What Regulatory Boards Should Know About Animal Shelters

1
What Regulatory Boards Should Know About Animal
Shelters

• Lila Miller, DVM
• Vice President ASPCA
• President of Association of Shelter
  Veterinarians (ASV)

2
Animal Sheltering in the US

• The ASPCA National Outreach Department estimates
  there are anywhere from 4-6000 animal shelters in
  the United States
• Animal shelters
• Rescue groups
• Sanctuaries
• No estimates as to how many shelters have
  veterinarians on staff

3
Animal sheltering in the US

• Why are animal shelters needed?
• Who is responsible for funding them?
• What services do they provide?
• What services should they provide?
• How do we help the shelter in our community?

This?
Or This!
4
Shelters in the 1900s

• Most shelters were located at landfill or in
  industrial areas
• Most buildings were converted warehouses or were
  hastily designed and built of concrete blocks and
  chain-link fencing
• Rarely had hot and cold running water, heat or
  air-conditioning

5
New Face of Animal Shelters

• New shelters and animal control services created
  to meet public demand
• Prevention programs to decrease pet
  overpopulation and increase responsible pet
  ownership developed and implemented

6
Types Of Shelters

• Municipal animal control
• Private, non-profit humane
• societies
• Foster care/breed rescue
• groups
• Sanctuaries

7
Types Of Shelters

• No kill or limited admission (private)
• Open admission/full service (public)
• No umbrella organization for humane societies or
  Societies for the Prevention of Cruelty to
  Animals (SPCA)- each is independent

8
Who Funds Animal Shelters?

• To protect public health and safety Municipal
  government
• To protect and advance animal welfare
• Private donors
• To provide preventive measures
• Municipal government and private donors

9
Public (municipal) shelters

• Counties and cities mandated to control stray
  animals and enforce animal related laws
• May fall under public health, sheriff,
  sanitation, neighborhoods, public works
• Public health protection historically, increasing
  animal welfare focus
• Must admit all animals

10
Public shelter functions

• Stray animal capture and care
• Owner surrender?
• Law enforcement
• Nuisance
• Rabies
• Cruelty
• Animal Adoption
• Euthanasia
• Disaster relief

11
Optional public shelter functions

• Education
• Volunteer programs
• Partnership with private shelters, auxiliary
  support, rescue groups

12
Private shelters

• Non-profit group (501C3) that houses domestic
  animals
• May be called SPCA or Humane Society or other
• Sanctuary, adoption agency, full service shelter,
  foster network, public shelter support
• May even operate from the home

13
Private shelter functions

• Adoption
• Humane education
• Behavior/training
• Low cost spay/neuter
• Low cost veterinary services?
• Wildlife rehab
• Animal sheltering /- contract

14
Source of Shelter Animals

• Stray animals
• Owner relinquishments
• Legal (owner evicted, deceased, in jail, in
  hospital, burned out of home, etc)

• Animal abuse victims
• Abandoned at veterinary hospitals
• Sick
• Relinquished for euthanasia

15
Shelter Oversight and Regulation

• There is no federal oversight of animal shelters
  in the United states
• Several states have regulations that provide
  guidelines for shelters
• Determine holding periods for lost animals,
  standards of care, etc
• May be under department of health or other state
  agency

16
What Is Shelter Medicine?

• Shelter medicine is herd health management for
  small animals
• Many shelters handle over 10,000 animals per
  year-veterinarians may or may not see them all
• VCPR is with the shelter- in most cases shelter
  animals are relinquished to and owned by the
  shelter!

17
Shelter Medicine

• Shelter medicine is not the practice of
  traditional small animal medicine in a shelter
  environment
• Emphasis is on herd health management and disease
  prevention
• Shelter medicine seeks to insert individual
  treatment protocols into a herd health setting
  when appropriate

18
Why shelter medicine?

• Treatment strategies and vaccination protocols
  are different by necessity from private practice
• Diagnosis often dependent on physical exams only
• Vaccination recommended at younger age, more
  frequently, using different products
• Treatment and euthanasia decisions influenced by
  different factors

19
Shelter medicine is production medicine
Decreased intake Healthy animals Increased
adoptions Happy public
20
Traditional Veterinary Services

• Physical examinations
• Vaccinations
• Deworming
• Treatment of external parasites
• Treatment of health problems
• Spay neuter services
• Euthanasia

21
Other Shelter Services

• Lost and found/Microchipping
• Adoption and placement services, including
  behavior evaluation and temperament tests
• Humane education programs, including responsible
  pet ownership
• Shelter to pets of victims of domestic violence
• Disaster relief!

