Photo: Kaylee Greenlee Beal/Texas Tech University

The inaugural class at Texas Tech University School of Veterinary Medicine graduated Sunday, May 18, 2025, at the Amarillo Civic Center Auditorium. The university in Amarillo, Texas, awarded doctor of veterinary medicine degrees to 61 new graduates, marking a milestone for the school that opened to its first students in August 2021.

Texas Tech's veterinary school was established in 2018, and ground broke on building its campus in early 2020. It now has a campus covering 185,000 sq ft, with “world-class” facilities that include interactive classrooms, state-of-the-art research laboratories, teaching laboratories, student support areas, and more, according to the university.

Provisional Accreditation status was granted to the school by the American Veterinary Medical Association Council on Education in March 2021.

The final step of the accreditation process for Texas Tech was completed during the final semester for the inaugural class.

The Lone Star State’s second veterinary school, Texas Tech’s institution for doctoral students, was the first to open in more than a century.

 It joins Texas A&M University College of Veterinary & Biomedical Sciences in College Station, which was established in 1916, about 500 miles away from Amarillo, and graduated its inaugural class in 1920 with 4 students.

According to Texas Tech officials, there is a long-standing need for veterinary care in rural and regional communities. The new graduates are projected to help address veterinary shortages, with 95% headed to work in rural and regional communities and 69% hired by clinical year practice partners, according to the university.

“The goal was to create a pipeline for veterinary workers to fill these gaps, specifically in rural and regional areas. When you look at the first class of graduates and see how many are going into large-animal practices and into practices in our rural and regional communities, you realize that we have accomplished what we had hoped and planned for, and it’s incredible,” Tedd L. Mitchell, MD, chancellor of the Texas Tech University System, said during the graduation ceremony that was also attended by Texas Governor Greg Abbott.

Guy Loneragan, PhD, BVSc, dean of the School of Veterinary Medicine, told ceremony attendees of the university’s pride in the inaugural class. “We were all on this educational journey together. They helped solve problems and develop solutions. They embraced and fostered the school’s core values, and [they found] so many ways to give back to the community through their efforts. Now, they are helping us achieve our promise to Texas by starting their careers in a practice that serves rural, regional, or large-animal needs. That is transformative and demonstrates how Texas Tech responds to and helps address the important needs of Texas,” he said.

In addressing fellow graduates, Austin Byrd, DVM, Class of 2025 president, said he and his peers feel well supported and prepared for starting their careers in veterinary medicine. “Texas Tech and the Amarillo community have done an incredible job at making all of us feel welcome and at home,” he said.

Texas Tech School of Veterinary Medicine hosts historic inaugural graduation. News release. Texas Tech. May 18, 2025.

Texas Tech opens Texas’ first new veterinary school in more than a century. 

. April 25, 2022. Accessed May 22, 2025. 

https://www.dvm360.com/view/texas-tech-opens-texas-first-new-veterinary-school-in-more-than-a-century

College history. Texas A&M University Veterinary Medicine & Biomedical Sciences. Accessed May 23, 2025. 

Articles

Sixty-one students graduated with doctorate degrees in veterinary medicine and are projected to help fulfill a critical need for animal health care providers in Texas and New Mexico. 

Texas Tech graduates first class of veterinarians

Kristin Kirkby Shaw, DVM, PhD, MS, DACVS-SA, DACVSMR, discusses the prevalence of arthritis in cats and the percentage of cats that are actually diagnosed

Feline arthritis remains underdiagnosed

Although arthritis is a common condition in aging felines, fewer than 20% of cats with this condition are diagnosed, according to Kristin Kirkby Shaw, DVM, PhD, MS, DACVS-SA, DACVSMR, founder of Canine Arthritis Resources and Education (CARE). In this video, Kirkby Shaw shares statistics on feline arthritis from a lecture she presented at a previous Fetch dvm360 conference.

