From the Vault: Pet Vaccination 101: Expert Insights from Dr. Jeff Grognet

Bonus Episode From the Vault: The #1 Most Downloaded Episode of 2024!
While we’re on a break until Feb 4, we’re bringing back one of your all-time favorite episodes from 2024!

In this episode, holistic veterinarian Dr. Jeff Grognet emphasizes the critical importance of understanding pet vaccinations, including core and non-core vaccines, potential risks of over-vaccination, and tailored vaccination schedules based on pet age and lifestyle. This episode empowers pet owners to have informed discussions with veterinarians and advocate effectively for their pets' health and well-being.

Highlights:

• The significance of core vs. non-core vaccines
• Assessing the risks related to vaccinations, including allergies and adverse reactions
• Evaluating age and lifestyle factors in determining vaccine needs
• Understanding rabies vaccination protocols and legal requirements
• Exploring alternatives to traditional vaccination practices
• Guidance on how to communicate effectively with veterinarians
• Stressing the importance of informed consent and pet owners’ rights

Learn more about Dr. Jeff, his work, and his courses at www.newearthvet.com.

Quick Update: We’re taking a short break and will be back with a batch of fresh episodes starting August 10! 
In the meantime, binge your way through 100+ past episodes packed with pet-saving sanity—and maybe even solve that one issue that's driving you (and your pet) nuts. 
Catch up, take notes, and we’ll see you soon! 

Chapters

• 0:40 Pet Vaccination Essentials and Guidelines
• 4:31 Optimizing Pet Vaccination Strategies
• 14:15 Vaccine Duration and Effectiveness
• 21:18 Alternative Methods to Pet Vaccination
• 32:28 Navigating Pet Vaccination Concerns and Decisions
• 41:09 Podcast Promotion and Pet Affection

Transcript

Speaker 2: 0:41

As we take a short break between seasons of muddy paws and hairballs, we're bringing back one of the most essential episodes for every pet parent pet vaccination essentials. Vaccines are a crucial part of ensuring our pets live long and healthy lives, but I've learned through my own experiences that understanding them fully can be a little more complicated than I once thought. Like many pet parents, I always used to follow a pretty standard vaccination schedule, but as I've learned more, and especially having conducted this interview with Dr Jeff Grognett, I've had to reconsider and educate myself more on the latest guidelines and the unique needs of each of my pets. In this episode, we dive into the core things that every pet parents need to know, whether it's determining what vaccines your pet really needs or understanding the risks of not vaccinating. I wanted to bring this episode back because it's so crucial to make informed decisions that are in the best interest of our pets. Whether you're new to pet ownership or you've been in the game for years, this episode has information you can use to make the best interest of our pets. Whether you're new to pet ownership or you've been in the game for years, this episode has information you can use to make the best choices for your pets. Stay tuned for expert insights and personal tips that'll help you navigate the world of pet vaccinations.

Speaker 2: 1:47

Today, we're gonna be talking about vaccinations for your pets, and my guest, who was actually a guest very early on in the show, dr Jeff Grognett, is a practicing veterinarian and an award-winning author With over 40 years in practice. He's been actively teaching for 35 years and has taught over 42,000 students wanting to create veterinary assisting careers. He has developed courses on pet first aid behavior and training, as well as holistic therapy. First aid behavior and training, as well as holistic therapy. Dr Jeff has a passion to teach owners how they can better care for their pets. From a holistic standpoint, he focuses on nutrition, minimizing vaccines and reducing toxin exposure. So, dr Jeff, thank you and welcome back to the show.

Speaker 3: 2:31

Thank you very much, amy. It's great to be here, great to get the message out.

Speaker 2: 2:35

Yeah, definitely, and obviously I get your emails and so I've seen all the information and the classes that you've been having about vaccines and I thought this is going to be a perfect topic for a perfect expert to help us kind of get some things straight, because I think pet parents are very confused and kind of don't know who to believe when it comes to what our pets need from the standpoint of vaccinations. So one of the things that has come up is the idea and I had never heard the term before except for in the past couple of years is core vaccines versus non-core vaccines? What does that mean?

