Vaccination Protocols

[windycanyon]

Thanks. Have you ever titered between vaccines on the 3 year protocol? After one titer came up short in the 2nd year I'm a bit iffy about going the 3 without at least titering. It's really expensive. I separate out any vaccines that I can also, so that it's not such a stress on her system. I also vaccinate for bordetella because I know that I occasionally have to leave her in the kennels...... and they often require it.

I haven't, but puppy owners who have had results that came back super high so I've not been worried. My dogs are out and about so much I figure their immune systems get "reminded" so often, it's like a natural vaccination almost.

Was it one thing in particular that came back low?

Do you get your dogs out a lot or not? That is a real consideration w/ a 3 yr protocol from what I've read and been told by my own vet. That and general health.

[Top Of The Hill]

I haven't, but puppy owners who have had results that came back super high so I've not been worried. My dogs are out and about so much I figure their immune systems get "reminded" so often, it's like a natural vaccination almost.

Was it one thing in particular that came back low?

Do you get your dogs out a lot or not? That is a real consideration w/ a 3 yr protocol from what I've read and been told by my own vet. That and general health.

My vet titered for parvo, distemper, adenovirus and for some reason lepto (even though he's not vaccinating for it now). I just checked back and it was the "distemper" titer that was low in the 2nd year. The parvo was actually higher than the year before and the adenovirus was fine. Of course the lepto (with not having had the vaccine for some time and it being a short lasting vaccine) didn't show anything. I'm not even sure why he titered for this, but I'm sure he must have had a reason. We live near and walk in the bush a lot, and so do many others and no lepto problems here. I question my vet and staff often just in case, but I'm sure if it ever did show up we'd hear about it. I don't have a problem with her having the vaccine and certainly would if I was taking her out of the area. In fact just on the off chance we decide to take her with us sometime I'd just as soon he was still including it in the combo.....so I didn't have to bother worrying about it.

I just have one dog at present and we do get out and about. We took group classes up until recently (kind of like a dog club thing) with lots of other dogs, she sees some other dogs when we're out walking.....plus she goes into kennels a few times a year. As I mentioned before we are in a bit of an isolated area, so I would think it's quite possible that she wouldn't be getting exposed to distemper etc. The parvo titer was actually stronger in the second year, so perhaps that indicates that she may have been exposed to parvo somehow? It is a pretty rare occurance to hear of parvo here, but every once in awhile. Anyway I ended up having the combo shot again at the 2 year mark because I was going out of town and had to leave her in the kennels. If I'm remembering correctly he couldn't get the single vaccine in in time for my trip.....didn't carry the single vaccines (at least at that point in time).

I have read that low titer levels aren't always necessarily an indication of low immunity because it could just be that the "memory" hasn't been triggered by exposure, but if anything is low I revaccinate.....not taking any chances. She's only just past a year from having her vaccinations right now, but if when I titer next time (at the 2 year mark) if anything is low I may just start doing vaccines every two years.

[Luvmydog2much]

I've heard about Dr. Jean Dodd's protocol for vaccinating. Do many people follow that?

My new puppy was vaccinated with the Dodd's protocol and I can say that she has had every sort of nightmare because of it.

In the future, I'll stick with my regular vaccines at 7, 10 and 13 weeks, rabies at 18 weeks and then again at 1 year and every three years later.

[Top Of The Hill]

My new puppy was vaccinated with the Dodd's protocol and I can say that she has had every sort of nightmare because of it.

In the future, I'll stick with my regular vaccines at 7, 10 and 13 weeks, rabies at 18 weeks and then again at 1 year and every three years later.

I was just curious about Dr. Dodd's protocol. I'd have to check back, but I think we did similar....7, 11, and 15 and rabies at 18 weeks and boosters at a year. Annual vaccines are still the most common here, and I'm sure I'm one of very few in this area that have used titering. For the reasons I mentioned above I am still not totally comfortable with going the 3 years between vaccines without titering, but it's very expensive here and the last time I ended up doing both because of a low distemper titer.

Curious, what problems did you attribute to going with Dr. Dodd's protocol? I thought that it included regular puppy vaccines. booster at a year.... and then titering every three, but I must be wrong about that.

[Luvmydog2much]

Its minimal vaccines, all separate.

My puppy came to me with just a Parvo, nothing more at 8 weeks. At 10 weeks, she had puppy strangles. The problem then on was, since she had ZERO immunity for anything else, no one knew what to do with her. Puppy strangles is usually attributed to over-vaccination.

So once we got rid of the strangles, what next? No one knew, $600 conversations with Dr J Dodd's was a loss. No one thought she should have the strangles.

She is through her vaccinations now, finally. But we went slow and trepedatiously.

[Top Of The Hill]

Its minimal vaccines, all separate.

My puppy came to me with just a Parvo, nothing more at 8 weeks. At 10 weeks, she had puppy strangles. The problem then on was, since she had ZERO immunity for anything else, no one knew what to do with her. Puppy strangles is usually attributed to over-vaccination.

So once we got rid of the strangles, what next? No one knew, $600 conversations with Dr J Dodd's was a loss. No one thought she should have the strangles.

She is through her vaccinations now, finally. But we went slow and trepedatiously.

Oh I see. So it basically just complicated what to do about the puppy strangles and further vaccines and was not actually caused by the protocol. Glad she's okay now.

My vet doesn't seem to carry separate vaccines for everything, so that puppy protocol would be very difficult to follow here.

[windycanyon]

Its minimal vaccines, all separate.

My puppy came to me with just a Parvo, nothing more at 8 weeks. At 10 weeks, she had puppy strangles. The problem then on was, since she had ZERO immunity for anything else, no one knew what to do with her. Puppy strangles is usually attributed to over-vaccination.

So once we got rid of the strangles, what next? No one knew, $600 conversations with Dr J Dodd's was a loss. No one thought she should have the strangles.

She is through her vaccinations now, finally. But we went slow and trepedatiously.

That's so odd. In your case, the puppy strangles couldn't be linked to overvaccination, but there had to be something else that messed w/ her immune system. No other problems w/ her littermates? Is there a chance she didn't get enough colustrum those first 24 hrs after birth maybe? I think I told you that I had a pup in a litter a few years ago that came down w/ HOD at ~9 wks or so. That too is linked to vaccines but we hadn't done any for at least 2 wks at that point. The only thing different about her was she was born several hours after all the others, and wasn't a real strong nurser. I wonder now if she didn't get enough colostrum. All the other pups were super healthy and always have been.