Raising awareness about the prevalence of arthritis in cats, given the gap in diagnosis, can help support earlier detection and treatment. To learn about how arthritis presents in feline patients, including signs client should watch for at home, watch our 

 with Kirkby Shaw where she highlights 6 key signs that have been specifically linked to arthritis pain in cats.

For additional resources on animal arthritis in recognition of National Mobility and Pet Arthritis Awareness Month, check out:

Raising the standard: Arthritis awareness in veterinary practice

Make a patient-specific plan for canine osteoarthritis

Understanding canine intervertebral disc disease

New guide designed to assist veterinary practices with canine OA protocols

Kristin Kirkby Shaw, DVM, PhD, MS, DACVS-SA, DACVSMR

: Hi, I'm Dr Kristin Kirkby Shaw. I'm a small-animal surgeon and rehabilitation specialist. I did all of my training at the University of Florida, and I've practiced in Seattle, Washington, for 12 years. I have a passion specifically for osteoarthritis [OA]. I've spent my career both in the surgical suite and managing rehab patients. I'm actually excited that the next step of my career is going to be as an orthopedic surgeon at Colorado State University. [As] my passion project on the side, because I've been involved with [OA] for so long, I started the website caninearthritis.org. Check it out; it's a website full of practical, free, evidence-based tools to help you and your clients manage dogs with [OA].

So, arthritis is very common in cats. As they age, basically all cats are going to develop arthritis similar to how all humans, we develop some degree of wear and tear and joint disease. The statistics show that about 60% of cats over the age of 6 have x-ray evidence of arthritis and 90% of cats over the age of 12 have radiographic [OA]. 

But we know that not all cats with radiographic arthritis actually have clinically relevant pain, so the best estimate right now is about 40% of cats actually have clinically relevant osteoarthritis. Unfortunately, probably less than 20% of cats actually ever get diagnosed with arthritis.

Videos

USDA updates policy taking the vaccine off the shelves

Vet Watch Update: Rattlesnake Vaccine

Editor’s Note (May 22, 2025): According to sources, since this conversation was recorded, the USDA may have renewed the conditional license for the 

 Toxoid (rattlesnake vaccine) as of Friday, May 19, 2025. The video conversation above reflects the status as of the original recording, serving as valuable context regarding the USDA's decision and the science behind the vaccine. 

Below is a partial transcript, lightly edited for clarity. Watch the full video for more.

. I'm your host, Dr Christopher Lee. We're talking today about the rattlesnake vaccine [

 toxoid] and its potential loss from the marketplace. It's my pleasure to introduce Dr Dale Wallis. She's a UC [University of California], Davis graduate, just like myself. But in addition to her DVM, she also earned a certificate in preventive medicine, which is fantastic.

She was a director of a vaccine laboratory in the town of Davis before she accepted a position at Hygieia Biological Laboratories in 1993. She quickly rose to become their vice president. You may also know their sister company, Red Rock Biologics. She is now the senior staff veterinarian at Red Rock Biologics, which manufactures the rattlesnake vaccine. Welcome, Dr Wallis.

So, tell us—what's going on with the rattlesnake vaccine? It may be losing USDA [US Department of Agriculture] renewal?

It has lost USDA renewal. We believe the problem is that the USDA has changed its policy on a category of licensing called limited market conditional licenses. Conditional licenses are issued when there is no commercial product available, but there is a need. The manufacturer has to show purity, safety, and a reasonable expectation of efficacy to get this kind of license. It’s issued for things like emergency conditions—like an outbreak of some sort—or, in our case, something called a limited market. This is where products are developed to address a problem, but the market is so small [that] it doesn't warrant the cost of full licensure.

Historically, there’s been no time limit on conditional licensing. They’ve just been renewed every year or every 2 years. The USDA wants to see ongoing research for them, which we do—and that's just been the way it's been.

Recently, they changed their mind and decided to time-limit conditional limited market licenses. And in so doing, ours got timed out.

Because the rattlesnake vaccine has been on the market for quite a while. How long has it been?

Twenty-one years—wow. And, correct me if I'm wrong, there is no other rattlesnake vaccine on the market?

