Clevengers Corner Veterinary Care

Q: I have a nine month old Boston Terrier. She has what appears to be a wart on her leg. She licks at it and it has become raw and bleeds. It also seems to be growing. What should I do?A: Fortunately, most skin growths in young dogs are benign. Warts are seen, but not as commonly as in older dogs. The mass could also be a histiocytoma, a benign mass usually no larger than the size of a nickel. Histiocytomas commonly occur in young patients and commonly ulcerate. Usually they resolve spontaneously within three months. It is also possible that the mass is actually due to the licking behavior. Chronic licking can lead to a raised area of inflammation, called a granuloma. Young dogs adapting to new experiences can develop anxieties that lead to licking.The fact that the mass appears to be bothering your dog is reason to visit your veterinarian. Sometimes inflammation of a benign mass can be treated in a way that minimizes the stimulus for licking. If medical treatment does not work, or the mass looks worrisome to the veterinarian, surgical removal may be the best option.Q: When I got pregnant, my obstetrician instructed me not to clean the cat’s litter pan. Why? A: Cats can be a carrier of a single-celled parasite called Toxoplasma gondii. If a pregnant woman who has never been exposed to the parasite is infected during a very specific period of her baby’s development, severe birth defects or fetal death can occur. . In the United States, as much as 40% of the population is seropositive for Toxoplasma gondii. This means that almost half of us have had the infection and not even known it. Exposure rates in France and Germany are as high as 80%. Toxoplasmosis generally causes no symptoms or a brief flu-like illness. The illness can be severe in patients with compromised immune systems, including people with AIDS. The good news is that the large percentage of women who are already seropositive before becoming pregnant has almost no risk of problems with their babies due to toxoplasmosis.Another piece of good news is that there is very little risk of contracting this illness from your cat. Most infections occur from consuming undercooked meat. Cat owners are no more likely than the general population to test seropositive. Vegetarians are infected less than the rest of us. Those of us who work in veterinary offices are also at higher risk. If otherwise healthy, infected cats rarely shed the infective form of the parasite, the oocyst or egg. It is typical for an infected cat to shed eggs for ten days or less during its entire life. The odds of one of these ten days happening during the critical points of a pregnancy in a previously seronegative woman are quite small. In addition, once passed in the cat’s feces, the oocyst requires at least twenty-four hours to mature before posing any risk to people. Therefore, asking someone else to handle litter pan duty AND having them clean it at least once daily will minimize the risk.You can also reduce risk by avoiding undercooked meat, especially pork or mutton. Meat that has been cooked only in the microwave may be a higher risk due to uneven heating. Unpasteurized dairy products, especially goat milk, may cause infection. Infection risk can also be lowered by regular hand-washing and by avoiding gardening, especially in areas where cats defecate. To reduce your cat’s risk of exposure to toxoplasmosis, you should keep her indoors and feed only cooked commercial pet food (i.e. no raw diets). Cats acquire the infection primarily through hunting. Infected cats shed oocysts at a significantly higher rate when they are co-infected with certain viruses. The risk for these viral infections can be minimized or eliminated by keeping a cat indoors.Having a baby is an awesome responsibility. Taking care of your health while pregnant plays a vital role in the development of your child. It is important to carefully follow the advice of your obstetrician regarding toxoplasmosis. When seeking to reduce the risk of your cat acquiring this parasite, or seeking to minimize the possibility of oocyst shedding, be sure to consult your family veterinarian.The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention publishes a very informative web site with more details about toxoplasmosis. It can be found at www.cdc.gov/toxoplasmosis.

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