Speaker 3: 3:12

That sort of moniker for the vaccines came out when they developed vaccine guidelines, and so core vaccines are the ones that are considered the life-threatening quote common diseases that, in this case, cats and dogs can suffer from. And so the core vaccines the guidelines suggest that they should be done in all cats and dogs. The non-core vaccines, differently, are ones that are you can call them optional, and what they say with those is that it depends on the risk and the exposure and what the pet is going to be exposed to, as in what they may come down with, is going to be exposed to, as in what they may come down with. The definition of core and non-core is strictly a conventional mechanism and that is just how they break down the vaccines. And there's also some confusion on what should be labeled as a core and a non-core vaccine.

Speaker 3: 4:19

And, for example, a little while ago in California, they put leptospirosis as a core vaccine in some areas because they were seeing more cases. So because of that, all of a sudden lepto became a core vaccine, according to those veterinarians in that area. This is not something that is regulated, it's something that veterinarians will sort of come up with. I'll call it by themselves, and what it does is. It creates the idea of calling it CORE, creates an urgency that you should get that vaccine done. It doesn't change the facts of the problems with vaccines how often you really should do them that type of thing but it does. It is used as a moniker for saying, oh, these are the important ones and we've got to do them on this regular schedule, conventionally.

Speaker 2: 5:06

Okay, got it and so you know, for years and years it was. You know, every year you go to your vet and every year you get this barrage of vaccines and it seems like nobody ever really questioned it. But I think this issue is coming up because we actually have been finding that we are over vaccinating our pets and that there are risks associated with that. What kind of risks do our pets face when we over vaccinate?

Speaker 3: 5:33

Yeah, well, I wouldn't even call it over vaccinate, I'll just call it vaccinating, because as soon as you say over vaccinate, then it's kind of well. What do you mean by that? No, it's just. Vaccinations can cause problems, and the one that's recognized universally, of course, is allergic reactions. You give an injection of a vaccine and they can have a life-threatening reaction. I always think of it as in the, you know, the 10-year-old kid who gets a peanut and they have an allergy, and then they end up going to hospital. They can have those life-threatening reactions. The most common allergic reactions are the ones where the face swells up and so the muzzle gets really thick, the eyelids swell, the ears get thickened, and in those cases it's like oh okay, we've got an allergic reaction going on here, and then another one they can have 12 hours later, 24 hours later, is hives, so they can have little bumps all over their body which are very itchy, and so that's the allergic reaction. That is the thing that is recognized by all veterinarians as in oh, that is a direct vaccine reaction. The other ones that occur are ones that occur delayed, and the one that came to the forefront back in the 1990s was the one that's called a feline fibrosarcoma. It's a tumor that occurs at the site of an injection in cats. Now that used to be called a vaccine-associated feline fibrosarcoma, but what they found is that it's to any injection you could have an injection of antibiotics, steroids, uh, program flea stuff and even microchips they can stimulate, uh, growth of a tumor in cats say, okay, so that's not a direct vaccine effect, but it's an effect of the injection of the vaccine. So so that's that cancer in cats. That was the thing that changed our whole thinking of gee, vaccines are safe and effective versus oh no, vaccines are causing a little bit of a problem here. Okay, so that actually that was the thing that changed the tide in vaccines for real.

Speaker 3: 7:56

The other things that we see we can see hemolytic anemia in dogs. That's where they start destroying their own red blood cells because their immune system's kind of messed up. We can also see bone inflammation. It's called hypertrophic osteodystrophy. It's where they get bone changes on their I call it the fingers, and again, that's in dogs as well. But the other two things and this is what's really pushed by holistic practitioners is that there's two diseases that are rampant and they're really causing problems and certainly most holistic vets would say, yep, vaccines have a role in this, and the two are allergies, which have so many dogs suffering from and generating huge bills because of medications that are used for that too, and the other one is cancer. We're seeing so much cancer now. Compared to when I graduated, the difference is night and day, and that's just in my time as a veterinarian, and so because of that, yeah, I think we have to sort of rethink our whole strategy on vaccination.

Speaker 2: 9:03

Yeah, and so how do we in general and then maybe get into the specifics for individual pets, but how does one find that balance between protecting my pets from the obvious dangers and then not over vaccinating and figuring out what's the right schedule and for us to follow?

