Well, that's it for this time.
Thanks for listening.
(19:46):
Bye bye.
I'm Jane Messineo Lindquist,
and this is a Puppy Culture
Potluck podcast.
You bring the topics,we bring the conversation.
(00:21):
Today's topic is a fan request,
and I'm going to go aheadand just read you the post.
What information and resourcesdo you use to help puppy buyers,
especially new and first-time dog owners,
screen and select a veterinarian?
In the past couple of years,
(00:43):
and it seems like more lately,I get these questions for my puppy buyers
that their vet told themsomething that ranged from harmless
but not really accurate,to so aggressively incorrect.
It felt like a scamand even a danger to the puppy.
I know stuff can get lost in translation.
(01:04):
I know some medical professionalsare better than others
and I know vets and their staffare stressed and overworked.
But I also fear the rise inthis issue is related
to venture capitaltakeovers, and it's going to get worse.
I provide information about food,
(01:25):
core lifestyle vaccines,
flea and tick,advocating for your puppies.
All of those things.
I am not wildly out of the mainstreamwith my recommendations.
I am gratefulmy puppy people check in with me
about things that seem weird to themso we can talk through it.
But I worry about what's happeningthat I'm not hearing about too,
(01:50):
since it feels like a trend,and especially
because I have a breed suitablefor first time owners.
I would like to be more organizedand proactive
in providing informationon how to ‘vet’ a vet.
I appreciate everyone's thoughtsand suggestions. P.S.
Maybe this would be a good podcastepisode?
(02:14):
Okay. This is me again.
I think you have to separate thisquestion out into two parts.
Part one
is how do we empower our puppy owners
to advocate for themselveswhen it comes to routine
veterinary care?
(02:34):
And the second part is
how do we help our puppy owners find
a competent veterinarianfor true medical needs?
If there's something wrongwith the puppy or the dog,
how do we find a good veterinarianthat's competent for this?
So let me take part one of this first,
(02:55):
which is teaching our puppy ownersto advocate
in routine situations.
I don't think this poster is wrong
that there is an increase in
veterinarians in a corporate setting
kind of selling stuffa lot more than they used to.
(03:19):
And I know this because from my insideconversations with vets
who've been in these corporate situations,they're given quotas.
They're given all kinds of metricsthat they have to meet.
And indeed, they are, a lot of times,
recommending things because they've beentold to recommend those things.
So that is definitely a concerning trend
(03:43):
where profit centres are dictatingwhat your veterinarian
is recommending morethan what the veterinarian
would normally recommend.
But, you know, that's not really
a difficult problem to solve as a breeder.
This is where and why I wrote the ‘Be
(04:04):
Your Puppies Advocate’ booklet.
And I give specific
direction to breeders as well as to puppyowners there that you need
to have your routine protocols in writing;
how you want that puppy fed,what vaccinations you want
the puppy to have, the worming protocols,whatever peculiarities of your breed.
(04:29):
You want that all in writingand you want to put that in the hands
of your puppy owner so that when yourpuppy owner goes into the vet,
they can just say, look, I don't know,this is what my breeder said.
And wow,I signed a contract with my breeder.
I'm sorry.
I mean, I, I'd love to consider whatyou're suggesting, but I really can't.
It would be in violation of my contractand, well, here it is.
(04:51):
Here's, here's the protocol.
Takes the heat off the puppyowner puts it on you.
And I also encouragemy puppy owners to give the veterinarian
my phone numberif they want to discuss it with me.
Any time there's going to be
any major suggestionof anything for this puppy,
(05:15):
I make it very clear to my puppy ownersthey need to call me.
Any medical procedure.
I mean, a lot of peoplewrote in in response to this
that as breeders,they'd gotten phone calls
from puppy owners, where the puppy ownershave been told all kinds of wacky stuff
that needs to be done to their dogthat were completely unnecessary.
(05:38):
So with routine veterinary care,
I do think that we can sidestepthese issues.
Okay.
Yes, they are sellingmaybe more things than they used to, but
it's kind of harmless
because you can head it off at the passas a breeder
as long as your puppyowner has their core protocols
(06:01):
in writing from you and also understandsand will call you if there's
any kind of major medical procedurethat is suggested to them.
But I think the point here is
that you do have to be involvedin this process with your puppy people.
And I think that
(06:22):
the questionthat the original poster had was,
how can we help them find vets wherewe won't have to be involved in this way?
And I don'tI don't think that's really possible.
I think this is part of the serviceyou provide being a breeder.
And I think it's really important
that you be part of that advocatingfor that puppy.
(06:44):
And, you know, that's,that's regardless of this whole corporate
takeover of the veterinary industry,it's always been that way.
