A picture of three dogs howling on a Zenrelia advertisement

Zenrelia vaccine safety

Vaccines can be safely given to dogs on Zenrelia.

We get a lot of questions about whether vaccines and Zenrelia are a safe combination. The short answer is yes, they are.

Zenrelia has an unusual safety warning based on a very small, unrealistic vaccine trial required by the drug approval process. For this trial, a small group of laboratory beagles who were less than 1 year old were given high, immunosuppressive doses of Zenrelia and then exposed to modified live vaccines. A few of these beagles developed unrelated infections based on contamination of the facility and the high, immunosuppressive dosage of the medication. Subsequent studies show good safety and efficacy of vaccines when normal dogs receive normal doses of Zenrelia, so this is not of concern.

Zenrelia is a Janus kinase inhibitor, the same as Apoquel. Apoquel has been administered alongside vaccinations millions of times over the past 13 years without abnormal consequences. According to Elanco, the manufacturers of Zenrelia, dogs can be safely vaccinated while on the medication. Based on this information, we believe Zenrelia is both safe and effective when used in conjunction with routine vaccinations.

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