Is there a connection between Old Dog Encephalitis and vaccines ?
 

I had a GSD hybrid at 10 years old come down with Old Dog Encephalitis. This happened exactly two weeks after he had received his yearly shots. Luckily a course of hydro-cortisone and antibiotics cured him. His health had been exceptional until this incident.

I immediately started researching this condition and found a bunch of unsettling information from several sources.

The first is that the veterinary health industry has done a good job through lobbying at the state legislatures to get rabies shots mandated at one year and sometimes three year intervals when clinical studies have shown the rabies vaccinations protect our furry friends out to ten years.

The second eye opener was the assertion that the individual cost for one vial of rabies vaccine is around .15 cents to a clinic. This shot plus the labor to administer it runs what? $15.00 to $25.00 for the owner which is an approximate 6000% increase. The source made a rough estimate that with an approximate canine patient load of 250 dogs, simply shifting a yearly vaccine out to every five years would subject the "typical" clinic to a substantial loss in pure profit.

Now understand, I am not laying this at the feet of rabies vaccines alone but when you involve this frequency with all of the other vaccines and their "purported" frequencies of need . . . . . Your thoughts?

Your dog is ten. Frankly, I would not do any more vaccines on the dog from here on out. If he makes it to 13, that is way old for a GSD, and every day beyond is a bonus and blessing anyway. I would be afraid that IF this was a reaction from his vaccinations, then the chances are when he is due again, it may just kill him.

Pssssp! By the way, if you insinuate anything about some vets wanting to make money or maybe being motivated by anything but a simple and pure love of critters, you will get the cold shoulder by some here.

:spittingcoffee:

How Drug Company Money Is Undermining Science


Don’t blame Betty White. Don’t throw your hands up in despair. Stop playing defense and start playing the pharmaceutical sales game by your rules. Fritz Wood, CPA, CFP, says veterinarians must play offense to realize their revenue potential and gain home field advantage over retail pharmacies.
The rules of the game have changed quickly and dramatically. Medications are no longer exclusive to veterinarians, big-box stores discount prices, and the weak economy makes client compliance for things like heartworm prevention a hard pill to swallow. Despite all that, Wood says clinics can do a better job of selling products--to stay healthy financially, they must. “Generally speaking, products sales are at least 25 to 30 percent of your business and businesses aren’t in a position to give up and lose a quarter or a third of their business,” Wood says. “The only alternative is they have to defend their business--even grow it.”
That’s why every team member must be involved--the veterinarian can’t do it alone. “You have to look at each of those touch points and ask, ‘What do we want to happen here.’” Woods thinks conversations on products usually happen randomly, not intentionally. A recommendation and compliance cannot be achieved with one suggestion. “It has to be reinforced probably multiple times, by multiple people, probably by multiple media,” he says.
Marketing the message
That means not only talking with clients, but actively advertising and promoting too. Wood says to make banners and signs; send emails and reminders; display products and deals--address medications when clients come through the door. And regardless of price, always keep the message about standard of care. It’s not just about selling a product; it’s about healthy pets. Wood even suggests providing videos of heartworm removal. “Show them what non-compliance looks like.”
The value of veterinary expertise
He says veterinarians can keep it about wellness by avoiding the feeling of retail--like having the receptionist offer the medication as a client is leaving the office. “If the doc puts the product on the table in the exam room--that’s medical.” And that translates to the client.

Above from Doctor of veterinary Medicine "business section" website
Play offense in the pharmaceutical marketplace - DVM

Distemper - VeterinaryPartner.com - a VIN company!

I feel very bad for people who are unable to develop good relationships with good vets. I had to bring a dog in on Sunday for emergency. The vet was caring and helpful, and was able to downcharge some items by finding subq fluids that had been started and not finished and other things like that, while still getting the diagnostics, information and treatment that my dog needed. This was a life-threatening emergency (HGE), the dog was known to the vet and I was able to bring her back home with me, instead of hospitalization for multiple days at a much greater cost.

Hard to imagine, I guess, that looking at the whole picture of the dog, my supervision, the vet's willingness to chat on her cell with me throughout the day as needed, allowed her to make the decision to release my dog to my care, while losing all that money.

I am not sure why vets are expected not to want to stay in business. I guess my question is how many people who don't have dogs with chronic health issues, or that are being used for breeding, or have accidents/ingestions, etc, would bring their pet in for their yearly wellness check minus the concept of vaccines and heartworm/tick tests? Those visits help to establish that relationship as a partner with your vet, get baseline information for the animals, and are important, but people won't use them.

In fact, I was sent on a home check for someone who was not using preventatives for heartworm and was not testing - and whose vet was fine with that. I talked to her for a long time about the dangers - she had a Chi so a single heartworm could be deadly. She took her dog in that week for testing and the poor little thing had anaplasmosis. http://www.peteducation.com/article....+2101&aid=3621

And again, so many dogs actually get HW - it's not some scam - it's not implanted into mosquitoes by the Veterinary lobby.

I am not so naive as to think that there are not vets who view it as business first, medicine second, and vets who are not as good as other vets. However, if everyone here is so smart that they can out-vet the vets, they should be smart enough to realize that they could seek out a better vet for their pets. At the same time, bashing all vets or painting them with the same brush is not helpful to anyone.

They aren't volunteers - they are doctors who work on multiple species, have teams of people working for and with them, and provide a valuable service.

:thumbup: Jean:)

Actually we had to have him put down at 13. That's him in my avatar.

As far as bruising the delicate proclivities of some on this forum.......meh !

Read the OP again and maybe translate what you wrote in response to it?

I think it was more so a response to the link I provided...you see I advocate for healthy natural food first to promote a strong healthy immune system, treating minor issues naturally and saving drug therapies where it actually necessitates...prevention is easier then cure and non toxic. The over use of vaccines, pesticides, abx., denatured foods do NOT promote health... REAL food is health care, medicine is sick care...I read somewhere (no link) that with the right nutrition over 60% of disease can be prevented - therefore less need for noted abx., etc. and less toxicity (drug treatments) leading to further illness and age related and/or acute/chronic disease states.

There was one member on this board who misconstrued everything I ever suggested and stated things like "just b/c you have a problem with vets", just to instigate a fight and/or discredit my opinions...some how their interpretation/twisting of my comments and their opinion has resinated to others, who also seem to think I am anti-vet...I do think that just b/c a vet has gone to med school and spent 100's of thousands of dollars to be lisenced to "practice" medicine doesn't give them the right to pad the bottom line with the over use of drugs where good husbandry, natural non-toxic, non-profit alternatives can be used....I don't think they deliberatly try to drive illness deeper into our pets, but I do believe they have bills to pay and as long as the sales people or the food/pharma companies that subsidized their education for profit are giving our vets some false sense of what is "safe" as a go to treatment...

Vets have witnessed time and time again how simply changing to RAW diet has had profound effects on chronic conditions...BUT they cannot promote health...so they go under the guise of prevention...fleas/ticks/HW...however, it is well documented that pesticides are toxic...SO WHY would they do this...Profit.

So what I have a problem with, the medical industry as a whole and the monopoly they have in the "Health Care" industry...again - food is health care