Episode 162: Toxicity Watchouts During Canine Pregnancy

Dr. Fran Smith dives into the everyday medications that can be potentially harmful to a canine pregnancy, and help breeders learn how to provide the best treatment for a pregnant dam that has the lowest risk for her fetuses.

This episode is an audio version of a webinar. Click here to view the video presentation.

Transcript

Nicole Engelman  00:04

Welcome to The Good Dog Pod. Join us every other Wednesday when we discuss all things dogs, from health and veterinary care, to training and behavior science, as well as the ins and outs of Good Dog and how our platform can help you successfully run your breeding program. Follow us and join Good Dogs mission to build a better world for our dogs and the people who love them. Hi, everyone, and welcome back to another episode of The Good Dog pod where we discuss all things related to canine health, research, how Good Dog helps breeders run their breeding programs, and so much more. I'm Nicole, the Breeder Community Lead here at Good Dog and your host for this week's episode. Today we're joined by our guest, Dr. Francis Smith, a canine reproduction specialist and she'll be talking all about toxicity watch outs during canine pregnancy. We've had Dr. Smith on for a number of webinars in the past. We are so excited to have her on the podcast to cover this topic. Dr. Smith will be diving into the everyday medications that can be potentially harmful to a canine pregnancy. And she's going to help breeders learn how to provide the best treatment for pregnant dams that have the lowest risk for her fetuses. And of course, as always, we're going to be answering your questions about canine pregnancy. Before I introduce Dr. Smith and her incredible background, I want to thank our friends at Purina for helping us make this episode possible. As always, this topic was requested by our community. So we're so excited to bring it to you today. And we hope it's going to be a helpful resource for you and your breeding programs. So with that, I'm going to tell you a little bit more about our amazing speaker today, Dr. Francis Smith, and then I'm going to pass things over to her. I just want to thank everyone again for joining us for our presentation today at Toxicity Watchouts During Canine Pregnancy with our amazing guest, Dr. Francis Smith, who has joined us again for another presentation. And she is an incredible canine reproduction specialist that I will tell you more about in just a minute. Dr. Smith is going to be discussing everyday medications that can be potentially harmful to a canine pregnancy. And she's going to help everyone here today learn how to provide the best treatment for a pregnant dam that has the lowest risk to her fetuses because that of course is the most important above all, we are so excited to partner with Purina again to bring you this good breeder webinar. This topic has been heavily requested by our community, it's not something we've ever been able to cover in the past. So we're super excited to bring it to you today. And thank you again for letting us know about things that you'd like to see more of in terms of canine health content. And please continue sharing any suggestions our way, if you want to use this time in the chat to share about anything you're thinking about relating to canine health that you'd like to see us cover in the future super helpful for us just as we start planning the year ahead. And we hope today will be really helpful to you and all of your breeding programs. Like I mentioned during the q&a segment of this presentation, we're going to prioritize the tons of previously submitted questions that all of you ask. So we're going to prioritize those first. And before we kick things off, I just want to share a little more about Good Dog for anyone new who's joining. Good Dog is on a mission to build a better world for our dogs and the people who love them by advocating for dog breeders like yourselves, educating the public and promoting canine health and responsible dog ownership through events just like this. We're a secure online community created just for dog breeders and we are completely free for dog breeders as well. We use the power of technology to help our good breeders really level up their breeding programs and give you tools like our secure payment system to protect you from scams and best in class software to post available litters, and start connecting with Good Dog buyers from across the country. So I see a lot of people in the chat saying they have litters on the way. Hopefully you're already a member of our community so you can get those litters listed with us and start connecting with buyers. But if not, you can always apply to join our community at gooddog.com/join. So before I pass things over to Dr. Smith to get this presentation started, I just want to share a little bit more about her amazing background in canine health. So Dr. Smith became a diplomat of the College of Theriogenology, I struggle to say that word so hopefully I got it this time, in 1986. Since that time, she has been in private practice as a small animal practitioner specializing in canine reproduction. Dr. Smith is one of very few board certified Theriogenologists in private practice. Her expertise in genetic counseling children, frozen semen and reproductive infertility of the male and female canine is known throughout the United States. Dr. Smith frequently speaks to breed groups, veterinary associations and students and the general public. Dr. Smith retired from full time practice in March of 2023, but maintains licenses in Minnesota, Mississippi and Colorado. Dr. Smith grew up in a military family that bred German Shepherd dogs. Her commitment to veterinary medicine began at seven years of age and was confirmed in her high school yearbook, which stated her goal was the patter of 40 little feet, not human. I don't think there's a better goal than that. So with that, Dr. Smith, I'm so glad to introduce you again and bring you back to our good breeder community? I will pass things over to you to get the presentation started.

