{"id":30123,"date":"2025-06-06T11:56:12","date_gmt":"2025-06-06T15:56:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/vet.purdue.edu\/news\/?p=30123"},"modified":"2025-06-06T11:56:15","modified_gmt":"2025-06-06T15:56:15","slug":"purdue-veterinary-hospital-participates-in-one-day-national-effort-to-preserve-sight-of-service-dogs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vet.purdue.edu\/news\/purdue-veterinary-hospital-participates-in-one-day-national-effort-to-preserve-sight-of-service-dogs.php","title":{"rendered":"Purdue Veterinary Hospital Participates in One-Day National Effort to Preserve Sight of Service Dogs"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>The <a href=\"https:\/\/vet.purdue.edu\/hospital\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Purdue University Veterinary Hospital<\/a>\u2019s Ophthalmology Service came to the aid of canines dedicated to lives of service recently during a special day set aside for checking the eye health of service dogs. On May 12, the Ophthalmology Service participated in the American College of Veterinary Ophthalmologists (ACVO)\/Epicur National Service Animal Eye Exam event by providing free eye exams for qualified service dogs. About a dozen service dogs received eye exams that screen for cataracts, glaucoma, and other eye diseases and disorders that can impair the dogs\u2019 vision.<br><br>According to Ophthalmology Client Liaison Abigail Lottes, \u201cThis was one of our most diverse years regarding the variety of working\/service dogs we were able to see.\u201d<br><br>Some of the dogs examined included:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Jake, a Labrador Retriever that works as a search and rescue dog.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Rosco, a Golden Retriever who works as a seizure response dog for one of our own Purdue employees.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Tate and Josie, who are both Labrador Retrievers that work as guide dogs.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Two police dogs<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>Ophthalmology team members, including students, veterinary assistant Kristen Earley, veterinary nurse \/ technician Megan Scheulin, and two ophthalmology residents, Drs. Leah Douglass and Julie McLaughlin, were involved in the free eye screenings, and Dr. Wendy Townsend, associate professor of ophthalmology, who is board-certified by the ACVO, conducted the actual exams.<\/p>\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\n<figure class=\"aligncenter size-large\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"576\" src=\"https:\/\/vet.purdue.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/Canine-Ophtho-Image-3-1024x576.jpg\" alt=\"Dr. Julie McLaughlin, a first-year ophthalmology resident with Megan Scheulin, veterinary ophthalmology nurse.\" class=\"wp-image-30125\" srcset=\"https:\/\/vet.purdue.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/Canine-Ophtho-Image-3-1024x576.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/vet.purdue.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/Canine-Ophtho-Image-3-300x169.jpg 300w, https:\/\/vet.purdue.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/Canine-Ophtho-Image-3-768x432.jpg 768w, https:\/\/vet.purdue.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/Canine-Ophtho-Image-3-1536x864.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/vet.purdue.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/Canine-Ophtho-Image-3-2048x1152.jpg 2048w, https:\/\/vet.purdue.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/Canine-Ophtho-Image-3-1320x742.jpg 1320w, https:\/\/vet.purdue.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/Canine-Ophtho-Image-3-scaled.jpg 1300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">Dr. Julie McLaughlin, a first-year ophthalmology resident with Megan Scheulin, veterinary ophthalmology nurse.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n<p>This is the 16th year for the annual ACVO\/Epicur National Service Animal Eye Exam event, during which participating ophthalmologists provided more than 5,300 of these complimentary screenings across the USA, Canada, Hong Kong, Puerto Rico, and the UK.<br><br>\u201cThe goal is to ensure excellent ocular health for the service dogs,\u201d Dr. Townsend said. \u201cI love participating in this event because we can celebrate the wonderful bond between the dogs and their handlers. The services these dogs provide are amazing.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Purdue University Veterinary Hospital\u2019s Ophthalmology Service came to the aid of canines dedicated to lives of service recently during a special day set aside for checking the eye health of service dogs. On May 12, the Ophthalmology Service participated in the American College of Veterinary Ophthalmologists (ACVO)\/Epicur National Service Animal Eye Exam event by providing free eye exams for qualified service dogs.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":30124,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[31,28,27],"tags":[23,393],"class_list":["post-30123","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-hospitals","category-our-impact","category-services","tag-hospital","tag-ophthalmology"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vet.purdue.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30123","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vet.purdue.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vet.purdue.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vet.purdue.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vet.purdue.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=30123"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/vet.purdue.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30123\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":30126,"href":"https:\/\/vet.purdue.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30123\/revisions\/30126"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vet.purdue.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/30124"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vet.purdue.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=30123"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vet.purdue.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=30123"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vet.purdue.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=30123"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}