Caring for exotic animals

What types of animals do veterinarians specializing in exotic species commonly see in practice? S. Emi Knafo, DVM, DACZM, zoological medicine specialist and assistant clinical professor of zoological medicine at the University of Tennessee (UT) in Knoxville, discussed treating exotic companion animals such as rabbits, reptiles and birds, in a dvm360 interview. In this video, Knafo talks about the species she most often treats.

The following is a transcript of the video:

dvm360: As a zoological medicine specialist, what exotic animals do you commonly treat?

S. Emi Knafo, DVM, DACZM: Our specialty is kind of weird in that we kind of joke about ourselves: Jack of all trade, master of none. My residency was zoological and wildlife medicine, and yet here I am at University of Tennessee, and I'm mostly doing what we call ZCA, or zoological companion animal medicine, which is like the exotic pets, but there's so much bleed over. Zoos have petting zoos, and so they have rabbits and rats and ferrets, and they're in the reptile collections. We're going to see lizards and turtles and snakes and frogs. And so there's a lot of crossover of species. And you can be a zoo veterinarian who sees a lot of exotic pets, so to speak. And then, within zoo medicine, there's the aquatic specialty and wildlife as well, but I'm mostly companion animal right now in my day to day.

Most of the species that come in are going to be pet rabbits, parrots, chickens. We do see reptiles, so like tortoises, aquatic turtles, a variety of lizards. Probably the smallest proportion is going to be our amphibians and fish, but we still do see those, and sometimes even invertebrates like tarantulas or pet hissing cockroaches, things like that. Veterinarians are also now charged with honeybee medicine since a 2017 FDA change. So we kind of see it all, and then in our companion animal side, we will still see what's considered an exotic cat, so a serval, a pet kangaroo or Wallaby.

Pet primates are a whole other controversial topic, but that also kind of falls under that purview as well. And so any exotic animal, legal or illegally owned, that's not part of a zoological institution could walk through our doors with a couple exceptions. And so, every day is a little bit unpredictable.

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