Dr. Francis Smith  05:06

Thank you very much. I appreciate that wonderful introduction. Well, I think we're gonna have a lot of fun with this topic today. But I will tell you, it is complicated. I will also tell you, there will be some things that you will not be thrilled to hear, but you will learn a lot and there will be a lot of food for thought. So I'm going to talk to you not about just medications that are bad during pregnancy, but a broader topic called reproductive toxicants. Currently, I will just give you a little more information on myself. I am the president of the OFA, which is the canine Health Information Center, the world's largest animal health genetic database. I'm the president of the Labrador Retriever Club Incorporated, which is the parent club for the Labrador. And I'm the health chair for the Labrador Retriever. So I'm the person that people who have questions about their Labradors, is this a hereditary problem or not oftentimes end up talking to. This is a big statement. And I want you to read this and think about it carefully. Owners and practitioners by bad I mean, veterinarians, et cetera, et cetera, apply products that companion animals with little consideration for the potential effects of these products, antibiotic preparations, antifungals, antivirals, capsaicin, which is a pain control product, sunscreens, tanning lotions, vitamin A, or E, diaper cream and topical corticosteroids have potential for toxicity in animals and in humans. Topical products and I want to spend a fair amount of time on that must be used with consideration for the current or the future reproductive potential for the individual animal that is treated. So most people think, if you put it on the skin or on the hair, it stays there. When using these topicals the product labeling and the package insert are very important. And you see there I have it kept, read the insert. I will expand that and say read the directions. If you can't force yourself to read the insert, at least read the package, the box, the tube, the bottle, it comes in. When selecting topicals for use in breeding animals, if there is a steroid preparation, or if you need a steroid, you want to select a product with the least potency and the shortest duration of action after withdrawal. Ocular products, ear products and topical skin preparations can be absorbed and many of them are and suppress the HPA for weeks, the hypothalamic pituitary axis of healthy dogs can be suppressed with any form of glucocorticoids. So that means you have a nasty yucky ear. Many of these ear medications that I know that all of you have on hand can interfere with normal hormone production there and we're going to also talk about some of the birth defects they can cause. The HPA axis controls development, reproduction and aging in animals. Now, here's an interesting study for you. This one, these were research beagles. They were treated with an ear prep for 21 days. Their cortisol, which is an important hormone, was suppressed within the first 11 days of treatment. How many of us routinely use ear products that have steroids in it, quote to maintain your health, not a good idea. The administration of those ear meds also resulted in increased liver enzymes, ALT, AST, GGT, and alkaline phosphatase. And it suppresses certain white blood cells eosinophils and lymphocytes. The cortisol and the white cells returned to baseline in seven days, but liver values remained elevated. Where that's important is not only for an individual dog, but certainly if you have some animals that have underlying disease, and no one thinks, I guess it doesn't matter if a dog has a bad liver if you're using ear medications? So this HPA axis regulates reproduction. The hypothalamus which is in your brain secretes a hormone called gonadotropin releasing hormone. In females gonadotropin releasing hormones are called FSH and LH. FSH is follicle stimulating hormone. That's the hormone that makes the eggs develop in the ovary. And LH which is the hormone that allows the female to ovulate so that the eggs are dropped. So these hormones activate ovaries to produce estrogen and inhibin. Because we will talk a little bit about negative effects, but you need positive feedback between estrogen and LH to prepare the follicle in the ovary, to ovulate and the uterus for implantation. 