You've always had to help your puppy owneradvocate for themselves.
I remember my first own puppythat was mine and I was 30 years old.
I mean, I wasn't a young woman.
(07:04):
I was an attorney.
I was certainly an assertive person.
And I went to a vet, an avuncular,
sweet manwho was so nice to me and kind to my puppy
until I got to the part where he wanted
to give rabiesand a five way vaccine at the same time.
(07:25):
And I said, oh, yes my breeder said,don't give those together,
so we'd like to do this and this
and the man turned on me.
He said, Oh, I'm glad to know thatthe breeder is no better than the vets
now. And I was horrified to this day,
and I'm quite a bit older than that now.
(07:48):
I remember the moment.
It was just terrible.
I had the gumption to stand up for myself,but it's difficult.
And that was way beforethere was any kind of corporate anything.
So look, you've just, as a breeder,
this is part of what we have to take on.
So we have to be involved in this processand helping the puppy owners advocate
(08:08):
for themselves.
There is a
whole psychology to thisfor the puppy buyer.
That's why I wrote the ‘BeYour Puppies Advocate’ booklet.
But at the end of the day,we do have to be there as breeders
to help be the puppy ownersbackbone in this situation.
The second part of this problem
(08:31):
is more difficult to address
because there just
aren't a lot of competentanythings in this world.
I mean, when you get a good plumber,doctor, dentist, carpenter,
you hold on, you cherish those,those great tradesmen and professionals.
(08:52):
It's not anything to do with the corporatetakeover that's causing incompetency.
It's just that there aren'ta lot of really good anythings,
particularly when it comesto being a good diagnostician.
That's something that requiresintelligence
and experiencethat not every vet is going to have.
(09:14):
So my
situationis different than the original poster.
I get the original postersis, is placing a breed where,
she's probably placing themgeographically far from where she lives.
And they're also first time puppy owners.
That's almost never the case with us.
We tend to place puppiesin our immediate geographic area
(09:38):
and they tend to be not just experienced
dog owners but experienced in our breed.
So for my puppy owners,
I got no problem with theirgoing to their very local vet
for things like vaccinationsor routine veterinary care.
But if there's ever anything,
(09:58):
even a question of anythingwrong with that puppy,
I want them to make the drive upto my vet doctor
Lovell here in Sussex Animal Hospital.
I had a situationjust recently with a puppy.
He was a year old at this point.
They kept saying to me,
he's got allergies, and they would send mepictures of him and I saw that
he had red skinand they took him to the vet.
(10:20):
The vet didn'twant to give allergy medicine to the puppy
because he's too youngand it was going back and forth.
And I kept asking and they kept saying,well, it's getting a little better.
Finally, I went down to see the dog
to train him for show training,and I was horrified.
The dog was bald.
I said, forget it, game over.
You're coming up to doctorLovell, did not take
(10:42):
doctor Lovellfive seconds to say this dog has mange.
Okay. One pill, it was gone.
But meanwhile, these puppy owners,this dog had been suffering
and they'd spent hundreds of dollars.
Not to mentionall the unnecessary allergy medication
and antibioticsthat the dog had been taking.
(11:03):
I have had puppies die
because the ownertook them to an emergency vet
and the emergency vet
did not run basicdiagnostics on the puppy.
I have saved the lives of puppies
(11:24):
where the puppy owner went to the vetand the vet
sent them home with anti-nausea medication
and I told the puppy owner, Turn around,go back to the vet,
demand these diagnostic tests.
I think to be fair,
you're askinga lot of these emergency vets
(11:45):
to understand breed differences
and to understand, for instance,that if it's a bull terrier
and it's not taking treatsand it's nauseous, it's
not a teething issue or a little somethingthat the dog's going to get over.
There's something profoundlywrong with this puppy.
In another breed,
(12:06):
it may be a very reasonable course
of actionto wait and see, but not in our breed.
But again, this points up the
idea that the breederalways, always, always has to be involved.
Any timethere's any kind of medical question
(12:27):
involving the puppy.
I don't think there's any way that you'regoing to educate a first time puppy owner
to navigate this situationand find a good veterinary.
And I think it's something that you haveto use your network of breeders
in your breed, preferably, and help them
(12:49):
find a veterinarian in their neighborhood.
I think you have to give themas much as possible in writing
regarding routine care,feeding and medication.
You have to teach themto stick to their guns
or at least call youbefore they do anything
that's at variancewith your recommendations
(13:10):
and I think you have to be really clearwith them
that they need to call youany time of day or night
if they truly thinkthere's something wrong with their dog.
