Dear Tracey

Thank you for the reminder about your letter requesting clarification of these issues, following on from the ANKC Conference.  I did receive that at the end of November but have been so fully occupied with commitments on behalf of Dogs Victoria, helping to formulate their submissions to the Codes of Practice shortly to be introduced as a significant amendment to current animal welfare legislation in that State.

It is nearly six months since the changes I had requested to ACES documentation (seeking to clarify ANKC’s position in regard to data base management) were agreed by the Ophthalmology Chapter and then approved in principle by AVA. It would have been my intention to copy the ‘marked up’ changes to ANKC at that time, so if I neglected to do that I most sincerely apologise. I have certainly been referring to the new copy in my communication with all  breed councils and clubs since then, and as far as I am aware there are no longer any outstanding  concerns, as I have heard nothing further from those members that had taken the trouble to set out their objections in detail.

The whole purpose of the series of talks I have been prepared to carry out in various States has been to provide factual answers to individual critics at the breed club level, and it is frustrating even after speaking to your national Conference of delegates, to be asked to re-explain points such as the basis for ACES fee setting, when this is clearly spelled out in the official Scheme Information and has never altered from the date ACES was launched.

The introduction of a properly structured national eye certification scheme with all the checks and balances that go with that, replaced the previous ‘non-system’ of ad-hoc eye assessments carried out by individual veterinarians, some of whom had been doing this on a private basis for years but were not actually State-registered eye specialists. The criteria for ACES Panel eligibility has been established  as part of the quality assurance framework insisted upon by AVA National, to protect the interests of end-users who are the members of all the ANKC-affiliated breed clubs. The only veterinarians eligible to issue ACES Certificates as part of an AVA- supervised and ANKC-endorsed national scheme are those registered as qualified eye specialists, who ELECT to serve on the appointed panel in their State of Residence. No other veterinarian (whether an AVA member or not) who is not so qualified is eligible to  participate in Australia’s national eye scheme or to issue ACES eye certificates, but there is nothing stopping any veterinarian issuing his or her own practice certificates and charging as much or as little as they choose.

There is no uniform Scale of Charges operating under the ACES Scheme – individual ACES Panellists set their fees according to their own practice costs, and are free to adopt different methods of calculating charges for multiple animals. There is NO recommended fee scale in operation and to my personal knowledge, charging methods do vary,  even amongst Panellists in the same city. That is the only way a national service structure like this can operate, as any attempt to ‘fix’ prices is of course prohibited  under federal Consumer Protection legislation. That is the explanation I have given at each  of the capital city meetings attended last year, but clearly there is still confusion in some quarters about what an ACES Certificate represents in terms of its built-in quality assurance, standards of assessment, access to a meaningful database and the review procedures available – compared to a general practitioner’s report form that offers none of those features! There are a number of reasons why charges may appear to have increased, not counting the comparisons made with services operating outside of ACES itself, which occurs only in WA. Some practices have been forced to review the way this service had been offered in the past, ‘taking stock’ of the time and resources committed under a more complicated recording system and have set their fees accordingly. Also, as a result of different specialist practice billing systems, some of the ophthalmologists include the AVA administration fee in their quoted ‘per-dog’ fee, while others charge it out as a separate item.

The supervisory roles of AVA National and the ANKC are clearly spelled out in the ACES Rules and Procedures. In accepting responsibility for overall administration and processing of results, AVA quite correctly set limits to what it was prepared to undertake on behalf of breeders and breed clubs, and prepared an operating budget that covered its own administrative functions, form printing and distribution, coordinating Panel activities and dealing with public enquiries; as well as the collection and filing of all returned report copies in a way that will allow breed data to be shared – not only with ANKC for whatever purposes are decided once the new computer capabilities are in place, but also for local and  international canine research. As part of that budgeted commitment, recouped by AVA as a very reasonable $10 charge on every ACES Certificate processed through the system (including whole litter assessments at a single $10 charge), AVA produces its own basic report which summarises everything happening in any particular breed during the previous reporting period – at no further cost to owners or club members.

Everything about the way in which ACES breed data is being collected and made available has been designed to support the needs of the breeds and ANKC-affiliated clubs, and there is no reason to suspect that AVA would have any other intention! The system has always been designed to deliver fully accessible information, and there is no argument as to who is responsible for what, or which party will be bearing the ultimate cost. We, the members of the Ophthalmology Chapter who serve on the ACES Panel are concerned only about providing a quality service in the interests of long term breed viability, while AVA National has seen to it that owner or client expectations can be satisfied to an internationally verifiable standard. The ANKC seeks to ensure that breed knowledge benefits , so through its Canine Health Committee and in consultation with all member bodies, was asked to outline their expectations and provide a list of conditions for national endorsement, which have been complied with in the establishment of the Scheme, without alteration apart from that required to comply with consumer protection law.

The Australian Canine Eye Scheme is working perfectly well, and is being used across the country to provide the necessary owner assurances. For the first time in twenty years that ‘ad-hoc’ eye certificates have been issued, we are seeing the beginnings of a worthwhile multi-breed information database that will allow more accurate conclusions to be drawn on the direction any breed is heading, or the threats it may be faced with. Regardless of the breed, many owners have yet to appreciate the true value of the comprehensive report issued at an annual ACES exam, with only a handful of breeds submitting more than 10% of annual registrations in the 2007 reporting period.

I believe I supplied this breed data summary immediately following the ANKC Annual Conference, but once again for the information of all member bodies I will attach the ACES individual breed report figures for 2007, expressed as a percentage of annual registrations in the 2005 year. Individual copies of every report form issued to date are safely filed with the AVA office in Canberra and will be maintained as annual summary figures breed by breed, until such time as the ANKC national computer system is ready to access and process this information. Hopefully when that time comes, there will be the opportunity for constructive input from all parties with an interest in monitoring breed statistics, so that all required features of the different canine health surveillance schemes can be incorporated into the newly developed software.

As requested, I also attach copies of the original ACES Rules and Procedures and the ACES Information for Owners, marked up to show where the various changes and deletions have been made, together with revised copies of the same documents, as they appear on the AVA website with recent information updates. Two additional documents, the ACES Information for Panellists and the Diagnostic Criteria Supplement are also accessible through the AVA website, in the ‘Members only’ section.

On behalf of all members of the AVA appointed national ACES Panel, I look forward to an atmosphere of mutual understanding and support from each of the State controlling bodies, during 2008.