22
Shelter Medicine

• Shelters serve as sentinels of disease detection
• Reemergence of feline panleukopenia and canine
  distemper reported in shelters
• Many shelters must accept all unwanted or
  homeless animals-prairie dogs, small mammals,
  exotic cats, primates, reptiles, wildlife
• Decisions often affect thousands of animals

23
Role of Veterinarians in Shelters

• Full or part time shelter employee
• Member of board of directors
• Administrators
• Spay neuter services
• Pro bono consultations
• On call services
• Role in decision making may be limited

24
Role of Veterinarians in Shelters

• Disease transmission experts
• Shelter design
• Stress management
• Sanitation protocols
• Behavior evaluations/ temperament testing
• Spay neuter services
• Media

25
Role of Veterinarians in Shelters

• Zoonosis recommendations
• Staff and OSHA safety guidelines
• Rabies and other reportable disease surveillance
• Euthanasia
• Feral cat management, including trap neuter
  release (return) programs
• Disaster experts

26
Shelter Medicine

• Shelter medicine courses are taught at Cornell,
  Ohio State, University of Illinois, UC Davis,
  Auburn, Iowa, Florida, Colorado
• Relationships at veterinary colleges exist for
  veterinary students to examine and neuter shelter
  animals
• Residency programs at Auburn and UC Davis-more to
  come (Cornell)

27
Shelter Medicine

• Continuing education in shelter medicine offered
  at North American, Western and Midwest Veterinary
  Conferences, various animal welfare conferences
• Courses in shelter medicine, infectious disease
  management and animal cruelty on the Veterinary
  Information Network (VIN)

28
Shelter Medicine Textbook!

• First textbook on shelter medicine, Shelter
  Medicine for Veterinarians and Staff, edited by
  Miller and Zawistowski, published in 2004 by
  Blackwell
• 30 chapter multi author volume covering a range
  of topics from disease management to shelter
  design

29
Shelter Medicine Textbook
30
Association of Shelter Veterinarians (ASV)

• Formed in 2001
• Over 400 members
• List serve, newsletter and website
• Beginning the process for seeking board specialty
  certification

31
Veterinary Care in Shelters

• Veterinary care is often provided by trained (or
  untrained) shelter staff workers
• Licensed or registered veterinary technicians
• Certified euthanasia technicians
• Staff workers trained in house

32
Euthanasia

• No one knows how many animals are euthanized in
  animal shelters annually
• May be vicious, injured, sick or just too many
• Some are owner relinquished
• Is euthanasia considered the practice of
  veterinary medicine?
• Not defined as such in the Practice Act Model of
  AAVSB, Model Practice Act of AVMA or many state
  practice acts

33
Euthanasia

• Some states permit direct purchase of sodium
  pentobarbital by the shelter for purposes of
  euthanasia
• Ketamine and other restraint drugs are restricted
• Carbon monoxide vs. sodium pentobarbital
  injection?
• Who is responsible?
• Training of lay staff and veterinarians
• What about compassion fatigue?

34
Spay Neuter

• Many shelters have mandatory neuter before
  adoption policies-incentives dont work
• Animals are neutered or they must be euthanized
• Shelters pioneered pediatric spay neuter since
  the 1980s in an effort to stem overpopulation
  from shelter animals

35
Community Spay Neuter

• Efforts have increased to offer neutering
  services to low income families to reduce
  overpopulation and shelter euthanasia rates
• Less than 20 of owned animals are acquired from
  shelters
• 20 of clients who have their pets spayed had an
  accidental or oops litter first

36
Spay Neuter

• Hundreds of thousands of animals have been
  successfully neutered at high volume, low cost
  facilities and mobile vans since the 1980s
• Different standards of care than at small animal
  hospitals-not lower!
• Utilize sterile technique and patient monitoring
• Adequate post op analgesia
• May operate on animals with mild disease or fever

37
High Volume Spay Neuter

• Relies upon a highly trained team of technicians
  who maintain a steady flow of patients to the
  surgeon
• Surgical techniques rely on use of spay hooks,
  smaller incisions
• Some veterinarians perform ovariectomies, which
  do not result in pyometras if the ovaries are
  removed
• Licensure required in each state for training?