To our knowledge, this is the only commercial vaccine against venom.

So, this is it. There are no other options for rattlesnake vaccination, other than treatment thereafter. Is that correct?

How does the rattlesnake vaccine work? Would you walk us through that?

Sure. My partner and I both had cats that were bitten by rattlesnakes in Northern California—mine in 2002, his in 2003—and both cats nearly died. Anecdotally, at least, the stories were that a dog would get bit the first year and get very, very sick—maybe nearly die. Get bit the second year, he’d get sick, but not as bad. Third year, he’d swell up but wouldn’t get sick. Fourth year, he didn’t even react to getting bit. So, there was evidence that a dog could mount an immune response to venom.

We also knew about antivenom, which has been around for about 70 years. It’s generated by vaccinating animals repeatedly to build up a titer. That serum becomes something that can neutralize venom; it can be given to a human or an animal to counteract an envenomation.

So, we were aware that there was a biological basis not only for developing immunity to venom, but specifically that a dog could do it as well. We started working on developing technology to process venom into something that would make a vaccine.

This is something the Army tried many years ago because of troops stationed in jungles and that sort of thing, but it was never commercially viable. They never got something that would develop the kind of immunity needed or persist. We were successful, so there's been a lot of interest in figuring out what we did and how we did it.

We started testing the vaccine in mice. The reason we started with mice is because antivenom is tested in mice. It’s applied to dogs, cats, horses, people—and all of it gets tested in mice.

We figured the mouse would be a good model to see if we were getting the kind of immunity we needed from this vaccine. Lo and behold, you vaccinate mice, challenge them with venom—they survive. The controls don’t.

There is a published paper on this that repeats our work and shows the vaccine is efficacious in mice. We looked at how dogs and mice seroconvert to the vaccine; they’re virtually identical in terms of antibody generation, so we felt the mouse would be a good model for the dog.

We applied for the license, and the USDA issued the conditional license once we’d satisfied purity and safety and showed enough data to where they believed there was a reasonable expectation of efficacy. The USDA license was issued in 2004.

That's a lot of information on how that works and why it can be trusted. What is the protocol for vaccination of a pet?

When we did our work, we used border collies and greyhounds—2 breeds known to have somewhat different immune system responses that are suppressed or altered. We were trying to make sure the vaccine we made would work for all breeds of dogs.

The dogs ranged in weight from about 35 to 70 lb. We found that 2 doses a month apart gave good immunity that persisted for at least 6 to 9 months. That would be enough for dogs in the northern half of the US, where rattlesnake season is about 6 to 9 months.

In the southern US, there's often year-round exposure. So, based on our work, the label is for annual revaccination. But in the South, they’ve found that 1 dose every 6 months—or 2 doses a year—is more beneficial.

Border patrol dogs get 3 doses every 4 months due to their higher level of exposure.

Later, we expanded to include English mastiffs—dogs up to 175 lb. We found that 2 doses didn’t provide the titer rise we wanted. We gave a third dose to that group and saw good titers, but it took 3 doses. I don’t know why larger dogs have that issue, but they do. That’s not on the label—that’s just experimental data.

We also adjusted for small dogs. Dogs under 25 lb get 3 doses in the initial sequence, but not for the same reason as the large dogs. Smaller dogs have smaller blood volumes, so at the same titer, a 10-lb dog and a 50-lb dog have a 5-fold difference in resistance. We achieve a higher titer in small dogs by giving a third dose.

They do great with single-dose boosters afterward, but it takes 3 for the initial sequence.

The USDA is ending automatic renewals for limited conditional licenses, putting the long-available rattlesnake vaccine at risk.

Vet Watch: What's going on with the rattlesnake vaccine (Crotalus atrox toxoid) and the USDA?

The American Board of Veterinary Specialties (ABVS) announced a call for public comments regarding 2 new proposed specialties. The American Board of Veterinary Acupuncture (ABVA) and the American Embryo Transfer Association (AETA) both have asked ABVS to be recognized veterinary specialty organizations (RVSOs).

