Transcript of personal comment from this episode of The Web-DVM:
Welcome back to the studio, where in my personal comment tonight, I will break down the root causes and effective prevention of ear infections, discussing the most appropriate ear cleansers for your pet.
So why is one dog or cat plagued by recurring ear infections, when the majority are not? You just were acquainted with my lab, Bernie, who tends to get yeasty wax build up in his ears that will lead to infection if left unaddressed. Yet in the same household, there are two other dogs, as well as one cat, whose ears I never have the need to even clean.
The answer to this oddity is that micro-organism overgrowth and waxy build up occurs most commonly due to underlying skin allergy. The sensitive skin that lines the ear canals is prone to inflammatory changes in the allergic patient that increase glandular secretions and irritate the tissue. Allergens that affect the ears are the same as those that affect people with allergic sensitivity, airborne allergens such as: pollens, mold spores, and dessicated grasses. This resultant allergy stimulated inflammation within a region that tends to be warm and poorly ventilated, creates an environment of tissue that is ripe for overgrowth of yeast and/or bacteria.
However, this situation does not necessarily have to spiral into a severe raging ear infection where a visit to the veterinarian is the only alternative. If you put the time and effort into keeping the ears clean, dry, and fresh, you can often prevent full blown infections, saving your doggy or kitty a lot of discomfort, while saving yourself a lot of money.
So let us start with good ear cleanser selection. Good ear cleansers should do three basic things: degrease, dry, and acidify the ears. This creates an environment less hospitable for infectious micro-organisms to grow and reproduce, and is accomplished effectively with cleansers that have a small percentage of acetic acid and alcohol. However, we do not want to make the ear canal tissue more irritated, so the inclusion of these agents needs to be well balanced with soothing ingredients such as aloe and omega-3-fatty acids. Vet Solutions ear cleanser fits these criteria well, and for years has been one of my favorite choices for regular ear cleanings. If the discharge that builds up in the ears of your dog or cat is yellow to yellowish light brown in nature, this indicates that it is primarily wax and perhaps some bacterial overgrowth, making Vet Solutions an ideal choice.
If like my dog Bernie, your dog or cat tends to get a dark brown waxy discharge in the ears, then the build up is likely the result of yeast overgrowth in the ears, making Vet Solutions still a decent choice, but you can likely do better with a cleanser that has an additional ingredient that kills yeast. As you saw in the video, I used T8 Keto on Bernie, which combines many of the ingredients that make Vet Solutions effective, with the addition of ketoconozole, an antifungal that has powerful yeast killing properties. Since we recorded this video earlier this morning, however, the company that makes T8 Keto has announced an indefinite back order on this line of product, making it increasingly difficult to find. A good alternative product has the identical ingredients as T8 Keto, called Triz Ultra (EDTA)with Keto, making it an ideal alternative. Again, that product is called Triz Ultra (EDTA) with Keto. Both Vet Solutions ear flush and Triz Ultra (EDTA) with Keto can be purchased from your vet, or through online pet medication retailers.
Whether Vet Solutions or Triz Ultra (EDTA) with Keto are the appropriate choice for your pet based on the criteria I discussed, you should flush the ears just like I showed you in the instructional portion of this program, once daily for 7 days, then maintain with flushes1-3 times weekly as needed. If you follow this and remain consistent with the care of your pet’s ears, you have a good chance of preventing full blown infections, making for a happier pet and a happier bank account.
That is our show for this Friday, November 19, 2009. We will see you again in 2 weeks, as we will be taking next week off for the Thanksgiving Holiday. I wish you all a safe and happy Thanksgiving.
Dr. Roger Welton is the President and chief veterinarian at Maybeck Animal Hospital in West Melbourne Florida, as well as CEO of the veterinary advice and health management website Web-DVM.net.
Transcript of personal comment from this episode of The Web-DVM:
As I stated, this leads into my personal comment tonight, which is in regard to a sad reality that I have voiced my grievance with before: that our criminal justice system is disgustingly lenient with its punishment in animal cruelty cases. The fact that operating what was essentially a torture and death camp for innocent animals bears only misdemeanor offenses is nothing short of appalling. That sends a message to our citizens that torture and murder is evil, but when enacted on animals, is simply just naughty. It certainly does little to nothing to deter sick individuals from enacting their sadistic fantasies on innocent animals.
I find it curious that the only circumstance that makes these offenses felonies, are if the deceased animals were ultimately found to have been the property of other people. Now this sends another lovely message: torture of animals is only wrong if they are the property of other people, but strays and wild animals? No worries, torture away, there’re plenty more where they came from.
What kind of criminal justice system is this? Having grown up near New York City, and practiced veterinary medicine just 10 miles west of the town where McDonough allegedly committed these atrocities, I know that New Yorkers consider themselves the most savvy and sophisticated citizenry in the country and even the world. Yet with regard to animal cruelty, the criminal justice system is as backwards as a third world country.
