Toolkit helps you teach about dog bite prevention

Educate clients, community during Dog Bite Prevention Week®

National Dog Bite Prevention Week® is being observed this week across the United States, and the AVMA has released a new veterinary toolkit to use in your clinic and community year-round. These resources are available free of charge to AVMA members and will help you educate pet owners and the public about what they can do to prevent dog bites.

Dog bites pose a serious health risk to our communities and society. More than 4.5 million people are bitten by dogs each year in the United States, including more than 800,000 who receive medical attention for their injuries. More than half of those bitten are children.

Responsible pet ownership and community-based education are the cornerstones of dog bite prevention. While veterinarians know that it is a dog's individual history and behavior – rather than breed – that determine whether it will bite, many people are unaware that even the cuddliest, fuzziest, sweetest dog can bite if provoked. National Dog Bite Prevention Week® offers an excellent opportunity to remind people that most dog bites are preventable and there are many things they can do to help prevent them.

Our new veterinary toolkit offers all the materials you need to spread the word about dog bite prevention. These include:

• Ideas and ready-to-use content for your social media pages, including pre-written posts and downloadable cover images
• A letter to the editor template that you can customize and send to local media to get the word out about dog bite prevention
• Client-ready materials for your clinic, including a Responsible Pet Ownership poster and Dog Bite Prevention brochure
• An activity and coloring book to teach children how they should and shouldn’t act around dogs
• Information and client handouts on the importance of proper pet socialization

We also encourage you to watch and share our Jimmy the Dog videos, which teach children how to be safe around dogs in everyday situations.

Access the complete toolkit to make use of all our dog bite prevention resources, and visit avma.org/DogBitePrevention for more dog bite facts and strategies to share with your clients.