This brand new manual provides a practical guide on how to deal with various clinical situations that arise when working with cats and dogs in a shelter environment. The first part of the manual describes the principles of shelter medicine and population health. The second part covers the prevention, management and control of disease in a shelter environment. The final part provides information on working with people in the shelter environment.

What is shelter medicine?

• Top tips for a shelter medicine vet

Ethics and animal welfare

• Using the ethical framework to make decisions

Pragmatic decision-making in the charity situation

• Dealing with the elderly thin cat

• Dealing with the elderly dog

• Dealing with heart murmurs in dogs and cats

• Dealing with the itchy dog: is it atopic dermatitis?

Population control and management

• Setting up a population control program

• TNR/CNR checklist

• Euthanasia and shelters

Optimizing neutering programmes

• General anaesthesia protocols for early neutering

Shelter metrics

Principles of infectious disease and transmission

Biosecurity in shelters

• A brief overview of disinfectants

Shelter design and the flow of animals through a shelter

Preventive medicine in the shelter environment

• Intake assessment for animals entering shelters

Diarrhoea in the dog in the shelter environment

Diarrhoea in the cat in the shelter environment

Respiratory disease in the dog in the shelter environment

• Rehoming a coughing dog

Respiratory disease in the cat in the shelter environment

• Rehoming a snotty cat

Skins diseases in shelter animals

Managing FeLV/FIV in the multi-cat/shelter environment

Managing feline coronavirus and feline infectious peritonitis in the multi-cat/shelter environment

• Toxoplasmosis

• Exotic diseases in shelters

• Zoonotic diseases in shelters

Behaviour and stress management in the shelter environment

• Current thinking on dog behaviour

• Current thinking on cat behaviour

• Socialization of puppies

• Socialization of kittens

• Dealing with the aggressive dog

• Dealing with the hard-to-handle cat

• Environmental enrichment for dogs in shelters

• Environmental enrichment for cats in shelters

Charities, their policies and their staff

Law and shelter medicine

• Dealing with a stray dog

• Dealing with a stray cat

The shelter veterinary team

Working with the non-vet shelter team

• Hoarding

• Non-accidental injury

Training and education in the shelter environment