a Legacy in Parasitology

Dr. Joseph “Carl” Fox retired this year leaving behind a body of work that has changed the practice of veterinary medicine.

Fox, who began his tenure as a CVHS faculty member in August 1978, held a bachelor’s and master’s degree in zoology and a doctorate with post doctoral studies in parasites. As a professor of parasitology, he and his colleagues made up a formidable team.

“I loved my job here. I loved the teaching part of it. I enjoyed the diagnostic services we offered to the community,” Fox says. “With many colleagues over the years, I was able to be involved in joint research projects, which was very rewarding. All of it was rewarding — the outreach, the research, the services and the teaching.”

He says mentoring and assisting graduate students with their research and developing the first heartworm test were the major highlights of his 27-year career. He also counts among his greatest achievements chairing the committee responsible for hiring Dr. Susan Little to replace Dr. Ewing.

New heartworm tests exist now, but veterinarians used his test for many years. In addition, Fox discovered leishmaniasis in dogs, developed diagnostic tests and offered laboratory services to the community.

One of the diagnostic tests Fox developed was a Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) test, which detects parasite DNA to determine if a dog is infected with a particular parasite.

Thanks to Fox’s work, OSU became known as one of the few places to perform Equine Protozoal Myeloencephalitis (EPM) tests to detect EOM, a nerve disease of horses. “The disease can cause many clinical problems including death,” he says. “We tested horses from all over the United States.”

An inaccurate report on leishmaniasis in the O’Colly led people to believe there was a disease outbreak that made their noses fall off, Fox says. He eventually appeared on television to calm the public but not before the story received national attention.

“If the word gets out wrong, sometimes there are consequences, but in this case the media attention resulted in Walter Reed Army Hospital contacting the college and coming to look at the dogs and our work,” he says.

“This was so important because this is the type of disease that is a threat to our soldiers abroad, including in Iraq today. Dogs in foreign countries can get infected with leishmaniasis and transmit it to our soldiers, many of whom have returned home with this disease.”