The health of dogs is a well studied area in veterinary medicine.
Dog health is viewed holistically; it encompasses many different aspects, including disease processes, genetics, and nutritional health, for example. Infectious diseases that affect dogs are important not only from a veterinary standpoint, but also because of the risk to public health; an example of this is rabies. Genetic disorders also affect dogs, often due to selective breeding to produce individual dog breeds. Due to the popularity of both commercial and homemade dog foods, nutrition is also a heavily studied subject.