Dr. Francis Smith  10:46

Post ovulation, the ovary produces progesterone, which inhibits the hypothalamus. So it's negative feedback. And it tells that portion of the brain to stop making more FSH. This stops the estrogen LH positive feedback loop and so it is in fact negative feedback to control things so you can maintain your pregnancy. In males, the effects of the hormones, of course are different. Males don't have ovaries, they have testicles. So follicle stimulating hormone then acts on sertoli cells in the testicle to stimulate sperm formation. LH acts on the Leydig cells, to stimulate steroidogenesis, which is testosterone production. So cortisol, when you have cortisol increases, again, you're interfering with that loop that comes all the way to the brain to the reproductive hormones. 

Dr. Francis Smith  11:54

So this is a couple of charts and the first one shows how these steroids work. Here you see exogenous steroids, which we're going to say is an ear med, because people tend to use ear meds longer than eye meds, which are absorbed in the hypothalamus and go to the pituitary which produces the FSH and LH. The testes then produce testosterone. And so all of these exogenous compounds with steroid activity basically work all the way through this big loop to tell the testicles not to make so many sperm.

Dr. Francis Smith  12:36

So glucocorticoids affect both genetic program secretion and the way they work. So in male dogs, any type of steroid inhibits gonadotropin secretion, resulting in decreased testosterone, and testicular atrophy. So you can actually cause your boys to stop producing many sperm with long term use of eye and ear medication and certainly with oral but right now we're talking about topical. Any exogenous steroid and exogenous means something that we apply or give to the animal, not something the animal produces itself, will interfere with the HPG axis, causing a decrease in hypothalamic activity and decrease testosterone in the testicle itself. Now, I want to warn you that there are people and there are practitioners who believe that if you have a problem in sperm production in a dog, the straightforward line is to give the dog so we're giving it exogenous, you're giving it a pill or an injection, hoping that that will improve sperm production. The real truth is you cannot give enough exogenous testosterone or any steroid to improve sperm production, because you're actually better falling into the risk of further decreasing sperm production. In females, corticosteroids suppress the hypothalamic pituitary axis, as evidenced by the interruption of the estrus cycle activity. Glucocorticoids are what are considered as xenobiotics. So this is a really, really good chart of what happens in a female and I want to point this out because I want you to know that a female's reproduction begins during her development within the uterus itself. And in fact, when the female puppy is still in utero, her ovaries develop and she develops all of the eggs that she will ever have for all of her life. So depending upon when the female is given a steroid compound, eye or ear compound, you can have delayed sterility, delayed to really shorten reproductive lifespan because that dose of cortisol then interferes with the development of [...]. If it's given pre puberty you can also have premature reproductive senescence. Now by back when I mean is that a female dog or the bitch, some people don't like that word, although it is correct, typically cycles for all of her life and has eggs present for all of her life. But with too many steroids, they might have used up or lost all of the eggs at a very, very young age. It can also cause failure in the cycle, temporary infertility in the cycling adult. During pregnancy, it can cause failed pregnancy, can affect milk production, and when you get to the old timers, you'll get increased tumors. And again, reproductive senescence, meaning in essence, infertility in dogs that should be otherwise fertile. So xenobiotic is a pharmacologic, endocrinologic or toxicologically active substance not produced by the animal and it's foreign to the organism. So that's why it causes problems. Depending upon the compound, it may have no effects, or it may cause irreversible sterility. Other effects can be premature reproductive aging, and increased risk of neoplasia. I will also tell you that many of these ear compounds, and I'm not picking on the ear compounds, because they're bad drugs, they're not at all they need to be used and they need to be used appropriately, given over the wrong period of time during pregnancy can actually cause cleft palates in puppies. In a mature female who is given a steroid or an ear medication, you're using ear medication in a non pregnant female, there is no issue during that pregnancy. And certainly most of them if they're not used within a month of pregnancy are not going to cause problems to the developing fetus or that cycle. If pre pubertal exposure can disrupt reproductive function by either accelerating or delaying puberty, so they might have anything really, really young, they might not come in heat until later. 

Dr. Francis Smith  17:36

Topicals in reproducing animals should be selected based on potency and duration of action. And we'll get to talk about some of these specific products. And again, I want to assure you, these products are well tested and if used according to label directions will not cause you any problem. Product should be selected with the least potency and shortest duration of action possible. If you were to ask me what ear medication can be used in an animal that is a breeding animal, particularly a bitch, because they have the least effect on her systemically it should have the steroid hydrocortisone. These medications, which are in most of the really great ear preps, should not be used in pregnant pitches. Dexamethasone, methadone, betamethasone and cortisone have been shown to increase the incidence of cleft palate and can induce premature labor and/or abortion. These all are products that are fabulous that I've used and used every day in practice, and they all contain what we would say are undesirable steroids, for reproducing animals and particularly during pregnancy. 

