Care of the Operational Canine in the Prehospital Environment - A Joint Position Statement and Resource Document of NAEMSP, NAVEMS, and VetCOT

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

7-8-2025

Institution/Department

Emergency Medicine

Journal Title

Prehospital emergency care

Abstract

The National Association of Emergency Medical Services Physicians (NAEMSP), National Association of Veterinary Emergency Medical Services (NAVEMS), and the American College of Veterinary Emergency and Critical Care's Veterinary Committee on Trauma (VetCOT) agree that the operational canine (OpK9) injured in the line of duty should be entitled to safe, efficacious, and ethical treatment and transport by prehospital personnel to higher levels of veterinary care. It remains clear that, in situations involving both human and OpK9 casualties, the priority of care and available medical resources should be directed toward preserving human life. The fact that there is currently no organized preveterinary care system in place to treat or transport the injured OpK9 drives the need for collaboration between the existing emergency medical services (EMS) system and the veterinary community. NAEMSP, NAVEMS, and VetCOT recommend:Operational canines injured in the line of duty should receive the highest level of resuscitative care, as close to the point of injury as possible, even without trained and licensed veterinary personnel.Established veterinary and EMS organizations should:Create collaboratively-developed consensus-based guidelines, aligned with the EMS clinician's scope of practice, for providing prehospital preveterinary care of ill or injured operational canines.Support advocacy for legislation and policy development to ensure that prehospital preveterinary care is more readily available to operational canines.Promote increased awareness of the needs and challenges hindering prehospital preveterinary care for ill or injured operational canines.

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1

Last Page

7

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