According to the American Veterinary Medical Association (AVMA), the ABVS will be accepting comments on the proposals through August 12, 2025.

 The AVMA utilizes public comments to gauge both the distinctiveness of the proposed specialty from current RVSOs and the public need for the specialty.

The AETA organizing committee explained that this assisted reproductive technology is unique and a specialized field in veterinary medicine, requiring extensive training and mastery of the technical and invasive skills. To receive certification from the AETA, individuals must pass an examination; demonstrate experience; participate in continuing education; and abide by AETA, International Embryo Technology Society, and US Department of Agriculture (USDA) rules, including laboratory and facility inspections. The AETA also pointed out that it is the organization selected by the USDA to certify individuals and companies to export embryos.

“Our high level of scientific knowledge and skills are evident in embryo collection, processing, cryopreservation, and export, a requirement to ensure biosecurity and public health safety and trust. Conventional in vivo and in vitro fertilized applications are invasive and require strict guidelines and attention to detail that is provided to AETA members,” according to the organizing committee’s 1-page summary of the proposed specialty organization.

Clinical applications through the AETA take place on several species. In 2023, 565,111 bovine, 14,619 ovine, and 12,178 caprine embryos were transferred into the United States.

In the US, there are between 4000 and 600 veterinarians who have completed acupuncture certification through 1 of 6 organizations—Chi University, International Veterinary Acupuncture Society, CuraCore, Canine Rehabilitation Institute, Evidence-Based Veterinary Acupuncture, and College of Integrative Veterinary Therapies—according to the ABVA. Of those practitioners, 80% are working primarily with small animals; 10% to 20% are working with equine patients; and a smaller percentage work with farm animals, exotics, zoo animals, and other species.

“Despite widespread clinical use and established training programs, veterinary acupuncture lacks formal specialty recognition. This gap limits oversight, consistency in credentialing, and advancement in education and research. The scope of acupuncture—its diagnostic methods, technical skills, and foundational physiology—is distinct from other existing specialties, and it is not encompassed within any current RVSO,” ABVA’s organizing committee said.

The American Academy of Veterinary Acupuncture (AAVA) became a member of the AVMA House of Delegates (HOD) in 2014 but was denied recognition as a specialty in 2016. During this time, the ABVS was advising the AVMA Board of Directors on specialty petitions, and the board would then approve or deny the petitions. It recommended the denial of the AAVA for multiple reasons, including a lack of scientific basis for such a specialty.

Then, earlier this year, the HOD approved the "Integrative Veterinary Medicine" policy, which now considers veterinary acupuncture part of alternative and complementary therapies.

The AVMA website includes submissions from the ABVA and AETA organizing committees, detailing each organization’s goals and justification for becoming a specialty. Comments should be emailed to ABVS@avma.org and must be submitted separately for each request. When submitting comments, use the following subject lines:

For ABVA/Acupuncture: “Public comment – Acupuncture Specialty”

For AETA/Embryo Transfer: “Public comment – Embryo Transfer Specialty”

If accepted, each organization will join the other 22 specialty organizations and 46 specialties recognized by the AVMA.

Two proposed veterinary specialties under consideration: Acupuncture, embryo transfer. News release. American Veterinary Medical Association. May 16, 2025. Accessed May 22, 2025. 

https://www.avma.org/news/two-proposed-veterinary-specialties-under-consideration-acupuncture-embryo-transfer

American Board of Veterinary Specialties. Veterinary specialties. American Veterinary Medical Association. Accessed May 22, 2025. https://www.avma.org/education/veterinary-specialties

The American Board of Veterinary Acupuncture and the American Embryo Transfer Association have asked to be recognized as veterinary specialty organizations.

ABVS seeking public comment on 2 proposed specialties 

The US Department of Agriculture (USDA) announced on May 11, 2025, that there is a suspension of bison, cattle, and horse imports through ports of entry along the southern border of the US due to the rapid northward spread of the New World screwworm (NWS) in Mexico. Despite continued efforts to interdict and eradicate NWS in Mexico, it has been detected in remote farms with minimal cattle movement, approximately 700 miles from the border in Oaxaca and Veracruz.

