Currently the Shelter Medicine Program partners with local and state wide organizations such as Lifebridge, Hopefest, Sojourner’s Center, and Indian Health Services to assist remote or underprivileged communities with their companion animals. These collaborative efforts address animal health needs, whose owners are indigent or are in a time of crisis such as domestic violence. Other efforts assist community public health through ongoing Trap Neuter and Release (TNR) Programs with feral cats and Rabies vaccination clinics. Many of these services are accomplished with the effective use of the MWU Mobile Clinic. This past April students performed a large scale TNR event, sterilizing over 100 cats in a single day on campus using surgical labs. As the programs continues to expand and additional faculty are added these programs will increase with frequency involving students in all four years of the veterinary curriculum.
Future goals as the program begins to solidify are to increase already fruitful relations with established animal welfare and human welfare entities. One proposal is for MWU to promote a conference or meeting of state animal control and humane society agencies to expand shelter medical science throughout the state. The MWU Shelter Medicine Program will become a source of consultation and education for shelters and animal welfare groups throughout Arizona.
