How age and breed affect toxin exposure

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Are dogs and cats of certain ages more likely to be exposed to toxins? How does breed and species affect exposure? During an interview with dvm360 about her lecture at the 2024 Fetch Kansas City Conference in Kansas City, Missouri earlier this year, Renee Schmid, DVM, DABT, DABVT, offered insight into how a pet’s age plays a role in their likelihood of toxin exposure. She also shared common toxins older pets may be more exposed to, as well as how a dog and cat’s breed may or may not affect their odds of getting into things.

Below is a partial transcript:

Renee Schmid, DVM, DABT, DABVT: When we have an older dog in the household, we may also have an older cat, or vice versa, and so there's more of those medications around. So those were like methimazole for hyperthyroidism. We saw heart medications—pimobendan, Vetmedin, was higher ranked in the older animals. Carprofen is higher ranked in the older animals.

And these are animals that are getting into an overdose, or maybe it wasn't their medication, it was someone else's medication in the household. And so I think it's just that [these medications are] more readily available. Animals are living longer. In veterinary medicine we're able to treat more diseases and try to improve their quality of life, and so we're seeing these animals that are getting into maybe their housemates’, medication, or maybe they were overdosed unexpectedly from an owner.