38
Animal Transport Programs

• Many shelters in the Northeast have a shortage of
  puppies due to aggressive spay neuter efforts
• Animals are being transported from the south
  where aggressive spay neuter efforts have not
  been undertaken
• Maddies Fund, state programs also fund spay
  neuter for low income residents

39
Rabies Vaccinations

• The 2005 compendium of rabies control recommends
  that Rabies vaccinations may also be
  administered under the supervision of a
  veterinarian to animals held in an animal control
  shelter prior to release. Any veterinarian
  signing a rabies certificate must ensure that the
  person administering vaccine is identified on the
  certificate and is appropriately trained in
  vaccine storage, handling, administration,
  management of adverse events..
• Issues of vaccination certificates, signature
  stamps?
• What about general vaccination clinics?
• Human health model does not require VCPR

40
Follow up care for adopted animals

• Shelters advise adopters to take adopted animals
  to private practitioners for follow up
  examinations, deworming, rabies vaccinations,
  FeLV, FIV and heartworm tests
• Often arrange a 2 week free exam with local
  veterinarians
• Compliance is variable, often low
• Some shelters offer insurance through Shelter
  Care program

41
Medical Records

• Veterinarians maintain records on the animals
  they examine and treat
• Technicians and lay people maintain other records
• Interface between veterinarians and shelter staff
  often mediated by non veterinary management staff
• Record keeping is not the same standard as small
  animal practice records!

42
Some issues for boards

• Euthanasia regulations
• Spay neuter programs
• Microchipping/confidentiality rules
• Medical records
• Standard of care
• Veterinary clinics open to the public

43
Conclusion

• The practice of veterinary medicine in animal
  shelters is an evolving specialty field that has
  different goals, issues, standards of care and
  challenges from that of traditional small animal
  companion practice
• When cases involving shelter medicine are
  presented to boards, the input and expertise of
  shelter veterinarians should be sought in order
  to fairly judge those cases

44
Help Wanted
Director of Veterinary Services - Humane Society
of Broward County (Ft. Lauderdale, Florida), an
open admission facility with over 25,000 animals
annually, seeks a hands on, motivated leader to
train and supervise veterinary staff, and perform
spay/neuter surgeries. Ideal candidate will be
licensed veterinarian (Florida license required
within 60 days of hire) with strong desire to be
involved in the daily activities of the animals
entrusted into our care. This team player should
have prior supervisory experience and at least
one year of surgical experience.
45
Help Wanted
Veterinarian - Bangor Humane Society seeks
motivated, enthusiastic veterinarian to establish
a low-cost spay/neuter clinic and to work with
animal care team to maintain the health of all
animals at the Whitley Animal Care and Adoption
Center in Bangor ME, close to the mountains, the
coast and the lakes. This is a full-time,
salaried position with health benefits. A
wonderful opportunity to make a difference as
part of an energetic team. Knowledge of advances
in shelter medicine and high-volume adult and
pediatric spay/neuter required. Excellent
communication skills essential.
46
Help Wanted
Veterinarian - Great opportunity available for
veterinarian who enjoys routine surgery and
preventive health care. The Richmond Spay
Neuter Foundation is looking for a full-time
veterinarian with confident surgery skills for
high-volume spay/neuter clinic. Pediatric
sterilizations required. Our hospital is clean
and well-equipped with an excellent support
staff.
47
Help Wanted
Veterinarian - The Kentucky Humane Society is
searching for a Veterinarian to open new small
animal clinic. Modern 2,600 sq ft free-standing
building that is next to state-of-the-art pet
resort. Excellent opportunity to act as an owner
without the financial risk. Guaranteed base
salary plus of production, with benefits.
Please contact Brent Hinton, President, Kentucky
Humane Society, 241 Steedly Drive, Lou, KY 40214
48
Help Wanted
Veterinarian - Oklahoma City's low-kill, full
access government shelter is seeking a
progressive Veterinarian with excellent medical
and inter-personal skills. Adult and pediatric
sterilizations supervise 5 Techs coordinate
relief vets direct routine and urgent care
medically evaluate cruelty cases emergencies as
needed, but usually weekend and evening hours are
covered by EC. Have or obtain DEA, State Drug and
OK vet licenses. Open until filled.
45,700-69,900 DOQ.
49
Help Wanted
VETERINARIANDMV to provide spay/neuter surgical
procedures for adopted and public animals and
diagnose and treat adoption animals. Upper Valley
Humane Society, 2501 W. Trenton Rd., Edinburg,
Texas
50
Help Wanted
Shelter Veterinarian- The City of San José, CA
offers a premiere opportunity for an enthusiastic
and team-oriented veterinarian. The experienced
candidate will develop and oversee the medical
program at our brand new 50,000 sq ft
state-of-the-art animal shelter. Responsibilities
include adoption spay/neuters, disease prevention
and treatment, as well as lead and train
veterinary support staff. Salary 74,256 to
90,600 annually plus benefits.