Speaker 3: 9:22

Yeah, that's. That's about a two day webinar that I could do for you. Amy, I'm quite sure this is OK. For the first thing is here's a simple one it's based on the risk of the disease. Ok, and so let's take two.

Speaker 3: 9:38

The first thing is here's a simple one. It's based on the risk of the disease. Okay, and so let's take two. You've got an indoor cat. Feline leukemia is only passed on from one infected cat to another when they have a fight. An indoor cat does not need the vaccine for feline leukemia. That's real simple.

Speaker 3: 9:55

When you have a dog and you're worried about Lyme disease, well, you've now got a four-pound Yorkie that lives in your apartment with you and you go out with it under your arm, put it down on a little bit of grass outside your apartment building, pee some poops, pick the dog up, go back in. Lyme disease is not a threat. That dog is not going to pick up a tick and get Lyme disease in his world, right? So you have to look at the risk from that standpoint. The other side is and this is what a lot of people don't even talk about is that, as you have animals that age and what I'm talking about is puppy and kittenhood versus three years old, say, distemper in dogs and also parvo are puppyhood diseases. If you give parvo to an older dog, they will usually survive it. They do quite well. They will usually survive it. They do quite well. In the same way, cats with panleukopenia, which is stupidly called distemper, but it's also parvovirus, which everything is really complicated on that one. But the point is, feline panleukopenia is a kittenhood disease. If you give that to an adult cat, yeah, they might get a bit of vomiting, might get a bit of diarrhea, but it's well known that if you have a pregnant cat, a queen that's pregnant, and they pick up panleukopenia during pregnancy, they will end up with birth defects in the kittens, they end up with this really wild nervous problem called cerebellar hypoplasia, and so the point is they survive the infection just fine, right. So the so the big thing is that, as as they start to age, their immunity to the diseases get so much better, and so even with the core vaccines, it's like, oh, if you have a 10 year old dog or cat, they don't need the core vaccines anymore. They're not going to die from it. They're not kittens, they're not puppies, right? So there's a huge difference there.

Speaker 3: 12:05

But the other side is and this is the thing that's really come to light is the effectiveness of the vaccines, and a great example would be dogs coronavirus vaccine, and coronavirus supposedly causes a little bit of vomiting, diarrhea, that type of thing when they did the studies on the vaccine that's available, what they found is that they couldn't actually create disease with the coronavirus virus in the control group. So, so, therefore, the vaccine didn't prevent anything from happening, wow, okay. And so the case is that the studies kind of show that, well, what's it protecting against Nothing? It's not needed, okay.

Speaker 3: 12:51

And then when we get into the leptospirosis vaccines, there's a lot of concern on that, one and two things. One is that quite often it doesn't produce immunity to the leptospirosis strain that the dogs are exposed to. But the other side is lepto and also Lyme in dogs are your most reactive vaccines causing problems? In cats, it's the feline leukemia one that causes a lot of the problems. So, as you can see, we have to start. We have to look at each individual vaccine. It's not fair to label every vaccine as causing huge problems, right, there's specific ones that do cause some real issues. Some of them don't.

Speaker 2: 13:34

Yeah. So when a pet owner because generally I think people don't do a good job of asking questions when they go to the vet they go to the vet and there's kind of two sides of it, right. There's the person that the vet says fluffy is due for X, y, z, and you get it all done. And then you get the people on the other end and oftentimes it's economic reasons that they say, well, I can't do all that or I don't want to do any of it because my cat doesn't go outside. So you had mentioned the idea of your living situation being a major factor in deciding what vaccines you need, and then age of the pet. Obviously that's going to play in. Are there other factors that I should consider? Obviously that's going to play in. Are there other?

Speaker 3: 14:15

factors that I should consider. Yeah, this is where you have to look at each of the diseases. Generally, most dogs can get away and this is dog land right now most dogs. You can get away with not giving any of the non-core vaccines because of lack of efficacy and also concerns with reactions to it. The problems with a lot of the vaccines is they don't work that well, and the best example is Lyme disease.

