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The Independent Vet

The Independent Vet

By: Dr. Beth Barrett
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Pets. People. Practice. Welcome to The Independent Vet — the podcast that helps you give your fuzzy family the best life possible. Hosted by Michael Dargie, join veterinarian Dr. Beth Barrett every other week as they dig into all things pet care: from puppy training and senior cat nutrition to parasite prevention and what to pack in your pet's first aid kit. Whether you're a new pet parent or a lifelong animal lover, you'll find expert advice, surprising facts, and real-life insights from a working vet clinic in Alberta, Canada. Short, practical, and full of heart — because at Barrett Veterinary Practice, we treat your pets like our own.2026 Relationships Social Sciences
Episodes
  • It's "Stiff" Dog Season

    It's "Stiff" Dog Season
    30 Sep 2026
    Season 1 · Episode 13 Run time: 35 Minutes Host: Michael Dargie Featuring: Dr. Beth Barrett, DVM Michael is arthritic. It takes him about an hour every morning to get moving, and the first cold morning of the year is when he feels it most. He remembers his dogs doing the same thing: slower on frosty mornings, careful getting up. Like most of us, he figured they were just getting older. Dr. Beth sees arthritis every day, in dogs, cats and horses, and she wants to put a muzzle on "just getting older." The stiffness you're seeing is pain. Cold weather doesn't cause it, but it brings it out: less moving, less blood flow, more time curled up on a cold floor. Motion is lotion. Her number-one prescription isn't a drug. It's weight. Extra weight makes joints work harder and makes inflammation worse, and a leaner pet is cheaper to feed, moves more, and gets more out of every other treatment. She tells the story of a 39-kilo dog who came in for joint surgery and, a year later, weighed 19 kilos. That dog spent the next eight years spry and happy. From there it's the rest of the toolbox: shorter walks but more of them, a bed that stays padded, foam steps for the bed, marine omega-3s, the joint supplements she actually trusts, and the newer medications, including the monthly injections Librela for dogs and Solensia for cats. Dr. Beth's own dog Sprint went on it at 13 and was galloping around like a puppy within two months. Her line for every listener: "That wasn't old. That was pain." And cats. Mabel and Charlie get a mention, because cats have far more arthritis than anyone used to think. Chapters & Timestamps TimeSegment00:00Cold open, disclaimer & welcome — "I know nothing about this other than I am arthritic"01:33What osteoarthritis actually is03:31The first cold morning: why cold makes stiff joints stiffer05:26The number-one prescription: weight (and why fat is inflammatory)09:19Exercise, warmth & bedding: shorter walks, more of them13:06Cats get it too — and the stiffness owners file under "just old"16:49Omega-3s, joint supplements & teaching the bed steps21:34The medicine toolbox: multimodal pain control26:06Monoclonal antibodies: Librela, Solensia & Sprint29:10Myth or Muzzle? — He's not in pain, he's just old31:44Ask Dr. Beth — Can I just give him an Advil?34:17Outro Myth or Muzzle? (29:10) The claim: "He's not in pain, he's just old. Slowing down is normal — dogs get stiff, that's just what happens." Verdict: MUZZLE IT. Dr. Beth: she hears a version of this in the exam room constantly — "he's not painful, he's just stiff" — and her answer is that stiffness is pain. Think about how your own stiff morning feels; it's discomfort, and animals are simply more stoic about it than we are. The signs owners read as aging are the ones she reads as arthritis: a long stretch every time they get up, a pause before the stairs, a dog who used to jump into the back of the minivan and now stops and waits for a lift, a dog who hangs back on walks or seems less social. Her own dog Sprint taught her the lesson at 13, when a monthly injection turned "an older dog" back into one who galloped. She isn't promising puppies, and aging is real, but pain is a component in far more of these animals than anyone realizes, and it's one of the most manageable things she sees. She doesn't want her dogs living like that, and she has a big toolbox to make sure they don't. Ask Dr. Beth (31:44) The question (from a listener): "My dog is clearly stiff and I've got a bottle of Advil in the cupboard. Can I just give him one? He's a big dog." Dr. Beth's answer, in short: no — not ever. Ibuprofen (Advil) is a risky drug in a dog's stomach. Dogs are very sensitive to its gastrointestinal effects, and Dr. Beth has seen a dog die from perforated gastric ulcers caused by it.Size doesn't make it safe. A big dog is still a dog.Never give a cat acetaminophen (Tylenol). Cats lack the enzyme to break it down and it is lethal for them. Tylenol can be used in dogs at a vet-prescribed dose — but that's a decision for your vet, not the medicine cabinet.There are better, pet-specific options. Call the clinic and check before you give anything.Pain management doesn't have to be expensive. If budget is tight there are still things to try, and if you aren't getting the answers you want, pain specialists exist. Michael's takeaway: Go see your vet. Talk to your vet. And the bigger one, the thing that changed the game for him: he's had dogs that "just got old," and he didn't realize they were in pain. Rule that out before you accept the slowdown — there's a very good chance something can be done about it. Key Takeaways Stiffness is pain. The thing owners describe as "he's just stiff" is the thing vets call discomfort. Animals are stoic and adapt around it, so the slowdown gets mistaken for a personality change or plain old age. Cold doesn't cause arthritis — it reveals it. Warmth increases blood supply to joints. Cold means less ...
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    35 min
  • Dog Days in the Water

