The establishment of the intestinal microbiota is critical for the digestive and immune systems. We studied the early development of the rectal microbiota in horse, a hindgut fermenter, from birth until 7 days of age, by qPCR and 16S rRNA gene amplicon sequencing. To evaluate initial sources of the foal microbiota, we characterised dam fecal, vaginal and oral microbiotas. We utilised an amplicon sequence variant (ASV) pipeline to maximise resolution and reproducibility. Stringent ASV filtering based on prevalence and abundance in samples and controls purged contaminants while preserving intestinal taxa. Sampled within 20 minutes after birth, rectal meconium contained small amounts of diverse bacterial DNA, with a profile closer to mare feces than mouth. 24 hours after birth, rectum was colonised by Firmicutes and Proteobacteria, some foals dominated by single genera. At day 7, the rectal genera were still different from adult feces. The mare vaginal microbiota contributed to 24 h and 7 day microbiotas. It contained few lactobacilli, withCorynebacterium,Porphyromonas,CampylobacterandHelcococcusas the most abundant genera. In the oral mucosa,Gemellawas extremely abundant. Our observations indicate that bacteria or bacterial components are present in the intestine immediately after birth, but the newborn microbiota changes rapidly.

With the increased supply and demand of veterinary continuing education (CE) and the growing number of CE providers, a clear need has arisen for a multinational accreditation system for veterinary CE. The objective of this document is to describe the current state of veterinary CE accreditation and the development of an accreditation system for veterinary CE, and discuss accreditation criteria and their pedagogical and practical significance. The hypothesis is that a profile of essential, pedagogically grounded, accreditation criteria can be established and utilized effectively in quality assessment. Accreditation criteria for veterinary CE can be created based on four selection principles: educational minimum requirements, coherence, efficacy, and assessability. The selected educational quality criteria are related to needs assessment, correlation of target audience and level of instruction, definition of scope, workload, and number of credits, organizer and instructor qualifications, constructive alignment, assessment of learning, learner engagement, and scientific quality of CE content. The created accreditation criteria and protocols should be regularly re-evaluated and modified in close collaboration with the relevant stakeholders. The desired outcome of CE, including behavior change and improvement of practice and ultimately human and animal health, remains challenging to predict based on course descriptions by the providers, and further research is needed.