Keeping pets safe from harmful pharmaceuticals

Renee Schmid, DVM, DABT, DABVT, senior veterinary toxicologist and director, veterinary medicine for Pet Poison Helpline, spoke about the most common pet toxins, including human pharmaceuticals, during a talk at the Veterinary Meeting & Expo in Orlando, Florida, and in an interview with dvm360. She also advised veterinarians on educating their clients about how to keep pharmaceuticals being kept in the house out of harm's way for pets.

The following is a transcript of the interview:

Renee Schmid, DVM, DABT, DABVT: Chocolate is typically the most common toxin that we see every year. And then we can see Xylitol, lilies in cats, ibuprofen, and then the main rodenticides, including bromethalin, cholecalciferol, and the anticoagulants.

Veterinarians can help educate the pet owners and their clients as to keeping medications out of reach. So, keeping them up high, well out of the way of an animal that could maybe be counter surfing. I always call them the assassin cat that likes to get up onto the table or the countertop and drop medication onto the floor for the dogs to get into, but [safety is] also taking the medication to a different place that the animal can’t get into. And then keeping that medication separate. If they have human medication and pet medication, making sure they're not storing them in the same place, where they may mistakenly give the wrong medication to their pet.