Dr. Francis Smith  19:02

Here's a couple of others. This one has dexamethasone, it's not quite as bad, bad. It would be my second choice over hydrocortisone. Topical steroid products, there's a list of what is the most potent, to the least potent and I think this is very important. Hydrocortisone, hydrocortisone aceponate, they're very, very low potency and they are not absorbed through the skin. So for bad ears in a pregnant bitch, I would use something like, there's a product called hydro plus, which just has hydrocortisone in solution. It is not absorbed systemically, but the others I would be very careful and I would rely on other methods of treating ears.

Dr. Francis Smith  19:51

The same thing would happen with many of the eye meditations. But unless you have, for instance, a German Shepherd with pannus, and in answer to what I do have a German Shepherd, again I'm a Labrador breeder but I guess you'd come full cycle as you age and I have a young German Shepherd puppy who's quite a character. German shepherds have an increased risk of pannus, which is a corneal disease, and it is treated with steroids. In my opinion, a German shepherd with pannus shouldn't be bred at all. But if you do use the eye meds that are used to treat pannus, it is not going to be good reproduction. Topical parasiticides are another source of concern. Labeled directions, indications and warnings should be followed. Many products have not been tested in reproducing animals. And that being said, if you read the label again, use only on dogs or puppies over seven weeks of age, do not use this product on debilitated, aged, medicated, pregnant or nursing animals or animals known to be sensitive to pesticide products without first consulting your veterinarian. Most of the newer products like this one, I believe this one says that they have not been tested for safety in reproducing animals. So read the label and follow the label. If a product has not been labeled for breeding animals, and this talk is given to veterinarians as well in my practice, if someone really, we think we need that product, we have them sign an informed consent form telling them that they have been informed that there are risks with the product. 

Dr. Francis Smith  21:40

Over the counter parasiticides, use care. Hearts, Zodiac and Raid often have pyrethrins, permethrins, or pyrethroid based, not for pregnant, lactating young or old. Likewise, flea and tick collars should not be on pregnant animals for a number of reasons. Including if they eat them. They're really really bad. Shampoos, penny royal interferes with reproduction so it is d-limonene. All of these natural remedies also are problematic boron, Melaleuca oil, garlic Skin-So-Soft. Now I want to say to you if you give a bitch one bath in something continuing penny royal are you going to destroy her reproduction? No. And are you going to affect a particular litter? Probably not but don't keep it up. During pregnancy also beware of herbal topicals that are soothing or sedative. Many oral medications used in dogs and cats have not been tested for safety in breeding animals or for effects on the fetus itself. All of the antifungals, so if you have animals with ringworm, blasto, or any of the other fungal diseases are known teratogens which means they cause birth defects. Fluoroquinolones, which are the really really great antibiotics, like Baytril, Zeniquin, et cetera, inhibits the development of cartilage. Aminoglycosides, which aren't as commonly used anymore are neurotoxic, so they affect the brain. Cimetidine which is used a lot for GI issues causes decreased testosterone which may contribute to cryptorchidism in puppies. 