Speaker 3: 14:47

Over 95% of dogs, when they're given Lyme disease, they will just brush it off. You won't even know that they had an infection. An infection, okay, they they may, might have a day where there's a little bit off, but otherwise, no, they don't have a problem there. They end up, uh, just just getting rid of it and like say, most times you wouldn't even know it's Lyme disease. There's a very small subset and this is what's really advertised in the veterinary world that they can suffer from. Something called Lyme nephritis is a kidney infection due to, or should say, kidney inflammation due to, lyme disease. We also see the same thing happening. If you vaccinate a dog, you can get Lyme nephritis, that from that. So it doesn't have to be the pure. You know the bug itself. So you have to look at all those aspects, as in gee. Is it really worth it? Should we be doing that? In Catland there is a vaccine available and I just want to throw this one out right now For FIP. It's feline infectious peritonitis, which is a coronavirus, and the vaccine has been proven to not work Okay. And if you look up the American Association of Feline Practitioners Vaccination Guidelines, it will say in there vaccination for FIP is not recommended. That's the stuff that we should be following and that is in the vaccine guidelines which are created by the veterinarians that know what's going on there. But but the real, real big thing about this uh, very simply, amy, is we have to look at how long vaccines last and the.

Speaker 3: 16:29

The pioneering work was done back in the 1970s by a Dr Ron Schultz, and what he did. He was a veterinarian, of course, and he had this concept of why don't we vaccinate dogs once, and I'm talking Cora vaccines here, so distemper, parvo. You vaccinate them once and then you check them a month later to find out did they respond to the vaccine? You do it tighter and if you find that they have produced an immune response, that immune response means that the immune system is activated. We have memory cells in there which persist for the lifetime of the dog, we do not need to do another vaccination period.

Speaker 3: 17:16

The same concept applies in cats with panleukopenia, not so much with the respiratory viruses, because that's kind of like you and me with the flu virus, right, and that is. It's changing all the time. So it's very difficult to have 100% immunity to the feline respiratory infections such as rhino and caliche, but that's the fate of that one. You're never going to have 100% on it because you can't vaccinate for every strain that's out there in the world. And the other thing is cat and dog vaccines never change. Is cat and dog vaccines never change? They don't update the strains in the vaccines from year to year like they do with the human flu vaccine or the COVID vaccine or anything like that. Okay, so they're static vaccines. They were implemented, created decades ago, okay, but the main thing is we've got them lasting longer. We don't need to vaccinate every year or every three years.

Speaker 2: 18:22

Well, and that actually brings up a question that I hadn't thought about before is the whole idea of what is the deal with these. One year, like rabies is one that is required in our communities here in Texas, even though there are very few cases of rabies that are out there in our communities here in Texas, even though there are very few cases of rabies that are out there. But obviously when you get into situations where it's a disease that can transfer to humans, I guess that makes it a much bigger deal. But it used to be. You got a rabies vaccine every year and then it's like well, if you got it one year and then you get the booster the year next, now you can go three years. But is it the same vaccine? Is it a different vaccine?

Speaker 3: 19:02

It is the same vaccine, completely Okay. The reason for the one the getting it done as a puppy or kitten and then doing it a year later and then moving to a three year schedule is because that is how the vaccine was tested Okay, so the vaccine manufacturer tested it that way. Vaccine was tested Okay, so the vaccine manufacturer tested it that way. And and what they said is that, okay, based on a three year, a three year interval we have, we have good protection, so therefore we can say it should be done every three years. It provides what they call 85% protection. It's not a hundred percent, okay, and that's the thing. Very few vaccines produce 100%, but in the case of rabies, 85 is the minimum for the three year duration. The kicker is this you're not going to find a vaccine manufacturer who's going to do an expensive study with the goal to reducing their sales. It just doesn't make sense for them.

Speaker 2: 19:54

Yeah, okay.

Speaker 3: 19:56

The one thing I do want to comment on, though in cats there has been a vaccine that was produced which was quote purer than the original vaccines, and so because of that it didn't have a lot of the gunk in there and it specifically didn't have an adjuvant. Adjuvant is additive vaccines to bump up the immune response. So the key with that is that the adjuvants were originally were blamed for creating the higher instance of the tumor, the fibrosarcoma we were talking about. Mm, hmm.