And apropos of that, if you have ‘donot disturb’ on your phone,
make sure that it's setso that any of your puppy owners
(13:31):
will come through
and your phone will ring if they call youin the middle of the night.
Because that tragic situationwhere we lost a puppy
because an emergency vet sent homethe puppy with nausea medicine,
when the puppy had something going oninside that needed surgery.
(13:51):
I never got that
call becauseI had do not disturb on my phone.
Very hard way for us to learn that lesson.
So there was a lot of great conversationaround this post.
Let me read you some of these comments.
This poster said, Thanks.
This is pretty much what I'm doing now.
(14:13):
Getting referrals from other people workedwell until about 2020
and now I keep running into placesthat aren't taking new clients.
So we're left looking for someone who is.
A number of people did write that in that
the good vets oftenare not taking new clients.
I do think that's changing now.
(14:35):
Things are opening up a little bit more,but you know,
all the more reason to be proactiveand help your puppy owners.
I know with my own vet,
I have my puppy owners when they call,tell my vet it's one of my puppies
so that I know that my puppy ownerwill be accepted as a client.
(14:55):
Ah, now here'ssomething from the other side.
And it's it's a good point.
This woman says,This is an excellent question.
As a general practicing vet,some breeders have crazy recommendations.
But I try to find a common groundand really hear what the breeder is saying
and respect that in most cases.
(15:17):
Yeah, you know, it's an interesting thingbecause when I wrote the Puppy
Advocate booklet, I did not wadeinto the debate of what is reasonable
as far as breeder recommendationsbecause I was writing the booklet.
From my point of view, it's the bookletthat I want to put in the hands
of my puppy owners and I knowmy recommendations are reasonable.
(15:40):
But so noted,
you know,sometimes the breeders recommendations
are not reasonable.
Okay, so here's a breeder writing in.
I'm pretty rural, but luckily we have twoold farm vets here that are really good.
But when I have puppiesgoing out of the area, it's tough.
We wean onto raw, so I tell them to finda vet that supports that.
(16:03):
And we don't do lepto vaccinebecause mom had a reaction
and my breed tends to be sensitive to it.
So that gives a couple of things for themto see if a vet's
willing to listenand work with them or not.
All right.
So now here's another one.
On the other hand,
(16:23):
this is so interesting to me becauseI've seen the other side of this issue.
Been a vet tech for two decades.
And we definitely see breederrecommendations that range from just
weird and unnecessaryto flat out dangerous.
My vet is relatively modernand up to date.
For instance,delayed spay neuter and accepts
(16:45):
things that might bea little out of mainstream within reason.
The thing is that there are changesand updates
that vets are aware of thatbreeders might not be for example,
in my region, lepto is a seriousbut under-recognized issue.
I've seen too many lepto deathsin the past two years and also the vaccine
has been changed and is unlikely to causereactions like the old version.
(17:11):
But on the other hand,I definitely see and hear of vets
that are not practicing medicinethat I would be able to support.
So I understand that aspect as well.
Yeah, I think that,
you know, again, it raises a good point
about having a good local vet if you can,because
I am always in contact with my local vet.
(17:33):
He's a resource for me.What's going around?
Do I need the flu vaccine for real?
Do I need a klepto vaccine?
Like what is what are you seeing?
What's coming in?
You do need a local vetbecause the risks can be very local.
And like Dr.
Leo would always say to me,we live kind of in a bubble here with
(17:55):
with very low parvo risk where we are.
But, you know, down in Oklahoma,
it's, they have parvo all over the place.
So what my vet feels is
a reasonable course of actionis rightly not going to be
the same as a good vetsomewhere else in the country.
(18:17):
So in sum,
you have to be involved.
I'm sorry for the original poster.
I do think maybe some of the problems
that we're seeing are exacerbatedby the corporate takeover
of veterinary practices and the pushingof protocols for profit margins.
(18:39):
But, you know, really,the game has not changed.
You know, it all comes down to us.
This is part of the vast experiencethat we have as breeders.
We experiencewhat the puppy owner is going through,
if not scores of times,hundreds of times in our lifetimes.
There's no way that
(19:00):
a first time puppy owner is ever goingto be able to assimilate that.
And this is part of what we offeras breeders.
We have to stay involved.
If you like this podcast,
you'll love our new booklet;Be Your Puppies
Advocate available at puppyculture.com.
(19:22):
And while you're there,check out our puppy course;
With Open Arms and a Level Head: How to Welcome a Puppy into Your Life. (19:25):
undefined
Also available through puppyculture.comBreeders, check out our bulk
discounts on multiple copiesof our puppy course for your puppy owners.
Well, that's it for this time.
Thanks for listening.
(19:46):
Bye bye.
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