    Dog Days in the Water
    6 Aug 2026
    Swimming, Splashing & the Stuff Nobody Warns You About Season 1 · Episode 12 Run time: ~29 minutes Host: Michael Dargie Featuring: Dr. Beth Barrett, DVM Michael has spent a lot of summers with wet dogs. Billy, his Staffordshire-boxer cross, was built — as Michael puts it — like a torpedo with the buoyancy of a brick; he'd wade into the river happily and never once swim. Skaya the husky would fetch logs, actual floating logs, until somebody made her stop. And Heidi, the shepherd cross, spent an entire afternoon being quietly, methodically outwitted by a beaver. So when this conversation turned to dogs and water, Michael brought the stories, and Dr. Beth Barrett brought the clinical picture that explains every single one of them. The premise is simple and a little counterintuitive: water and dogs are pure summer magic, and the water is also exactly where a perfect day quietly goes sideways. Not in dramatic, horror-movie ways — in small, easy-to-miss ways that a prepared owner can head off completely. They start with the myth Michael believed his whole life: that every dog can swim. Plenty can't. Brick-built, barrel-chested, short-nosed dogs are dense with muscle, sit low, take on water through big open mouths, and struggle for air before they struggle to float — they end up bottom-down, top-up, paddling frantically and going nowhere. And it isn't only the breeds you'd expect. Dr. Beth spent hours in the water with Briar, a long, lean standard poodle with the textbook body for it, who simply never found the coordination. Her advice: let a dog tell you whether the water is their thing, and never over-face one that says no. From there it's the full swim-day picture. The fetch-till-they-drop dog has no off switch — Dr. Beth's own Zip and Saco would retrieve until they collapsed — which is why you have to be the brakes. Dogs overheat in water, especially as the season warms it up. And then two things most owners have never heard of: water intoxication, where a mouth held open around a ball or a log takes on so much water that it dilutes the body's sodium into a genuine, treatable-but-life-threatening emergency; and limber tail, the terrifying limp tail that sends people into a panic and is usually a few days of anti-inflammatories and rest. The back half is aftercare and Alberta. Rinsing the hot-spot and ear-infection risk off a dog as the water warms. Watching for blue-green algae — that oil-slick or spilled-green-paint look on the surface. Backcountry care when there's no garden hose and no vet down the road (Dr. Beth doesn't leave home without a bottle of Hibitane soap). River undercurrents and post-rain water levels that sweep dogs away. And the underwater hazards of northern "stick ponds," where a hard-charging retriever launches in and comes out with a gash up its chest. Plus the mailbag question Michael wrote himself, because it really happened: are beavers actually dangerous? Yes. Genuinely. And so, it turns out, is Florida. The throughline, as it so often is with Dr. Beth: your dog doesn't always know when to quit, so you have to be the sensible one. Be their advocate, read the day, and when in doubt, head home early. Chapters & Timestamps Time Segment 00:00 Cold open, disclaimer & welcome 01:31 Can every dog swim? (Spoiler: no) 04:02 Teaching a dog to swim — and when not to push 05:30 The fetch-till-they-drop dog: you're the brakes 07:33 Water intoxication — when swimming makes a dog sick 10:27 Limber tail: the scary limp tail, explained 13:18 After the swim: rinsing, ears & blue-green algae 15:58 Backcountry care: no hose, no vet down the road 18:29 Hazards owners miss: hose games, currents & runoff 20:59 Myth or Muzzle? — Does my dog know when to stop? 21:47 Ask Dr. Beth — Are beavers actually dangerous? 25:17 Michael's takeaways, stick ponds & outro Myth or Muzzle? (20:59) The claim: "My dog knows his own limits — he'll stop swimming or fetching when he's had enough." Verdict: MUZZLE IT. Dr. Beth: it's dog-dependent, and drive is the deciding factor. A lower-drive dog will pace itself, be mindful, take things easy. A high-drive dog, left to its own devices, will retrieve until it collapses from exhaustion — it simply doesn't have the self-preservation instinct to stop when it should. As Dr. Beth puts it, if somebody kept throwing something, her dogs would not know when to quit. That's exactly why the owner has to be the limiting factor: the parent, the sensible one, the person who ends the day before the dog would. Ask Dr. Beth (21:47) The question (from Michael — and it really happened): "We had a shepherd cross named Heidi, high prey drive, and there was a beaver at the dam in Beaumont Park she loved to 'play' with. The beaver would let her get close, slap its tail, dive under, and pop up behind her. At first we thought it was cute. Are beavers actually dangerous to dogs?" Dr. Beth's answer, in short: yes — genuinely. Beavers have drowned dogs. A big one ...
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    29 min
  • Worms & Wildlife: Echinococcus Multilocularis in Alberta