Dr. Francis Smith  23:34

So the US Food and Drug Administration has developed a table which categorizes drugs into the effects of pregnancy on women. Drugs are graded A through D. You can find this list online. And it will list what drugs are graded A through D and we're going to talk about this grading system. A drugs are probably safe, B drugs are safe for use cautiously. C drugs are potential risks. And D drugs are contraindicated. All drugs should be used on a risk versus benefit philosophy. And I want to talk to you a little bit about antibiotics now. Broad, and I'm going to call it broad random prophylactic use of antibiotics is not indicated. It does no good to the dog and is bad for both dogs, for us and for our environment. We are creating huge levels of antibiotic resistance because people just randomly do them. There has been a change with the FDA, you can no longer get the old fish antibiotics that I know breeders use. Now all antibiotics including fish antibiotics are going to require a prescription. All drugs should be used under risk versus benefit philosophy. And then there's also compounded topicals, which have unknown and variable effects. And so I talked to you, is it on top or is it not? I wouldn't talk to you about other parasite type products. And one of them if you were to come to me as a reproductive client and you're having problems with infertility or not the kind of fertility you would like to see in your practice, I would ask you to make a list of every product you use in or on your kennel and in an on your dogs and what medications that you use, because many times inadvertently, we are creating our own problems. And the first thing I would ask because it's such a widespread issue, what do you use for heartworm preventative? And I will tell you right up front, you should not be using ivermectin, the liquid ivermectin, which is used injectably in cattle, sheep, pigs, etc. And again, we've talked about earlier, reading the label on the package label for that product. It says, this product is not to be used in dogs, as fatalities have occurred. And people all say to me, well, it's the same ivermectin that is in Heartgard. It is. But it's not the same product. And it's because it is in a vehicle and it may be the vehicle that causes that problem. So it is worth your investment. In Heartguard, Triheart or one of those and those companies have all done the studies, so that commercial dog labeled heartworm products are all safe in pregnancy, with the exception of the proheart products, which are a long acting moxidectin product. To the best of my knowledge, they're not bad, but they don't have the label that they have been tested safe. So don't do ivermectin, it's just not worth it. Read the directions on those products. Water quality also has important effects on reproduction in general health. If you have well water make sure to have it tested. Nitrates in your well water have been associated with cleft palates. So that's an important one. I was just talking with some of the people at Good Dog earlier. There's huge interest now and concern over micro plastics in water. And micro plastics are the result of plastics as they degrade and as they shed. And they occur even with us using laundry, microplastics come off our clothing, go down the drain going to our water systems and ultimately we ingest them. So I think we will see increased information in helping to decrease microplastics particularly what are called the phalates. Well water can be a source of issue and certainly any other additives as well. Fluoridated water should not be if it doesn't have other issues with the water itself. Other plastics that can degrade, hard rubber over time does degrade. The black rubber buckets and the black rubber cow mats which are used in kennels are good for a very long time. But over time, they do break down and make and produce estrogens. So you want to think about your housing situations as well. Stainless steel is probably the safest surface to use in buckets, any kind of fencing, etc, etc. Because there is no degradation. So just be aware of the products that you're using. Also, if you are feeding products that come packaged in plastic, I would remove the plastic and not eat any substance that you're feeding to a dog in a plastic container of any type.

Dr. Francis Smith  29:38

Okay, so that is the great majority of what I want to cover so we have lots of time for talks. Plastics are bad, bad, bad, bad, bad if you could avoid them. Nate, you want to start off with some questions?

Dr. Nate Ritter  29:55

Yeah, fantastic. That was very informative. Thank you so much. I think the point being right, not to avoid medications in general but ensure that you're choosing the correct one. So, in that vein, we had a lot of questions, mostly revolving around heartworm and flea and tick preventatives are those medications that you would recommend the breeding dogs receive at any time.

Dr. Francis Smith  30:15

I would. Absolutely. All bitches shouldn't be kept on heartworm preventative throughout pregnancy. And it also decreases today's heartworm preventative, lowering a hookworm and roundworm burden, which bitches can pass to their puppies. So it also has benefits to the puppies and they have been tested safe in pregnancy. So, there is no reason to stop it. Now. Again, if you're using the injectable ivermectin, don't do that.

Dr. Nate Ritter  30:46

Kind of branching off of that. I think someone asked a very interesting question that, you know, parasites are known to kind of evolve and mutate wondering, you know, how to go about that discussion in terms of whether it be deworming or preventative medications with their veterinarian, what are your recommendations there? Because to your point, hooks, you know, we've seen increased resistance to a lot of the normal medications that have been given over time. 

Dr. Francis Smith  31:09

Well, I think one of the big things is, I would say that a huge amount of that can be blamed on ivermectin alone, but for instance, fenbendazole is a very safe drug. But most of it is random use of the wrong product at the wrong time and not doing it well. Again, if there's going to be resistance to anything it will be to ivermectin because it's been most commonly used for the longest period of time. However, again, Heartgard, for instance, is a combination of ivermectin and pyrantel pamoate. And with that, you still have very, very good parasite control or there's milbemycin and several others, all of which have been tested with pregnancy. But ivermectin itself will do a very poor job of controlling roundworm/ hookworm.

