Vaccination: To Titer or not to Titer? – Page 2

Keymaster

Hi all

After a lot of indecisiveness, Mable’s titres were taken yesterday and I declined to have her vaccinated until we have the results. They had told me there was no titre test for FeLV, so I took matters into my own hands and contacted Cambridge University Vet school, who are quite near us and who informed me this was available at Idexx or Glasgow university. Luckily my vets were willing to go with this, so her panleucopenia and respiratory virus titres have gone to Idexx, and her FeLV has gone to Glasgow. I thought this might be useful for users in the UK to know, as it seems Glasgow do quite a few different tests.

I talked to the vet about disease incidence locally and she said they have seen a few FeLV cases recently, and the local animal shelter (about a mile away) has had some panleucopenia cases, so I figured I can’t just leave it.

Mable also had a “wellpet” blood screen (Glucose, ALT, Creatinine/Urea, total protein, ALKP, GGT and Thyroxine), and I asked them to do a PCV at the same time. I am a bit worried about her. She’s ok, but has been reluctant to go out in the mornings and didn’t want much to eat this evening. Her gums and tongue are pink, but her “bottom lip” looks pale, almost slightly blue. She’s not having trouble breathing and is alert, but, well, you know what this disease does to us. The vet has checked her over and is happy, but this is exactly how it started with Molly, almost a year ago. That said, Mable did this last year too, so it may simply be the change in weather. I can hardly bear the thought of it and find even going to the vet quite traumatic now. Yesterday I burst into tears because someone else’s cat was put down. Crazy? Yea.

The vet said she would call today with the wellpet and PCV results but no call, so I rang them but had to ring the emergency line as it’s a Sunday, and they were busy with an emergency so I can’t ring until tomorrow. I’m trying to adopt the approach of “no news is good news”, but we shall see.

Will keep you all posted anyway, and I hope that the titres will provide some useful information which will perhaps help others when trying to decide about vaccination. My vets has been open over 100 years, and I get the impression that I am their only customer ever to have insisted on an FeLV titre! I’m sure I have a great big “crazy paranoid nutcase” flag on Mable’s records!

Much love to all,

Mary and Mable x

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Patrice

Keymaster

Mary,
This is such an interesting story. And though some of the details are feline related, it is still a worthy read for canine owners too. And the take away is, it’s not straightforward! Thank you for the detailed report and I am glad that Mabel is now protected from those things that could harm her.

I am a firm believer in this approach. The last Giant rescue I made was for a very young (maybe a year old) Giant roaming loose in Livingston County. The first thing they made me do before I could take him with me was give him a rabies vaccination. It was after hours but my vet met us and the county agent at the clinic and gave him his shot. You would think they would do that when they pick up a stray, they do not.

I immediately took him in for a complete health check, and yes I did a complete titer count on him. Dr. M called me when the results came back and told me he was “a blank.” No immunity to any of the normal canine diseases they are normally vaccinated for. Not low, NOTHING. I was mildly surprised and a little upset at myself that I had let this dog into my household. Chance was better at this point, but it had only been by a few months.

So I had him vaccinated similarly to how a puppy is treated. A few weeks later I also had his hips xrayed, had him chipped, a full CBC, chem screen and had his blood typed. That fine fellow, so much like Willie is now, ended up in a wonderful home in New Jersey living with another Giant. I would never do less when placing a rescue like a Giant in a home. That is why rescues should not be free to new owners. It is a responsibility and they should be willing to care for the health of the dog immediately. However, in this case, since they drove from so far away, I didn’t ask for anything.

So there is what happens when an animal is not vaccinated as a young animal. They develop no immunity to any of the common diseases. Thus why it can be dreadfully risking to take a stray home if you have other animals.

You said you did not understand what the vet meant by cellular mediated immunity rather than immune mediated. I happen to have written two entries in the glossary quite a while back that may help you understand this better!

Humoral Immunity

Cell-mediated Immunity

If you have any questions about this, please ask me to explain it better. This is a complicated topic, but this one is probably the most important one that we need to understand when helping owners with autoimmune diseases. It took a lot of studying to finally grasp the depth of this topic. Dr. Dodds’ information was of great help to me.

my best

patrice

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