“The United States has ordered the suspension of livestock imports through ports of entry along our southern border after the continued spread of the New World Screwworm in Mexico. Secretary Berdegué and I have worked closely on the NWS response; however, it is my duty to take all steps within my control to protect the livestock industry in the United States from this devastating pest,” Brooke L. Rollins, US Secretary of Agriculture, said in a USDA release.

“The protection of our animals and safety of our nation’s food supply is a national security issue of the utmost importance. Once we see increased surveillance and eradication efforts, and the positive results of those actions, we remain committed to opening the border for livestock trade. This is not about politics or punishment of Mexico, rather it is about food and animal safety,” she continued.

US-Mexico agreement allows screwworm eradication efforts to resume

Screwworms: when the larvae don't care about boundaries

Screwworms are moving north—are we prepared?

According to the USDA, effective immediately, the USDA Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) in conjunction with the Customs and Border Protection (CBP) will restrict the imports of live animal commodities originating from or transiting to Mexico and will persist on a month-by-month basis. This restriction will continue until a "significant window of containment" is achieved. At this time, any livestock that is currently in holding for entry in the United States will be processed normally, including an APHIS port veterinary medical officer inspection exam and treatment to make sure the cattle entering are not carrying NWS.

 The new restriction will also apply to dogs traveling with owners to Mexico, and a health attestation before returning to the US will be required before they can re-enter the US.

The USDA shared that it will also continue to constantly collaborate with Mexico on this issue by reviewing the latest data and metrics in 2 weeks. The department is also in daily communication with Mexico to discuss how to build on what has been accomplished so far to improve the strategy toward eradicating NWS. The 2 countries plan to effectively eradicate NWS by using a 3-pronged approach with robust active field surveillance, education, and outreach to ensure prevention, treatment, and early detection; controlled animal movement to limit spread; and sustained sterile insect dispersal.

 Through the suspensions, the US will have a chance to reassess whether the current mitigation standards remain sufficient. However, the USDA noted the northward spread of NWS could also be possible through natural wildlife movements.

Other efforts for eradication from the Panama-United States Commission for the Eradication and Prevention of Screwworm, which is a joint program between Panama’s Ministry of Agricultural Development and APHIS, include releasing sterile flies at strategic locations, focusing on Southern Mexico and other areas throughout Central America, to disrupt reproduction.

 The US has also utilized the USDA Tick Riders, mounted patrol officers employed by the USDA who served as the first line of defense against an outbreak of cattle fever,

 to monitor livestock and wildlife along the southern border region for the presence of NWS between the ports of entry.

Secretary Rollins suspends live animal imports through ports of entry along southern border, effective immediately. News release. US Department of Agriculture. May 11, 2025. Accessed May 21, 2025. 

https://www.usda.gov/about-usda/news/press-releases/2025/05/11/secretary-rollins-suspends-live-animal-imports-through-ports-entry-along-southern-border-effective

APHIS halts live animal imports across US southern border again due to screwworm. American Veterinary Medical Association. News release. May 19, 2025. Accessed May 21, 2025. 

https://www.avma.org/news/aphis-halts-live-animal-imports-across-us-southern-border-again-due-screwworm?utm_source=delivra&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=todays-headlines-news

Avalos E. Tick riders: the cornerstone of USDA’s Cattle Fever Tick Program. US Department of Agriculture. April 23, 2011. Accessed May 21, 2025. 

https://www.usda.gov/about-usda/news/blog/tick-riders-cornerstone-usdas-cattle-fever-tick-program

This halt in imports is due to the rapid spread of the New World screwworm in Mexico, taking effect immediately.

APHIS stops live animal imports across US southern border

A preliminary study by MI:RNA Diagnostics and Scotland’s Rural College (SRUC) has found that microRNA profiling in combination with advanced predictive modeling and artificial intelligence (AI) may help diagnose Johne disease in cattle with greater accuracy. According to MI:RNA, a veterinary diagnostics company, the new diagnostic approach could change the way the disease is managed.

