Chances of getting rabies from my dog?

Dr. Marie replied:

Hi, I'm sorry to hear that this incident happened. It must have been quite frightening.

When reading this answer, keep in mind that I am not a human physician. It's always a good idea to contact your doctor when a human's health is in question. However, I can give you some general statements about dog bites and rabies.

Rabies has to be spread via saliva and this is why a dog bite is how the virus is transmitted. In your wife's case, the fact that there was barely any break in the skin tells me that it is extremely unlikely that any saliva was injected into her.

If you are in the USA or Canada, in most places there are very few cases of rabies. So this is in your favor as well. Rabies is a problem in other parts of the world such as India but cases of rabies in North America are very rare.

When an animal has rabies they get extremely ill VERY quickly. Usually you are seeing signs within a few days. An animal with rabies will usually have very unusual neurological symptoms such as hind end paralysis. The well known symptoms of rabies such as foaming at the mouth and snapping and extreme aggression come a few days later. It is really obvious that something is wrong with dogs who have rabies. Also they would have had to have been bitten by an infected animal within the last few days.

It is very very very unlikely for a vaccinated animal to transmit rabies, provided that the vaccines are up to date. In many cases, even if the vaccines are a year or two out of date they dog can still have good protection.

All of these things mentioned above make it extremely unlikely that rabies was transmitted by your dog to your wife.

The biggest concern with a dog bite is infection. It is good to keep the wound clean. (In your case if there is no break in the skin you likely don't have to do anything more.) I wouldn't be surprised if there is some swelling, bruising and redness in the next couple of days. But if you feel that the wound is getting infected then I would definitely see your doctor. Signs of infection include increasing redness, pain, oozing of yellow or green liquid or pus.

There really isn't anything that I can think of that would cause this to be a problem for your new baby. Congrats by the way! My 2 month old is sleeping next to me as I write this.

I hope that helps. Please let me know if you have more questions.

Dr. Marie.


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