Speaker 3: 20:32

And so this this vaccine was manufactured, but because it didn't have an adjuvant to stimulate immunity and it was brought on sort of quickly, it was only good for one year, so that specific rabies vaccine had to be done every year in cats. This wasn't dogs, it was strictly cats. But what we now know is that the incidence of tumor is no different with the non-adjuvanted one-year vaccine and the three-year adjuvanted vaccine, and what we're doing is we're giving three times as many vaccine, which is just boosts up the number of the tumors that can actually occur. So very good reasons to avoid the one-year vaccine and stick with the three-year one if you have to do it.

Speaker 3: 21:19

Uh, and unfortunately, as you, as you mentioned, amy, in texas, but in pretty every us state, there is a requirement for rabies vaccination. There is something that in and the number the number that I've got from this and I don't know how accurate it is is 18 states supposedly have exemptions for rabies vaccine that you can actually apply for, so to speak, and but that has to be done by a veterinarian and what they do is they apply for an exemption based on the health of the animal had, past reactions to the vaccine or something like that. And certainly when you're dealing with a cat that's got kidney failure. You've got a dog that's diabetic or had cancer, like a mast cell tumor, you know things like that. It's kind of like gee. Do we want to give them any vaccines and mess up their immune system here?

Speaker 2: 22:12

Yeah, really.

Speaker 3: 22:13

And if the answer is no, that's what we're trying to avoid. We're trying to prevent that from happening. Like you say, the rabies incidence is really low, but unfortunately, because it's a human disease, then you get public health involved, and they're the ones that stimulated the rabies vaccination laws for the dogs and cats Right right so very hard to get around that. Okay, and so because of that, unfortunately we do see some areas where the rabies vaccine is really pushed, and this is one sort of thing.

Speaker 2: 23:04

I get, I guess, confused and concerned about. Is that, when did?

Speaker 3: 23:05

veterinarians become the police in the rabies vaccines for animals. Good point as in why are they the ones that are pushing this point when it's the you know, it's the law that should be saying it, and then it should be our option to say, hey, I'm going to, I'm not going to do it, I'm going to disregard the law. But the veterinarians quite often get in there saying that we have to do it and it comes down to their liability. I think it's a little bit misguided. I don't think we do that. It's the same thing with our medical doctors, where they do the same thing to us. Good question.

Speaker 2: 23:43

Well, I think you know, as far as the rabies goes, I mean, when it would ever come up is really when you're trying to do something like going to a boarding facility, going to a training class, whatever it might be, where there would be required proof of rabies. Because your average person who goes to the vet once a year gets done what needs to get done, has their pet in their home and takes their pet everywhere with them and doesn't partake of those facilities. Nobody's ever going to question whether their dog has a rabies vaccine, unless it bites somebody. Then that's a whole other ball of wax, but it's just not something that's going to come up.

Speaker 3: 24:17

No, no, if you're just walking down the street, you don't have the people asking you can I see your rabies vaccine before I pet your dog? You know exactly. But anyway, yeah, the thing about that is that if you're pushed into doing any vaccines and this is just a case of if you have to get vaccines done there's also what we call remedy, called Thuja, and it's spelled T-H-U-J-A, and that one is a general remedy that's used for vaccinosis to prevent the side effects of vaccines long term. And then, if you're dealing with rabies, the most common one that's used is called Lyssin. If you're dealing with rabies, the most common one that's used is called Lyssin L-Y-S-S-I-N, because the rabies is a Lysivirus. That's where the name comes from. Okay, okay.

Speaker 3: 25:23

And so I mean those are homeopathic remedies that are used a lot for incense, like a detox, and so definitely, if you're getting that done, that's something to consider as well.

Speaker 2: 25:35

Okay, okay, so kind of along that same line for somebody that might be concerned about disease but at the same time maybe more concerned about vaccines are there alternatives to vaccines, to protecting our pets from some of these common diseases?