    Worms & Wildlife: Echinococcus Multilocularis in Alberta
    4 Aug 2026
    Season 1 · Episode 11 Run time: 26 Minutes Host: Michael Dargie Featuring: Dr. Beth Barrett, DVM Every so often a topic comes with a name so intimidating that people avoid talking about it altogether — and that, Dr. Beth Barrett says, is exactly the problem. Echinococcus multilocularis sounds like a spell from a fantasy novel (Michael gives it a heroic run and lands somewhere around "Alec-Kabam"), but most Albertans know it by its friendlier alias: the fox tapeworm. Here, it's really more of a coyote tapeworm. It's been in the headlines lately, and Dr. Beth wanted to get ahead of the worry rather than feed it. Her approach is the one she brings to everything: know your enemy, then make a plan. So this episode is a calm, thorough walk through what this parasite actually is, why Alberta has become a hotspot, and — most importantly — the handful of simple, inexpensive things that keep it away from your dog and your family. The short version, the one Dr. Beth keeps coming back to: this is rare, it's highly preventable, and you do not need to panic. The parasite itself is microscopic — a few millimetres, far too small to ever see. It lives quietly in coyotes and foxes, cycling through the mice they eat, and in those animals it causes no real trouble. The danger only appears when it lands somewhere it doesn't belong. Dogs can pick it up; people can too; and — good news for the cat households — cats appear to be spared. When it does land in the wrong host, the larval form settles into the liver and grows slowly, like a tumour, over five to fifteen years. Dr. Beth has seen it up close. She walks Michael through a case from her own practice: a four-kilogram acreage dog whose liver alone weighed 2.8 kilograms by the end — an abdomen so full of it that everything else was squished into one corner. And she connects it to the case that made the Alberta news, a woman whose suspected liver cancer turned out to be this parasite instead. That's the sobering part. The reassuring part is everything the back half of the episode is about: wash your hands, keep your dog clean, pick up the poop, and deworm on a schedule that fits your dog's life — with a product that actually contains praziquantel, because the pet-store dewormers (and the garlic, and the cayenne) won't touch it. Dr. Beth has already switched her own dogs to monthly. As she puts it, it's a slow-moving train — but it's a train you can see coming, and step off the tracks. Along the way: a name nobody can pronounce, a parasitologist on speed-dial in Guelph, a poop-roller named Saco, and a cat-caught mouse in the garage that explains exactly how easily this happens. Chapters & Timestamps Time Segment 00:00 Cold open & disclaimer 00:33 Welcome back to The Independent Vet 01:02 A name that sounds like a spell — Echinococcus multilocularis 01:49 Why it's in the headlines, and why Alberta 02:44 Section 1: How big is this thing? (It's microscopic) 03:34 The natural hosts: coyotes and foxes 04:26 The life cycle: rodents, eggs, and the larval liver form 06:53 The wrong hosts: dogs do, people can, cats don't 07:38 Why it's serious in people — a 5-to-15-year slow burn 08:09 The Alberta news case: a liver mistaken for cancer 08:58 A more aggressive European strain arrives 09:37 A short history: Alaska, Manitoba (1928), Minnesota (1977) 10:30 2013 onward: the sharp uptick in Alberta 11:09 Section 2: Dr. Beth's case — the 4 kg dog with the 2.8 kg liver 11:44 Why city dogs are now at risk (up to 60% of urban coyotes) 12:59 Inside the surgery: an abdomen full of liver 13:37 Consulting the parasitologist — and a prediction 14:26 Section 3: Can people be tested? And how do we prevent it? 15:17 Step one: wash your hands 15:53 Deworming: praziquantel and Interceptor Plus 16:55 Why monthly matters now 18:04 What doesn't work: pet-store dewormers, garlic, cayenne 18:20 Pick up the poop; manage rollers and mouse-eaters 19:52 Saco, Zip, and the cat-caught mouse in the garage 20:16 "Like insurance for your car" 20:25 Other parasites on the radar: roundworms and hookworms 20:58 Reminders, and why we all forget 22:12 The slow-moving train 22:53 Myth or Muzzle? 23:29 Ask Dr. Beth — the on-leash city dog 24:58 Michael's takeaways 25:51 Outro Myth or Muzzle? (22:53) The claim: "If my dog looks perfectly healthy, there's no way it's carrying a dangerous tapeworm." Verdict: MUZZLE IT. Dr. Beth: dogs are canids, and they can carry this exactly the way a fox or coyote does — as an intestinal parasite quietly shedding eggs. A dog with the intestinal form usually shows no symptoms at all. So a healthy-looking dog tells you nothing about whether it's shedding, which is the whole reason prevention matters even when everything seems fine. Ask Dr. Beth (23:29) The question: "My dog's a total city dog. We walk on leash, and he's never caught a rodent in his life. Do I really need to deworm for this?" Dr. Beth's answer, in short: it comes down to ...
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    26 min
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