Abstract
ISFM
New National Partner in Asia
ISFM has a new National Partner – the Taiwanese Society of Feline Medicine (TSFM). The non-profit association was founded this year by a group of veterinarians with the purposes of:
✜ Furthering feline disease treatment standards;
✜ Furthering feline disease knowledge and veterinary clinical skills;
✜ Educating the public about healthcare concepts for cats;
✜ Promoting international academic exchange;
✜ Subsidising feline medicine research; and
✜ Awarding veterinarians and animal hospitals that make exceptional contributions to veterinary education.
Feline congress by the Danube
Societatea Română de Medicină Felină (SRMF), the Romanian National Partner of ISFM, held its 7th congress in May, on Uzlina Island in the Danube Delta, Romania.
Over 200 delegates attended the congress, and enjoyed state-of-the-art presentations from 11 speakers on topics such as practical issues in feline anaesthesia, causes and management of hypertension, and managing cats with feline idiopathic cystitis. In addition, Sarah Endersby, ISFM’s Veterinary Development Manager, and Andy Sparkes, JFMS Editor, discussed handling cats in a pre-congress workshop day.
Outside of the lectures, delegates enjoyed boat trips on the Danube and the local cuisine.
AAFP
Coming soon: Cat Friendly Certificate program
Over the years, the Cat Friendly Practice (CFP) program has furnished veterinary professionals with the resources to elevate the standard of care provided to cats, and more specifically to reduce the stress of veterinary visits for cats, their caregivers and the entire veterinary team. CFPs receive feline-focused education and other benefits, such as continuing education and marketing support. Currently, the AAFP is preparing to launch two new Cat Friendly Certificate programs: the Cat Friendly Veterinary Professional (CFVP) Certificate and the Cat Friendly Veterinary Advocate (CFVA) Certificate.
The Certificates allow individual veterinary professionals to develop feline-specific skills and knowledge relevant to their role in veterinary practice, via a series of online course modules. The Certificates gives veterinary professionals transferable tools and knowledge to develop, reinforce and change the way they interact with cats. It will also enhance their ability to fulfill client and patient needs, build feline confidence, help practices develop talent and understanding of cats, demonstrate a personal commitment to feline health, and reinforce the important role feline knowledge and understanding plays in the practice. As a further benefit, the Certificates will allow individuals to increase and showcase their feline expertise while contributing to professional development efforts.
New RACE-approved webinars
The AAFP recently released several new RACE-approved webinars that are available on the eLearning Center platform. The webinars provide learning opportunities for veterinarians who want to gain valuable feline education incorporating the latest available research and information.
Members, team member subscribers and CFP cat advocates can access these and all other AAFP webinars via the enhanced Member Center at
2019 conference partner spotlight
The AAFP would like to thank and recognize its many wonderful partners participating in the 2019 AAFP 5th World Feline Veterinary Conference, ‘Complex disease management – exploring feline comorbidities’. Special thanks go to long-standing partners, the American Board of Veterinary Practitioners, the ISFM and the Winn Feline Foundation, which help to provide current advanced information, research and education for attendees.
For the fourth consecutive year, The International Cat Association is generously securing cats for the live, hands-on Feline-Friendly Handling Workshop.
In addition, this year the AAFP is honored to have four other partners: the American Veterinary Medical Association Professional Liability Insurance Trust, the International Veterinary Academy of Pain Management, the National Association of Veterinary Technicians in America and the Veterinary Hospital Managers Association.
With the support of leading experts in feline medicine, this first-of-its kind conference promises to be a unique meeting that encourages attendees to think differently about treating comorbidities. The interaction and processes between two or more distinct diseases can be challenging, and yet practices experience this occurrence almost daily. Veterinary professionals will acquire knowledge about two or more different diseases or conditions that exist together and what to do if treatments appear to conflict.
AAFP
Diabetes toolkit success
In June, the AAFP released a Diabetes Educational Toolkit
This is the first online Educational Toolkit produced by the AAFP and it has been received with great interest from veterinary professionals, media outlets and social media influencers. Encouraged by the use and positive response to the Toolkit, the AAFP plans to develop additional digital resources for its members and the veterinary community to advance feline medicine.
JFMS
New impact factor is cause for additional celebration
The JFMS team is celebrating the news of the latest impact factor. Announced in June by Clarivate Analytics, which compiles the Journal Citations Reports (JCR) for over 11,800 journals, spanning more than 230 disciplines and 2.3 million scholarly articles, the 2018 impact factor has risen by 8% to 1.584, up from 1.466 in the previous year.
By looking at all the citation activity in a single calendar year, the impact factor represents a snapshot in time, providing transparency on what makes a journal influential and valuable.
The news has come as the journal is marking its 20th anniversary. The impact factor is the highest since 2010, and the second highest since 2004, the year that JFMS first recorded an impact factor. It moves JFMS up the journal rankings in the JCR Veterinary Sciences list, where it currently enjoys a position of 39 out of 141 journals.
Talking behaviour
A new podcast discussing the recent JFMS behaviour special issue series, features Steve Dale – certified animal behavior consultant and a well-known radio presenter in the USA – in conversation with Sarah Ellis, feline behaviour expert at iCatCare, who helped to develop and also contributed an article to the series.
Steve Dale interviews Sarah Ellis in an engaging podcast spotlighting the behaviour special issues
Behaviour has not always been considered particularly relevant to veterinary medicine. Sarah explains that the JFMS special issues (published in May and November 2018, and March 2019) aim to correct this misunderstanding and help veterinarians to realise the importance of integrating feline behaviour into their clinical practice. To get the most out of the special issues, she recommends reading the articles in the order they are presented. That way the reader will gain an understanding of normal feline behaviour, as well as the underlying motivational–emotional systems and how to recognise them, first. This information helps to underpin the later articles on prevention and diagnosis of, and treatment approaches to, a variety of problem behaviours. As Sarah points out, the behaviour in question may be one that is problematic for the cat (eg, due to pain or disease) or one that is problematic for the owner, such as scratching. The latter, while a perfectly natural behaviour for the cat, can negatively affect the owner–cat bond.
As prevention is always easier than reacting once a problem behaviour has started, all veterinarians who treat cats are encouraged to incorporate behaviour into the feline consultation. Veterinary nurses and technicians play an important role, too, and Sarah recommends sharing the three JFMS behaviour special issues with the whole veterinary team.