Speaker 3: 25:52

Okay, well, there's two ways to go. One is to reduce the vaccines to a lower number as possible, and the other one is to not use vaccines and use a different method. In terms of the different method, that's where we're talking about using homeopathic no-sodes, and no-sodes are homeopathic preparations made from the disease itself. It contains the virus, and then they're prepared in the homeopathic method of dilution and succession, as they call it, and that is what's given to the animal and this is the key it doesn't produce an immune response. Okay.

Speaker 3: 26:32

Okay, so you can't measure antibodies after you give them a homeopathic preparation. What you're giving them the homeopathic thing for is that they're at risk of picking up the disease, and what it does is it helps the dog or cat get through that without having any symptoms of the disease at the time. Okay.

Speaker 3: 26:52

And if you want to get into no-sodes, there's companies that sell them both for dogs and cats, and you just look up homeopathic no soads for canine distemper, or you look for feline leukemia or something like that, and what you can do is you can purchase them. What I found is that each one of them has different directions on how to use them. What I found is that each one of them has different directions on how to use them. Okay, and so what you'll find is some say, give it twice a week or something like that, during the susceptible period, and then you give it once a month or something like that. They're all over the map on that, and so where you purchase it from, they'll be able to tell you how you should use it. Okay, but that's one method. The other way, and this is the one that I used at the hospital is and just here's a very simple program for you and I'll tell you what it is and then I'll tell you how it works.

Speaker 3: 27:47

What I was doing, for example, in dogs, is that I would see them as a puppy dogs is that I would see them as a puppy at 16 weeks. I'd see them before then. But the first vaccine, and the only vaccine I gave was at 16 weeks of age. The reason we wait for that is maternal antibodies have come down, and so what happens is, as they go down, there's no interference from the maternal antibodies they got from their mother's colostrum. Therefore, they'll respond to the vaccine at 16 weeks and 97% of puppies respond then. Okay, so we know that.

Speaker 3: 28:22

So what you do is you give the vaccine and this is a core vaccine and then a month later you do a titer, and a titer is a measure of the antibody in the bloodstream to that specific disease. And so, for example, we gave a parvovirus vaccine. A month later we do a parvoviral antibody test, the titer, and if we find that it's gone up, the immune systems now responded. And that way we also know we've got a clone of white blood cells called B lymphocytes, which are producing antibodies to that virus, and they will persist for life. And this is something that every veterinarian knows and learned in vet school.

Speaker 3: 29:08

As in yeah, immune system means we've got it for life. Just like me having a polio vaccine when I was a little guy, I don't get re-vaccinated when I'm 40 years old or whatever. It doesn't run out right. So the key is, it does persist for, as far as we know, a lifetime for the memory cells. So if the titer's proven that you got a response. There's two big things here. It means that oh, we've got memory there, we don't need to revaccinate, and the other side is we also don't need to do another titer.

Speaker 2: 29:43

Oh, okay, there's no point, because I was wondering if that was going to be something you have to keep doing.

Speaker 3: 29:47

No, well, some veterinarians do that, and what they're doing is they're looking at the antibody level in the blood. Well, it's natural for the antibody level to go down, but even though that antibody level may be close to zero and it probably never gets to zero, it's just the test can't detect it.

Speaker 3: 30:09

But once it gets low enough, then they're saying, oh, there's no immunity there. No, if you give that dog a vaccine, you're going to find that the immunity goes up in a heartbeat, like in a couple of days, Like boom, you've got it. But the other side is, if that dog picks up the disease, as in picks up parvovirus, you know, when the level's gone down the immune system is going to kick right into high gear and produce what's called an anamnestic response. That's a big word, but what it means is that the immune system's already in charged and all you got to do is stimulate that little bit with a disease or vaccine and the number goes right up and it's protective and they won't get sick. So that's the key. We can do one vaccine, one titer, and then we're done. Call one and done. We don't have to do it. Keep going. Same applies to cats with the core vaccine as well.