You will recall that I reported on Michael Vick some time ago, that I actually supported his reinstatement back into the NFL, because he had served his time in accordance to our criminal justice system, and as such, had a right to rejoin society and make a living the only way he knows how. You may also recall, however, that I felt his penalties were a joke for the degree of his offenses.
I am not deluded into thinking that stiffer penalties will truly lead these cruel individuals to see the error of their ways. While I support affording Michael Vick the right to make a living, I still feel strongly that in his heart he is a cruel sadist. If cruelty is in someone’s heart, they are not sorry for their crimes, they are just sorry that they got caught – these leopards rarely change their spots.
However, stiffer penalties accomplish a number of positive things. First and foremost, they remove these people from society, sparing innocent animals their wrath. Next, it serves as a deterrent the perpetrators and others who share their brand of evil intent, that if you are caught, you will serve the time and be branded with the stigma of being a convicted felon. Lastly, it sends a message to all that torture of animals is not just wrong, but a serious crime against society.
So rise up, New Yorkers, and make a stand for the animals of your state. I know how most of you love and care for animals, with many of you I was privileged to have as clients in the three years I practiced in Long Island. Make your voices be heard, that you will no longer accept your laws being so tolerant of animal cruelty. And that does not just go for New Yorkers, but any other state that essentially condones animal cruelty with lax penalties for violators. Remember the enlightened words of the great Mohandas Gandhi:
"The greatness of a nation can be judged by the way its animals are treated."
Dr. Roger Welton is the President and chief veterinarian at Maybeck Animal Hospital in West Melbourne Florida, as well as CEO of the veterinary advice and health management website Web-DVM.net.
Transcript of personal comment from this episode of The Web-DVM:
We have a little change in format tonight, as we are forgoing news stories in lieu of a more than typical substantial personal comment tonight. My comment deals with a subject that is in the forefront of the minds of most Americans right now, the subject of human health care. While I agree that our health care system is badly in need of reform, that health insurance companies are a big part of the problem, where that aspect of reform should go is not within the scope if this program.
The reform I am talking about, starts at the level of the care givers and health institutions themselves, to hold themselves accountable to a higher standard, in short, to start acting more like the veterinary industry does. If you bear with me for the few several minutes, I briefly want to recount two recent personal experiences I had in the human health care system that are abominable examples of what is wrong with our health care system, then explain to you how we veterinarians do it differently, and frankly, emphatically better.
On week 16 of my wife's pregnancy with our beloved Austin, she was out to dinner with her brothers when she suddenly experience a gush of clear fluid. Terrified that she may have expelled life sustaining amniotic fluid, she proceeded straight to the emergency room having called me to meet her there en route.
Upon arrival, we began our experience by waiting more than 90 minutes from admission to actually having her in a bed and ready to be examined. Once there, we were greeted by nurses, but there was still another thirty minutes before a physician came in to see her. Only the caregiver that came in was not a physician at all, but a physician assistant, known by the abbreviated term, PA. After she performed her examination and told us she suspected a threatened miscarriage, I asked her when the doctor would be in, to which she replied, there would be no doctor, that she was the assigned care giver in the emergency room that evening. Apparently, potentially losing your unborn child and having excellent health insurance does not qualify for actually getting an MD in this hospital.
The PA next came in with a device called a Doppler to check for the baby's heartbeat. Having seen my wife's regular top notch OBGYN take some time to locate the heartbeat previously with a Doppler, and having had a lot of personal experience with the use Doppler in animals, I knew that there was an art to successfully using Doppler, the mastering of which comes with experience.
I watched as this PA was clearly not confident with the device, while she failed to find my baby's heartbeat. She then told us that since Doppler was not infallible (at least in her hands), the definitive state of the baby could not be determined, but that the signs did not look good. Her recommendation was that was we go home and call our OBGYN first thing Monday morning to have an ultrasound scheduled. Dumbfounded at this point since it was Friday, I asked her why we could not get an ultrasound right then and there, and her answer was that the urgency of the situation would not allow her the authority to order one!
Having quickly gone from dumbfounded to appalled, I asked her to meet me outside the room in the hallway, where I told her that I will not allow her to enact such cruelty on my wife and I, to make us go through the emotional turmoil of an entire weekend of not knowing whether or not our baby lived. I told her in no uncertain terms that if denying us an ultrasound was her final position, that Monday morning I would not only be calling the OBGYN, but also submitting a grievance with the Florida state medical board, as well seek out the most aggressive shark of a lawyer I could find and sue them.
As luck would have it, my discussion with the PA revealed that an ultrasound was not out of the question after all, and my wife was promptly taken into ultrasound, where we saw our little guy happily swimming around in Mommy's uterus. I was so elated, I hugged the ultrasonographer, not only because of the news her scan brought us, but also because her diagnostic capability was the only bit of professionalism and quality care we had received the entire evening.