Paratuberculosis, also known as Johne disease, is an infectious, chronic disease that is often fatal and affects cattle and other ruminants, including sheep and goats. The disease, caused by a resistant species of the 

mycobacterium avium subspecies paratuberculosis 

(MAP) bacteria, causes granulomatous enteritis—a chronic form of inflammatory bowel disease—resulting in reduced nutrient absorption that leads to weight loss, diarrhea, and eventually death.

Endemic globally, including in the United States, Johne disease represents a high economic cost to the agricultural economy due to reduced milk production, late pregnancy or failure during breeding season, early culling, and poor condition at culling.

 In the US, the disease is believed to be more prevalent in beef cattle than commonly assumed due to a lack of recent survey data evaluating its current prevalence, according to a publication in 

 by the University of Florida, Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences Extension.

US Department of Agriculture 2020 survey data show that 7.9% of beef cattle herds in the US have 1 or more cows that are positive for Johne disease.

 Moreover, 92% of the US beef producer survey participants either did not know about the disease or recognized the name but did not know much about it.

 Additionally, 2017 data from Johne’s Testing Center revealed that MAP was detected in 18% of the samples submitted from beef cattle herds.

In the United Kingdom, Johne disease is especially prevalent, affecting up to 50% of herds. Each year, the disease costs an estimated €200 per cow and €10 million to the UK agricultural economy.

Currently, diagnostic tests for Johne disease pose limitations, with available diagnostic tests “exacerbate[ing] the difficulty of managing Johne disease, which often goes undiagnosed due to silent carriers of the disease,” according to MI:RNA.

 However, the new diagnostic approach using microRNA developed by the diagnostics company and a team of scientists at SRUC may help identify the disease earlier.

MicroRNAs are cellular RNA fragments that control the proteins that cells produce and regulate gene expression.

 These biomarkers offer insight into what happens in cells as they are stable and easily detected in bodily fluids.

Research indicates that microRNA expression levels vary during bacterial infections, including early-stage MAP.

According to MI:RNA, diagnostic precision can be improved by applying advanced statistical and machine learning techniques, which enable rapid data analysis, detect patterns missed by traditional methods, and offer infection predictions.

In the preliminary study by SRUC and MI:RNA, microRNA expression was measured in samples from cattle infected with MAP and those not infected. With machine learning AI, the data were then analyzed, and an optimal method for disease diagnosis was developed.

According to the study’s results, microRNA profiling, along with advanced predictive modeling, shows potential in serving as a diagnostic tool for Johne disease in cattle. However, because a small sample size was used for the preliminary study, future efforts will increase the sample size to further validate the results and ameliorate precision.

“Animal health is more important than ever, with Johne disease costing farmers tens of millions around the UK each year,” Eve Hanks, founder and CEO of MI:RNA Diagnostics, said in a company release.

 “For MI:RNA, this is a key area of research and development. Biomarker science combined with our AI-powered modeling means that we can significantly improve animal health, reduce financial strain on farmers, while also reducing greenhouse gas output as a result. We believe [micro]RNAs can assist with progressing future diagnostic testing and understanding diseases more effectively.”

The silent killer: breakthrough in pursuit of Johne’s Disease diagnoses. News release. MI:RNA Diagnostics. May 20, 2025. 

Johne’s disease. US Department of Agriculture Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service. September 24, 2024. Accessed May 21, 2025. https://www.aphis.usda.gov/livestock-poultry-disease/cattle/johnes#:~:text=Johne's%20disease%20is%20endemic%20in,reduce%20the%20disease's%20national%20prevalence.

Stice B, Wiggins L, Thrift T, Bittar J. Johne’s disease in beef cattle. EDIS. 2023;2023(6):VM256. doi:10.32473/edis-vm256-2023

The approach, developed by a veterinary diagnostics company and Scotland’s Rural College, uses AI and microRNA.