Canine Vaccination—A Survey of Owner Attitudes and Adherence to Vaccination Protocols

Vaccination is one of the most important measures for infectious disease control. Recently, media-generated concern about vaccine-associated adverse effects has produced a rise in both human and animal “anti-vaccination” movements. This study aimed to understand factors involved in dog owner vaccination decisions and explore whether there has been an increase in titer testing. An online survey targeting dog owners received a total of 2585 responses, which showed 79% of respondents had their dogs vaccinated in the last 12 months. A few owners had never vaccinated their dogs, and 13% of owners used titer testing prior to booster vaccinations. The factors with the strongest positive predictors for vaccination were requirements by third party services (e.g., kennels) and, for a negative response, lack of time. For respondents that had not vaccinated, the factors with the strongest predictive powers to determine if they titer test were education/working in the veterinary industry for a positive response and not having heard of negative side effects after vaccinating for a negative response. Overall, no evidence was found that a rise in anti-vaccination attitudes was pervasive in dog owners; however, the study shows that the veterinary profession has work to do to ensure herd immunity is maintained within dog populations.