No, not really, they don’t. The short and sweet answer reflects a major change in the thing of veterinarians, one that merits a detailed explanation. Giving dogs in general not just Labradoodles yearly vaccine boosters against the Big Three viral diseases: distemper, parvo and hepatitis was accepted veterinary practice until the late 1990s. Why? Because exactly how long the vaccines protected the dogs against those diseases was unclear. Vaccine manufactures typically tested their products’ effectiveness under laboratory condition to a year or two post-vaccine, and then stopped testing. Veterinarians wanted to be certain dogs remained protected, and the vaccines themselves were considered perfectly safe, so we adopted a practice of getting our Australian Labradoodles vaccinated annually.
Then our conviction that dogs and cat vaccines were absolutely safe was rocked. In the late 1990s, it was found that vaccines had caused malignant tumors at the injection site in a small number of cats. Although the vaccine/cancer connection has only yet to be made in cats there has been a recent connection to malignant tumors in dogs at the injection site of microchips!?! Suspiciously enough this is the same location that nearly 99% of all veterinarians give vaccine injections! A recent discussion with my veterinarian about wheather or not to continue microchipping my own puppies lead us to the discussion of vaccination sites vs. the microchip. < this is a HOT TOPIC and I am sure to write about it in the future but for now back to the topic of vaccinations. Veterinarians and animal owners alike began to question the more-is-better philosophy of vaccine boosters.
Researches started compiling statistics on the long-term effectiveness of vaccines. The data came mainly from vaccine manufactures' tests, measurement of antibody titers in vaccinated dogs, and natural disease outbreaks, rather than new challenge studies where dogs were deliberately exposed to viruses to see if they would become ill. One influential report by veterinay researcher R. D. Schultz, published in 2000, stated that the currently available vaccines against parvo, distemper and hepatitis remained effective for at least seven years in most pets.
Rabies is effective for at least three years again in most healthy pets but is a public health issue as well as for animals, and states regulate how often pets must receive a rabies booster. The frequency ranges from every year to every three years, depending on how prevalent rabies is in that state.
Vaccines against kennel cough, lyme and leptosspirosis are also exceptions. those diseases are bacterial or only partly bacterial in the case of kennel cough and vaccines against bacterial diseases are only thought to be effective for 6 to 12 months. Studies have not been done to actually determine the longevity of titers on bacterial diseases.
In 2006 the American Animal Hospital Association release its canine vaccine guidelines. Those guidelines recommend that your pet should receive booster vaccines against distemper, hepatitis and parvo ever three years or even less often at the veterinarian's discretion. To date, however the American Veterinary Medical Association (AVMA), has not endorsed any specific vaccine protocol. Their position is that individual veterinarians should set their own protocols based on local and individual risk. In the real world that is what most veterinarians do however some less educated or more money motivated veterinarians recommend annual boosters. In a perfect world veterinarians would order blood tests to measure antibody levels or titers against these diseases followed by a booster in dog where titers are to low to be considered protected. I am sure however that the backlash from pet owners would be to high for most veterinarians, I already overhear at least one complaint per veterinary visit of someone who doesn't want to pay for the blood test for heartworm disease and antibody tests are more expensive than vaccines so most dog owners would choose to skip this option when given by their veterinarian.
Some things have not changed during this shift in thinking about vaccines. It is still recommend that puppies receive a series of vaccines followed by a booster when they turn one year old and all dogs should be on heartworm prevention and have a physical examination once a year so that illnesses can be detected and treated sooner rather than later.