In another recent health care experience, I was referred to a specialist by my primary doctor. To my dismay, it would be 3 weeks before I could be seen by this specialist, and the only other alternative for this specialty was all the way in Orlando. Also to my dismay this specialist, as it turned out, only actually worked 3 1/2 days a week.
After I finally had my appointment with this doctor, he had ordered a battery of blood tests, telling me that they would be in in one week, and that I should call back then for results. I called as he said one week later and a nurse confirmed that the blood work was in. This is when the fun really began.
She promptly was about to refer me to the receptionist so I could make an appointment with the doctor to review the blood work, when I asked her why he could not go over results over the telephone as I do for my clients. She proclaimed that the doctor as a strict policy does not review labs results over the telephone, that it must be done in person with an office visit. At this point very unhappy with the way I was being treated, I was still was willing to go along with this nonsense, until I was informed that it would be another 2 weeks to get an appointment to review my labs!
Right then, I was done with this doctor. After making me wait 3 weeks for an appointment and one week for the test results, just so that he could bill my insurance company another office visit, he was making me wait another 2 weeks to get my results. No way!
I told the nurse that I was effectively done with this doctor, that his policies and lack of accommodation was disgusting, and demanded that she fax me my lab results. I interpret lab data every day for dogs and cats, much of which are the same parameters as for people, so I certainly was capable of interpreting my own. And if not, I would drive to another state for help, rather than take this abuse any further.
This last part is the icing on the cake. When I demanded to get my lab work faxed to me, the nurse informed me that she could not, for the administrative paper pusher that normally was in charge of something like that, was on vacation and would not be back for another week. I said to the nurse, "So you are telling me that there is only one person in your office that is capable of sending a fax?" Her answer to me was that it was not a matter of being capable, but that it was policy that only this one person was in charge or processing paperwork. Finally, I said, "Go to your manager, doctor, or whoever your superior is today, and tell her that refusing to release my labs is both unethical and illegal in the state of Florida, and that she could either fax them to me immediately, or fax them at a later time when the Florida state medical board ordered them to after I filed my grievance. I had my results in hand 15 minutes later.
Being a health provider for dogs and cats, all I can say to the medical profession is four words, "ARE YOU KIDDING ME?" I would be put out of business and run out of town if I or my hospital behaved like this. Let me tell you how we do it in veterinary medicine so that you can see what real health care is.
No matter how booked up we are, we do not turn away a sick patient, find a way to fit them in, even if it means working through our lunch break and/or staying late, sometimes very late. Routine blood work is back within 10 minutes, most other blood work back within one business day, even tissue biopsies are back in 2 business days. When the results come in, I call the owner free of charge and review them, as well as answer any and all questions, no matter how long it takes.
When owners call with questions about a particular treatment course, refills, or just general questions, I communicate with them through a technician if possible to save time, but come to the telephone regularly myself if the questions are very involved, or if the client feels more comfortable talking directly to me.
When we have to refer a patient to a specialist, there is NEVER anything even approaching 3 week wait, with our nearby critical care and specialty referral center happy to receive patients right away, within minutes, or at most within an hour or two at most, even under non critical circumstances.
The bottom line is that in veterinary medicine, we think of the needs and well being of the patient first and foremost, rather operate with abject apathy and arrogance under the guise of policy, red tape, and feeling that we are justified in charging for every single word we speak.
All this said, this is not an indictment of all medical doctors and health care institutions. For example, the rest of my wife's pregnancy with Austin unfortunately was not smooth, and it was ultimately the tireless dedication of our wonderful OBGYN group that delivered him safely to us, not a hair on his little head harmed. In a nut shell, this OB group operates more like us.
Unfortunately, health care institutions like the ones that saved my son's life, are becoming increasingly the minority, with the nonsense that I previously relayed to you, more the norm. Congress will hash out what they will, and people will debate and shout until they are blue in the face on how health care reform should proceed. Regardless of whatever the result of that debate is, health care providers should think long and hard about reforming themselves first and foremost and becoming a little more like us.
Dr. Roger Welton is the President and chief veterinarian at Maybeck Animal Hospital in West Melbourne Florida, as well as CEO of the veterinary advice and health management website Web-DVM.net.
Dr. Roger Welton is an experienced ER and general practice veterinarian, and reporter for the Veterinary News Network (VNN). He is a published author and expert in his field, offering advice, pertinent veterinary information and news to the general pet owning public through his YouTube and BlogTalkRadio shows, which are embedded weekly here for your viewing and listening convenience. Dr. Welton is a reporter for the Veterinary News Network (VNN), enabling him to offer the most up to date, interesting, and cutting edge pet related information. Dr. Welton is happily married with 2 small children, and in his spare time competes in triathlons and coaches youth league lacrosse.
