Dr Abbie Tipler, a surgeon at Veterinary Specialist Services, explains how to use the drug meloxicam. Meloxicam is a commonly used drug, however it is important to use it as prescribed and to monitor for any side effects. This video explains how to use the drug safely, how to draw up the correct dose and what side effects to watch out for.
Hi my name’s abby and i’m one of the surgeons at veterinary specialist services today i’m just going to have a little bit of a chat to you about the use of the drug meloxicam and we use maloxicam frequently in the surgical department and unfortunately it is actually one of the drugs that’s most commonly uh overdosed so through by around medicine discipline
We often see pets coming in due to meloxicam overdose and it can be quite dangerous for the pet if that’s to happen now i think why that often occurs is because there’s a number of different ways that this drug can come in terms of the little bottles and syringes and i guess the most important thing is to make sure that you use the use the syringe that comes
With the bottle and only that syringe and the reason for that is because uh some of the the versions come with syringes that are in kilogram dose and others come with little syringes that are in mills so now i’m going to show you how to draw the drug up from the bottle into the the syringe and this is cat medicam and so basically to open the bottle it’s got a
Child safety little lock and then once you’ve got it open the syringe will basically click onto the top now this syringe is in kilograms so click onto the top of the syringe and then drawback and it doesn’t really matter how far you draw back to start with and then we just want to flick the air bubbles out and then let’s just say this is a five kilogram cat or
Your vet has given a five kilogram dose so occasionally we will give it at a lower dose so we may say give the three kilogram dose but that will still be for a four or five kilogram cat and there may be a good reason for that so then we want to basically push the plunger back to the five and that would be the five kilogram dose etc etc now the other important
Thing about this drug is that it needs to be given with food so you can either feed your pet and then basically just pop the syringe straight into their mouth or it is fine to mix it with the food so long as it’s not given on an empty tummy the next important thing is that it’s a once a day drug and more is definitely not better so don’t be tempted if your pet
Seems painful to give it twice a day if you think that’s the case then just give the vet in charge of the case a call and they’ll be able to advise on other pain relief that we might be able to add in another important thing about the use of meloxicam is to make sure that you stop it if there’s any side effects such as vomiting or diarrhea or if your pet’s not
Eating obviously you won’t be able to give the drug then either because it must be given with food so if that’s the case then stop the drug and give your vet a call and they’ll be able to advise on maybe switching over to a different drug or lowering the dose and finally when patients are on this drug in the long term we often like to monitor their blood work
At regular intervals so that will depend a little bit on the patient but roughly every six months and the reason for that is just to make sure that they’re not developing any problems with any of their other organs especially the liver and kidneys because if that’s the case then we may need to change to a different drug or again reduce the dose of the naloxone
So just to recap it’s really important that you understand exactly the amount of drug to give to your patient and if there’s any confusion with the with the syringe or the dosing it doesn’t seem to match what it says on the box then it’s really important that you just double check with your vet so for any further information at all about the use of maloxicam
Then please feel free to contact us at veterinary specialist services you
Transcribed from video
The use of Meloxicam By Veterinary Specialist Services
