As is the case with human medicine, an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure for your furry family member.

Just like with humans, it is important to monitor health and wellness of your pet on a regular basis. Animals of all ages need to have their health checked for different reasons.

Young animals need health checks to rule out issues they were born with or have developed early. They also need a healthy diet and activity recommendations and rigorous preventative care including vaccines and anti-parasitic medication to prevent serious diseases like parvovirus, canine distemper, and severe intestinal worm burdens, respectively.

Adult and geriatric (older) animals require routine health checks to prevent illness and/or catch it early. They will also need preventative care as well, especially as they are part of the family and may be travelling with you, going to kennels, meeting new dogs at the park, or engaging in countless other escapades that might predispose them to contracting communicable diseases and parasites.

As animals age, they may also need support to ensure a continued excellent quality of life. Age-related issues such as obesity, arthritis, diabetes, thyroid-hormone issues, among others may need ongoing management.

Annual wellness exams that include a thorough and complete physical examination, potential diagnostics including blood work and/or x-rays if indicated, routine vaccination, and parasite prevention can ensure your pet is as healthy as possible.

This helps avoid costly vet bills through early detection and treatment of many issues involving your pets health. The team at Bragg Creek Vet Clinic would love to help you maintain your beloved pet’s optimal health to ensure their best quality of life.

A vaccine is a biological preparation that provides active acquired immunity to a particular disease. A vaccine typically contains an agent that resembles a disease-causing microorganism and is often made from weakened or killed forms of the microbe, its toxins, or one of its surface proteins.

Vaccines are essential for prevention of highly infectious diseases that can cause severe illness and death in animals of all ages, and specifically in young animals.

Remember that indoor-only animals still need to be vaccinated as well! We can bring these diseases home to them on our clothes and hands, and in Alberta there is always a chance a bat or other wild animal can get in your house.

The diseases we recommend routine vaccination for are:

Dogs (DA2PPL + Rabies +/- Bordetella):

• Canine parvovirus
• Canine distemper virus
• Canine adenovirus 2
• Parainfluenza
• Leptospirosis
• Rabies
• Bordetella (when there is an indication of risk)

Cats (RCCP + Rabies +/- FeLV):

• Feline panleukopenia
• Feline rhinotracheitis/herpesvirus
• Feline calicivirus
• Chlamydiosis
• Feline leukemia virus (when there is an indication of risk)
• Rabies

At Bragg Creek Vet Clinic we recommend a well-researched and effective vaccination schedule to ensure your beloved pet is protected without any added risk. Please feel free to ask us about it.

Animals have evolved with numerous parasites that have specialized in avoiding detection. As such, even the healthiest of animals can carry a significant parasitic burden.

While parasites can infect an animal throughout the body, the most common are infestations of the gastrointestinal (GI) tract and skin.

Opportunistic parasites of the GI tract include round worms, hook worms, whip worms, tape worms, flukes, and protozoa like giardia. These infestations often arise from exposure to wild canids like coyotes and foxes, the hunting of small rodents, flea infestations, eating the fecal matter of other animals, contaminated water, and situations where there are high densities of animals together like off-leash dog parks, kennels, and daycares.

Parasitic infections of the skin are most often caused by fleas, ticks, mites, and lice. While ticks are often found in long grasses or leaf litter from the months of March to October, fleas, mites, and lice are transmitted in situations where animals are close together such as off-leash dog parks, kennels, and daycares. Unfortunately, there are a number of diseases like Lyme disease or other bacterial infections that can be transmitted by biting parasites and so parasite prevention is the only reliable way to avoid these infections.

Thankfully, both GI and skin parasites are easily treated and/or prevented with simple and safe medications that we can dispense at your annual wellness exam and/or throughout the year following the exam.

While we are fortunate not to have the mosquito that carries the devastating heartworm parasite Dirofilaria immitus in Alberta, any travel outside of the province warrants heartworm prevention.

Please do not hesitate to let us know if you think your pets are at risk for any parasitic infections.

Unlike in human medicine, animals cannot verbally tell us what is wrong. In a general examination a veterinarian examines your pet for any physical signs of a medical condition. It generally consists of a series of questions to the owner about the patient’s medical history followed by an examination based on the reported signs.

This exam includes a complete physical exam where the vitals and all the body systems are evaluated. When indicated these exams may be expanded upon to include exams of the inner eye, the ear canal, oral/dental/pharyngeal space, a gait analysis, lameness/orthopedic exam, neurological exam, and rectal exam to name a few.

The full physical exam work-up will be augmented by any potential diagnostics that may help to clarify your pet’s health status.

These diagnostics may include: blood work, radiographs (x-rays), urinalysis, fecal analysis, fur-plucking, biopsy of masses or diseased tissue, cytology (eg: ear or skin swabs), and others.

