Читать книгу Infectious Disease Management in Animal Shelters - Группа авторов - Страница 11

The first shelter medicine textbook, Shelter Medicine for Veterinarians and Staff, was published in 2004, five years after the first formal shelter medicine course at a veterinary college was taught at Cornell University in 1999. The preface to the 2009 first edition of Infectious Disease Management in Animal Shelters stated that “shelter medicine is a relatively new specialty area in veterinary medicine.” Much has changed in the past 12 years, with perhaps the most significant change being that the evolution of shelter medicine resulted in it being recognized as a veterinary specialty in 2014. In addition, there are many shelter medicine classes offered as part of the core and elective curriculum of veterinary colleges, as well as internships and residency programs. The animal welfare field has acknowledged and embraced the foundational role that shelter medicine’s core principles of population management, capacity for care, preventive medicine and infectious disease control play in the success of the field as a whole, and their importance in improving and saving individual animal lives. A broad range of animal welfare, veterinary, and even public health organizations have embraced the inclusion of shelter medicine and shelter considerations in guidelines for general management and disease control.

Despite numerous advances in the field, the need for these core foundational strategies persists and the purpose of this textbook remains the same as the first edition, i.e., to provide detailed, useful information regarding fundamental principles of disease control and specific management of the most important diseases encountered in dogs and cats in shelters. The information in this text is based on the authors’ own substantial, practical experience working with shelter populations, as well as the latest research and evidence‐based medicine. While the emphasis throughout is on strategies for the prevention of illness and mitigation of disease spread, pragmatic information on treatment and considerations for adoption are also included. Reflecting on the dynamic nature of sheltering organizations, the populations they serve, and the environment we live in, this edition contains a new chapter on exotic companion mammals. The chapters on vector‐borne, bacterial and protozoal gastrointestinal diseases have been removed, and the zoonosis chapter has been streamlined and no longer includes abbreviated descriptions of the various zoonotic diseases. The editors recognized that an expanding wealth of resources are available to veterinary and sheltering professionals, and other textbooks and websites are available that can provide the latest up‐to‐date details about disease pathogenesis, diagnostic testing and individual animal treatment protocols. The reader is encouraged to use those resources along with this text. Readers are also encouraged to pay particular attention to the introduction, wellness, sanitation and outbreak management chapters, as this information is useful in all shelter situations. As in any practice, final decisions regarding the selection of treatment protocols, compliance with state, federal and local regulations, safe drug use and shelter practices are the responsibility of the veterinarian. The editors hope that this textbook will contribute to the continued improvement of animal health and welfare and the ongoing elevation of sheltering practices across the field.