Course curriculum

  • 01

    Essentials of Canine and Feline Gastroenterology

    • A note regarding the subtitles provided for this course

    • Chronic enteropathies in cats: work-up and treatment – part I

    • Chronic enteropathies in cats: work-up and treatment – part II

    • Clinical manifestations of gastrointestinal disorders

    • Feline acute gastroenteritis

    • Esophageal disorders in dogs – more common than you thought

    • Practical pearls for the diagnosis and management of the vomiting dog and cat

    • Rational approach to diagnosing and managing acute diarrhea in dogs

    • What’s the latest on diagnosing and managing constipation in cats?

    • Rational approach to diagnosing and managing chronic diarrhea in dogs

    • Diagnostic approach to the jaundiced patient

    • Bonus: Stanley Marks Top 16 pearls for Diagnosing & Managing Chronic Diarrhea

Karin Allenspach

Meet your instructor

Karin Allenspach received her veterinary degree from the University of Zurich. She did an internship in small animal emergency medicine and critical care at Tufts University and a residency in small animal internal medicine at the University of Pennsylvania, and is a diplomate of the European College of Veterinary Internal Medicine. She was awarded a PhD in veterinary immunology from the University of Bern, Switzerland for her work on canine chronic enteropathies. Karin has published >125 peer-reviewed publications and has a current H factor of 41. She is currently employed as Professor of Small Animal Internal Medicine at the University of Georgia, Athens, USA and is a PI of the SMART Translational medicine Lab at ISU, which focuses on the development and culture of adult stem stem-cell-derived organoids from various species. Her latest efforts have resulted in the founding of a start-up company (3D Health Solutions, Inc.) with the goal of commercializing assays for drug screening based on organoid methods.

Stanley Marks

Meet your instructor

Dr. Stanley Marks graduated from the University of Pretoria, South Africa, and completed an internship in small animal medicine and surgery at the University of Missouri, Columbia. He completed a small animal internal medicine residency at the University of Florida and an oncology residency at the University of California, Davis. Thereafter, Dr. Marks received his PhD degree in Nutrition from the University of California, Davis, School of Veterinary Medicine, where he is currently a Professor in the Department of Medicine and Epidemiology. Dr. Marks is a Diplomate of the American College of Veterinary Internal Medicine (ACVIM) in the subspecialties of internal medicine, oncology, and nutrition. He is the immediate past President of the Comparative Gastroenterology Society and the Director of the Companion Animal Gastrointestinal Laboratory at UC Davis that focuses on furthering our understanding and knowledge of canine and feline infectious enteropathies. In addition, Dr. Marks has clinical and research interests in deglutology, with an emphasis on canine esophageal motility disorders and gastroesophageal reflux.  Dr. Marks has received 10 faculty teaching awards at UC Davis during his career, and was honored to be selected the Speaker of the Year at the NAVC Conference and the Canadian Veterinary Medical Association Convention. In addition, he is the recipient of the 2022 AVMA Career Achievement in Canine Research Award. He has authored or co-authored over 140 manuscripts in the areas of canine and feline gastroenterology, has contributed over 60 textbook chapters, and has lectured extensively worldwide.

Linda Toresson

Meet your instructor

Linda Toresson graduated from the Swedish University of Agricultural Science, and became a Swedish Specialist in diseases of dogs and cats in 2002 and a Swedish Specialist in Small Animal Internal Medicine in 2007. She has combined clinical practice, focusing on gastrointestinal disorders, at a referral animal hospital (Evidensia Specialist Animal Hospital, Helsingborg, Sweden), with research throughout most of her career. Linda served as the Medical Director during 2007-2013, a position she left to become an external part-time PhD-student in gastroenterology at Helsinki University. In 2018, she presented her thesis on oral cobalamin supplementation in dogs with chronic enteropathies. She has collaborated with professors Jan Suchodolski and Joerg Steiner at the Gastrointestinal Laboratory at Texas A&M University in College Station, Texas for many years. Currently, she is a senior consultant in GI at the Evidensia Specialist Animal Hospital in Sweden and is still affiliated with Helsinki University as a post-doc. She is especially interested in the intestinal microbiome, fecal microbiota transplantation, bile acid diarrhea, cobalamin deficiency and the link between emotional stability and chronic enteropathies. She is a board member of the European Society of Comparative Gastroenterology and a member of Comparative gastroenterology Society as well as a member of several advisory boards, including the Companion Animal Fecal Bank Consortium and the Scientific Committee of the Swedish Medical Product Agency.