Speaker 2: 31:23

Okay, so you know, and I kind of skipped over a question that I was going to ask you, but I want to get back to the idea of kind of traditional versus. I mean, that sounds like what a holistic veterinarian would take, that approach versus a traditional. And I know there's, you know there's a scale of people in between. It's not just one extreme or the other, but from the one end, where it's traditional and this is just what we do, we give vaccines every single time until the dog dies or cat dies versus the one and done approach, how is a pet parent to know what's the right thing to do? Or how do you? Do I just go out and look for a veterinarian that has this approach over here, or do I try to convince my veterinarian to take that approach? Or, you know, because it kind of, you know, we're not the vets. We're, you know, we're relying on their advice when we go there.

Speaker 3: 32:10

That's right, yeah, and here's a few ideas for you. I mean, I'm giving this idea and if I had a conventional vet right in front of me here, they'd be shaking their heads going, no, that's not what I can believe. This is the point. It's not what I can believe in. And so when people are looking at alternative vaccinations, they have to decide what do they believe, what are they comfortable with? And this was really brought home with that. You know that virus thing that came out in people called COVID that one. Yes, we got a complete dissection of the population in terms of what people believed about the disease and the vaccines.

Speaker 2: 32:53

Yes.

Speaker 3: 32:53

Okay.

Speaker 3: 32:54

So, we had people that were lining up to get vaccines because they really wanted it, and we had the other group that was saying, oh no, those things are dangerous.

Speaker 3: 33:05

But the point is you as in you, me and everyone else are comfortable in going down the path that you believe is the right one to go into. And whichever one you go into, you can probably get backing for it. You can do research and say, hey, this guy agrees with my thinking. Not that you're going in to change your thinking, you just get someone to back you up. And so the thing about it is this I was born and raised a conventional veterinarian. When I graduated in 83, we were vaccinating every year, um. And then when things started changing and we realized that the vaccines are causing some issues here and it was feline fibrosarcoma was the biggie, uh. The allergies, that that was another one, uh. But then it's like gee, we got all these other little niggly diseases. Some of them are huge, and and vaccines just aren't as safe as we really believe. Other veterinarians will tell you, and the research papers only look at what happens in the first three days after a vaccination. They don't look at what happens after three months. So for that reasoning. Sometimes it's very difficult to get the information that you really want, and this is the key. In practice, I would have animals that had a cancer Mast cell tumor is probably about the best one in terms of dogs and they've had mast cell tumor. They took off the left hind leg last year and they're going. Gee, I wonder if I should get vaccines, and my recommendation was no, I think we should avoid them. Thankfully we do not have a rabies vaccine requirement where I live, but anyway I would recommend no. But so many times I had animals that had had cancer and they were vaccinated, as I call it, at elsewhere a vet hospital, and a month after that vaccination they've got a lump that just appeared. Now. Was it going to appear anyway? I don't know, but it just seemed to happen a lot more often than I really wanted it to.

Speaker 3: 35:10

Uh, the one that really shows up is when you have dogs or cats with allergies. If you vaccinate them, their allergies will get worse. You're mucking with the immune system, you're stimulating, and so and and most, even conventional vets will go that route. They'll try to avoid doing vaccinations during that dog or cat's allergy season. Okay, and I just want to hit one thing on the in terms of allergies and such sure.

Speaker 3: 35:38

When, when we have a dog or cat that has a reaction to a vaccine, the approach that's quite often used at that point is that, oh, on the next vaccine, what we're going to do is we're going to give an injection of Benadryl about, say, half an hour before, and then we'll give the vaccine and then, hopefully, that will prevent any reaction. Well, if you had a reaction before, it could become life-threatening later. And are you going to take the chance on a shot of antihistamine that's going to prevent the death of your pet? The vaccine isn't that important. You can avoid giving it because we know it lasts longer. We don't have to do it every year or every three years, and so, therefore, trying to give something so we can get the vaccine in, we have to look at what's important here. That's the key. Okay, but veterinarians are, unfortunately, I'm seeing a trend backwards.

Speaker 2: 36:31

So I live in a small town it's somewhere in the world and there's one veterinarian in town versus in Houston. I could probably seek out a veterinarian that had my beliefs and, you know, work that way. What would you suggest, as far as a pet parent, having those conversations? I mean, first of all, you have to have the guts to stand up and say I have concerns about this, but what else can we do to have that conversation with our vets?