Together, the medical history, physical examination, and diagnostics help to determine a diagnosis and devise the treatment plan for your pet. This data then becomes part of the permanent medical record.

In the event of an injury or illness to your pet outside of annual wellness or geriatric exams, the team at Bragg Creek Vet Clinic would be honoured to help.

Nutrition is a science that interprets the nutrients and other substances in food in relation to maintenance, growth, reproduction, health and disease of an organism. It includes food intake, digestion, absorption, assimilation, biosynthesis, catabolism and excretion.

Dentistry, also known as dental and oral medicine, is a branch of veterinary medicine that consists of the study, diagnosis, prevention, and treatment of diseases, disorders, and conditions of the oral cavity in animals. This includes the teeth, gums (gingiva), and related structures and tissues in the jaw and facial area.

Dental health is an integral part of holistic health. Unfortunately, left untreated, dental disease can cause bacteria, toxins, and inflammatory molecules to enter the bloodstream, leading to local and systemic infections, heart disease, kidney disease, and worsening of your pet’s overall health.

The team at Bragg Creek Vet Clinic would love to help you assess your pet’s oral health, advise about strategies to minimize dental disease, and, if necessary, schedule your pet for a Comprehensive Oral Health Assessment and Treatment (COHAT) procedure including dental radiographs to ensure your pet’s ongoing health and well-being.

Radiology is the medical discipline that uses medical imaging to diagnose and treat diseases within animals.

At Bragg Creek Vet Clinic we have the benefit of high quality digital radiographs (x-rays) to aid in the diagnosis of illness or injury in your pet. This includes full digital radiography of the body, extremities, and digital dental radiography for all of our dental COHAT procedures.

We also offer digital consultation with radiology specialists should the need arise for further interpretation.

Additionally, we are happy to work with our clients during the diagnostic process should referral for more complicated radiological cases, such as those needing CT scans, MRIs, or nuclear medicine be warranted.

Bragg Creek Vet Clinic is partnered with IDEXX laboratories to offer state-of-the-art in-clinic diagnostics. We also offer access to comprehensive send-out diagnostics through IDEXX and their affiliates.

Our in-house analyser offers comprehensive CBC, chemistry 10 or 17, SDMA, and total T4 assays, where results are available within 20 mins.

Other panels, tests, and diagnostics are sent away to the IDEXX Canada laboratory in Calgary, and turn around for simple tests is less than 24 hours.

Therefore, regardless of the issue, we can offer the best diagnostic tools with the most value for you and your pet.

Bragg Creek Vet Clinic is pleased to offer surgical procedures complete with the latest knowledge in techniques, the safest anesthetic protocols, and surgical maintenance including up-to-date surgical monitoring equipment, intravenous fluids, and active patient warming.

This includes everything from routine elective surgeries like spays and neuters, certain emergencies, dental surgery, to specialty referral surgeries for orthopedic and/or complicated soft tissue procedures.

Please ask the team at Bragg Creek Vet Clinic for more information if you have surgical needs for your pet.

Acupuncture is a form of Traditional Chinese Medicine and is now widely acknowledged to be an important part of integrative medicine. Human acupuncture has existed in China for more than 4,500 years. The first known documentation of veterinary acupuncture was during the western Jin dynasty period of China from 136 to 265 A.D. In its inception, sharp stones were used to cut and bleed specific locations to improve quality of life in animals vital to human survival such as horses and other large working animals.

Veterinary acupuncture has been used extensively to treat chronic pain and illness in companion animals and horses.

Dr. Laura Fick received her initial acupuncture training from the Atlantic Veterinary College. She is excited to pursue her acupuncture training and is looking forward to expanding this aspect of the practice.

For veterinary acupuncture information please see the International Veterinary Acupuncture Society‘s website.

Apiculture is the husbandry, maintenance, and study of honey bees, their hives, and their products. Honey bees are defined as a production animal and deserve to have the highest level of veterinary care as well.

Dr. Laura Fick is very interested in the care and health of honey bees and looks forward to working with established beekeepers in the area to optimize hive health and productivity.

While she is a novice beekeeper herself, she has registered Bragg Creek Vet Clinic with the Provincial Apiculturist, has attended the Vet-Beekeeper IPM Workshop, and is looking forward to attending beekeeping courses with ABC Bees in the spring.

As Health Canada has mandated a veterinary-client-patient relationship (VCPR) and prescription for dispensation of all production animal antimicrobials, Dr Fick wants beekeepers in the area to know she would be honoured to help create an action plan should antimicrobials be warranted.

Useful links:

Health Canada Responsible Use of Medically Important Antimicrobials in Animals

Alberta Beekeeping Registration

Canadian Best Management Practices for Honey Bee Health

ABC Bees