Recent controversies surrounding vaccination have led to the suggestion that the interval between booster vaccinations should be increased. However this would potentially decrease the frequency of veterinary visits, which may result in fewer opportunities to discuss additional health concerns. Some evidence suggests that animals presented for vaccination often have concurrent disease and therefore these visits may be an opportunity to discuss such issues.

The Centre for Evidence-based Veterinary Medicine (CEVM) is working with a network of sentinel practices to investigate common presenting complaints and conditions encountered by veterinary surgeons. The aim of this study was to determine the signalment of animals presenting for vaccination, and how frequently other aspects of the animal's health were discussed. A secondary aim was to determine the nature of these additional problems, and whether they resulted in an action.

Data were collected during 1 week from 6 sentinel practices working with the CEVM. A data collection form was used to gather details on reason for presentation, signalment, additional problems discussed and outcome of the consultation.

A total of 819 animals were presented during the 6 week study, of these 264 (32.2%) presented for vaccination. Following analysis, 69.7% of animals presented for vaccination were dogs, 25.4% were cats and 4.9% were rabbits. In the majority of cases (87.9%), other aspects of the animal's health were discussed. A total of 512 additional problems were discussed, with a median of 2 per animal (range 0–7). Almost half of additional problems discussed were new problems (49.2%), 23.4% were pre-existing problems, and 27.3 % involved other aspects of preventive medicine. The most common diagnosis made was periodontal disease (10.4% of additional problems), followed by overweight/ obese (8.0%). At least one action was taken for 66.8% of additional problems with the most common action being management (29.7%), followed by prophylactic (27.5%) then therapeutic treatment (13.3%). The majority of animals presented were still vaccinated, with 1.9% having vaccination delayed.

This study demonstrates that when animals are presented for vaccination various other aspects of the animal's health are discussed and acted upon. These data suggest that an annual health check, regardless of whether a booster vaccination is given, may be important for discussing additional concerns and detecting concurrent disease.