Dr. Nate Ritter  32:04

Great, thank you. And then we had another interesting question. I think, once again, along those lines do you alter the administration of any of these preventatives? Or, you know, if they have been deemed on the label and you've worked with your veterinarian and discussed that to be safe? Should you just give as directed? Or do you have any recommendations for altering the schedule depending on the breeding dogs schedule?

Dr. Francis Smith  32:24

During breeding, and I would say for bitches this applies for probably, let's just say conservatively, a month before the next expected cycle, I would not give any unnecessary medications. And by that, I mean, I certainly would never start a month on Baytril, which I cannot tell you how many breeders say to me, well, I'm just going to arbitrarily put this female on Baytril starting now, so that I don't have any problems during pregnancy. Bad idea, both for the cartilage issues with puppies, but also for creating antibiotic resistance. Heartworm should still be given on whatever schedule you're given it. Bravecto, which is a flea and tick product, admittedly expensive, but my favorite product for flea and tick control in breeding kennels has been proven safe, all throughout pregnancy and in stud dogs and is given either every month or every three months depending upon the product. I wouldn't alter that at all. But really be careful with the flea and tick products. And I have no experience because I don't want to tell someone something is okay without knowing. I don't use any of the Moxidectin products in breeding animals. 

Dr. Nate Ritter  33:49

Thank you. And you actually answered a couple of the other questions in that explanation. I think we had one asking if you can give heartworm preventative and flea and tick preventative concurrently to the breeding female. I think you answered that. And if you wanted to have anything there?

Dr. Francis Smith  34:04

Sure the answer is yes, as long as you're using the appropriate product, and you also need to base all of this information on where you live. And by that I think reasonably I don't think most of the breeders listening today probably live in an 800 square foot apartment on the 15th floor. In that situation, if the dog is using pee pads inside, probably don't mean flea and tick preventative at all, but if you have a colony of dogs or a group of dogs and they're getting out in the yard, and you live a place where there's weather, if you live in Mississippi, you need to do it year round. I have roses and azaleas blooming today.

Dr. Nate Ritter  34:45

Great. Thank you, another question, what are the safest times to deworm a pregnant bitch so kind of along these lines, right, you're giving you've spoken to.

Dr. Francis Smith  34:55

So a really really good example, not as commonly now, but when I was a younger veterinarian, et cetera, but there still are companies that produce dogs for research, and they're primarily beagles, and for many types of research, they need what is called SPF puppies in that specific pathogen free. So the way to do that is that the moms have to be pathogen free, and the puppies are delivered by C-section. There is a product called Revolution (selamectin), which is another product for parasite prevention that can be given, it should be given before breeding, two weeks before they whelp and every two weeks until the puppies are six weeks of age. That actually will give you puppies that are totally parasite free. So yes, there are things that you can do and worm and what I recommend, if you're using monthly, again, a dog label product for heartworm control that contains pyrantel pamoate, you probably don't need to do anything extra, but it would be safe before the bitch whelps to give her a dose of fenbendazole.

Dr. Nate Ritter  36:17

Great. Thank you. We had another good question. Are there any preventative medications that are safe for pregnant whelping females continuously throughout the process? For MDR1 positive dogs, what to keep in mind for animals impacted by that condition?

Dr. Francis Smith  36:31

Okay, great question. I'm glad someone did that. At a dose of ivermectin or selamectin that is in those two products Revolution, and most of the Heartgard like products, even MDR1 dogs are unlikely to react and have an adverse reaction. Okay. Again, the MDR test is really important and it doesn't apply to only those kinds of products. But most of the dogs that are MDR1 positive that have had problems have it due to ivermectin and it's usually due to dosing accidents. Because the ivermectin at 1% is 10,000 micrograms per mil. And the dose that is in heartworm preventative, is six micrograms. So a minute dose compared to a mil of ivermectin.

Dr. Nate Ritter  37:35

Great, thank you. We have a lot of people asking about the book that you referenced in your presentation. Would you be able to provide the name or title if people would be interested in pursuing that?

Dr. Francis Smith  37:47

It's written by Peterson, it's a red book, it has something toxicants in the title. And I can't think of it at the moment, but I'll provide it so that you can provide it to them.