Speaker 3: 36:55

Well, a big part of it is that it depends on the veterinarian as to how receptive they are to any conversation about this and the way I would approach that as a client. When you say, oh, the vaccines are due, and then the first thing you should be thinking about saying if you're comfortable saying this is that, gee, doc, I've got some concerns about the vaccine. Can we talk about that first? And you're going to get one of two reactions. You're going to get a reaction that says, oh, yeah, let's go over that. What are your concerns?

Speaker 3: 37:29

But some veterinarians are just going to say, well, they're due and I don't have time to talk about this with you, okay. And some of them will just brush that off and say, no, they're just due, and that's what hospital policy put it in those words, right? And if that's the case, then this is the key here you, as a cat or dog owner, are in charge of the health of your pet. You should be able to have input there, and if the veterinary can't respect that, then hey, you've got to find one that you can talk to.

Speaker 2: 38:07

Yeah, so you do have the right to speak up and say I decline, I do not want to have that vaccine.

Speaker 3: 38:12

Exactly yeah.

Speaker 2: 38:13

People just need to be better advocates for their pets. But it's awkward, you know there's an authority figure that's telling you that they're the ones that went to the school for an extra four years or more, and it's kind of hard to stand up to that for some people.

Speaker 3: 38:27

Yeah, and they're wearing a white coat and you call them Dr Somebody, rather than my case. I was known. As for people who got formal at my hospital, I was Dr Jeff. Most of the time it was Jeff, which is great. I love that.

Speaker 3: 38:42

But some of them don't have a barrier and they don't want to do that. So you have to take the health into your own hands. And this is the biggest part.

Speaker 3: 38:53

When a medical procedure is done at a veterinary hospital, you as a client has to have informed consent. So if you're okay in chemotherapy on your dog or your cat, you're supposed to be given all the pluses, the minuses and then you can make an informed decision and give them consent to go ahead with the treatment. How often when you go in for vaccinations are you given informed consent? How often when you go in for vaccinations are you given informed consent? Do they actually go over the guidelines and tell you about the risks of the vaccination?

Speaker 3: 39:25

It's a medical procedure. It's just the same as any other procedure. Good point, but at the same time that also lacks in human land. As I said, if you go in and have a vaccine, they're not going to sit down with you for 10 minutes and go over all the stuff. So if you're thinking about having a vaccine, then find out what vaccine brand the hospital is using. Look up the drug, insert the thing that lists all the things about the medication and it has all the side effects on there, all the possible things that can go wrong.

Speaker 2: 40:03

So start there. Yeah, good point, yeah.

Speaker 3: 40:09

Okay, anything else that we didn't cover that Well, the main thing with all this is that you are the advocate for your dog or cat's health. You're the one that gets to decide what's going on. And the thing about the vaccines is that there are side effects, there are things that can go wrong, and the getting on the treadmill of giving them every year, every three years or something like that. When you look at the scientific data, it doesn't back up giving them that often at all. So the evidence points that we can go much longer, and I think that's really what we have to start looking at in terms of hey guys, why are we doing what we're doing? It's due to tradition.

Speaker 2: 40:45

Yeah.

Speaker 3: 40:46

That's it. Yeah, that's really it.

Speaker 2: 40:49

Well, jeff, thank you so much for being here with us today and for sharing this information. I think, like I said, I think people are very confused, they're anxious, they're worried about it. And, like I said, I think people are very confused, they're anxious, they're worried about it, and I think what you've shared today has really helped people to A better understand things and better create a plan for how they're going to move forward with their pets.

Speaker 3: 41:06

Wonderful. Glad to be helpful there, Amy.

Speaker 2: 41:10

All right. Thank you to everybody for listening to another episode and we will see you next week. Thanks for listening to Muddy Paws and Hairballs. Be sure to visit our website at muddypawsandhairballscom for more resources and be sure to follow this podcast on your favorite podcast app so you'll never miss a show. And hey, if you like this show, text someone right now and say I've got a podcast recommendation. You need to check the show out and tell them to listen and let you know what they think. Don't forget to tune in next week and every week for a brand new episode. And if you don't do anything else this week, give your pets a big hug from us.