Dr. Nate Ritter  37:57

Perfect. Thank you. So we will get that out to all of you shortly. Let's see. Interesting with your discussion of water, we get the question, does reverse osmosis water have any adverse effects on dogs? To your knowledge? 

Dr. Francis Smith  38:09

No, it will not. But it also won't prevent microplastics. And it won't do anything for nitrates in water use and we now know all I know about water.

Dr. Nate Ritter  38:24

Great. Someone asked, are there any flea and tick preventative medications that can cause resorption of pups? To your knowledge?

Dr. Francis Smith  38:33

I would say any of them that don't have a label on it for reproduction, potentially could. Have there been studies that prove that, no. And fortunately, or unfortunately, dollars for Veterinary Research and drug research are very limited. So since the percentage of people that breed dogs is very small compared to the people that own dogs, there's not big motivation for these reproductive trials, because they are profoundly expensive to maintain. So as I say, Bravecto is the only one that made a formal trial about safety in pregnancy. And it actually is right on your label. 

Dr. Nate Ritter  39:17

Thank you. Yes, I think as we've stated over and over, right, read those labels, discuss with your veterinarians. 

Dr. Francis Smith  39:24

Can I add one other thing that, can we just briefly touch vaccines? 

Nicole Engelman  39:29

Oh, go for it. 

Dr. Francis Smith  39:31

Okay, so, vaccines should not be given to pregnant bitches. They may or may not cause problems but the possibility is there. If your bitch is not current on vaccines, and when vaccines are a whole different topic, I would not give them once she has been bred. A vaccine given in the first few days of the estrus cycle is not going to interfere with your pregnancy. But once she has been bred, there is potential to interfere with the survival of the brand new embryos. So there's just no reason to do it. In that case, I would vaccinate the bitch as soon as she whelps. But the reason that you want to keep your bitch current on her vaccines is it will keep her maternal antibodies in the colostrum high at the time of delivery.

Dr. Nate Ritter  40:31

Yeah, very, very good point. Going back to your kind of risk benefit analysis there. This is just one last follow up question. Say that the vaccine schedule wasn't necessarily adhered to the timing didn't work out perfectly. You mentioned vaccinating the dam after how would you go about or would you change the puppy's vaccine schedule? Should you know that the mom was impacted by maybe not vaccinating on schedule?

Dr. Francis Smith  40:54

Well, if dollars are no limits, I would. So what can be done, you can have blood drawn from the bitch when she whelps and send them out to have antibody levels measured. And that will then tell you when those puppies can respond to vaccination. They'll miss periods because there's always a period where puppies are totally unprotected, whether it's vaccines or maternal antibodies, when that period it'll be. Colorado State University to the best of my knowledge is the only place that runs those titers accurately. They're not exorbitant, but they're not cheap. But if they were to save one puppey, would be a big difference.

Dr. Nate Ritter  41:41

Absolutely. Dr. Smith, thank you so much. I will turn it back over to you, Nicole. 

Nicole Engelman  41:45

Amazing. Well, thank you so much for joining us, again, Dr. Smith. This was an incredible presentation. I think our community got so much out of it. So thank you, again, for joining us for this, we absolutely love having you. Again, if you're not a member of our community, yet, we invite you to apply at gooddog.com/join. I dropped that link in the chat and it should be pinned to the bottom. So you can stay up to date on all of our future webinars and Facebook Lives and events just like this. We have tons that are planned throughout the year. And until then, thank you all again for joining us, and we're looking forward to seeing you at our next webinar. Bye, everyone. Thank you. Thank you again, Dr. Smith. This was great. 

Dr. Francis Smith  42:22

You're welcome! It was fun, as usual. Great. 

Nicole Engelman  42:25

Great. Bye. Thank you. So that wraps up this week's episode of The Good Dog pod. We hope you learned a lot from this episode and that it's going to be a helpful resource for you and your programs going forward. Thank you again for joining us for another episode and we'll see you right back here on May 1 for our next one. 

Nicole Engelman  42:44

Thank you for listening to The Good Dog Pod. We'll be back in two weeks with another episode so be sure to subscribe to The Good Dog Pod on your favorite podcast platform.