DrAndyRoark.com

Articles, Videos, & Training on Pets & Veterinary Medicine

Sarah Boston, DVM, DVSC, DIPL ACVS

My Dog Is Not a Petting Zoo

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My dog is my constant companion. I take him everywhere with me. I choose restaurants based on their patio and dog/patio policy. He is one of the joys of my life. I love him unreasonable amounts. He is awesome. I could go on. I will go on, later.

What he is not, however, is a petting zoo. He is not here to entertain other people and he is definitely not here for the amusement of children. I know that sounds harsh. Maybe it is, but I have a point. Here is my point.

I used to let anyone who asked, any kid or adult, pet Rumble. I would let them interrupt me, my meal, my conversation, my blog writing, and pet him. I would make him sit and submit to being “petted.” Even though he doesn’t really like affection from strangers that much. Even though I can see it makes him feel a bit insecure and stressed, especially if the petting goes on for too long or if people start commanding him do things like “shake a paw.” Why do people do that? It’s so weird.

I told myself it was good socialization for him. And it was, when he was a puppy. But now he is a dog. He is fully formed. The bottom line is that he is a herding dog, he is not that cuddly (even with me, snuggles are not his thing) and he does not seek out or particularly enjoy random petting from strangers. He just wants to sit near me quietly. He is extremely obedient and a lot of people ask me if he is a service dog because he is so calm and quiet. (See above, my dog is awesome.)

A few months ago, I was out for dinner at one of my favourite places. Okay, that is not even true, it had a dog-friendly patio and mediocre food, so I went there. Partway through my meal, a minivan rolled up and a woman with somewhere between four and 12 small children between the ages of one and eight streamed out. (I can age a stray dog within a few months, but I am not very good with packs of small children.) They were a handful. I would have felt sorry for this woman but, you know, choices.

Anyway, except for being loud, the gang of small children at the next table left us to our own devices while they were feeding. As the pack started to finish up, they started to look around for other things to do. They spotted my sweet dog, lying under the table quietly, minding his own business. Two of the children descended on him. Their mother was tending to a one to three year old infant(?) who was wailing and crying, so she let them go. They were on their hands and knees trying to get to my dog. They didn’t ask. She then came over to our table and another couple of the children joined the kids trying to get to my dog. She was holding the screaming infant/toddler directly over my dog, trying to stop him from crying by saying, “Look at the puppy! Puppy dog!” I will just give you a moment to try to imagine what happened next.

Take your time.

Okay, he didn’t bite anyone, but he gave a warning lunge and it scared me because he could have bitten one of the kids and I should have shut it all down sooner. I finally said “Ok, I think that is enough, you need to leave him alone now.” I was mortified and almost started crying. Even though this is actually completely normal behaviour for a dog, and he was just giving a warning that he wanted to be left alone. Still, I was also left feeling somewhat ashamed of him for being a “bad dog.”  If he had bitten, it would be completely my fault and I might get sued, or much worse, have to destroy my dog. My heart.

It was a terrible experience, but I am grateful for it because it woke me up. My dog is not here for everyone else. He is here for me. He is not a toy, he is my best friend. It is my job to protect him from stressful situations where he might hurt someone or get into trouble. Yes, he must be well-socialized and well-behaved. He is. But I am not obliged to let anyone who wants to pet him say hello, just because they want to.

So I have started saying no sometimes. Mostly to children because I think they are most at risk for a negative interaction. Here is how I decide: if the kid is rude, loud, unruly, comes running up to the dog, doesn’t ask me if they can pet him, or if I think that the parents are just trying to distract their child with my dog-plaything, I just politely say no. I can spot the parents that see my dog as a toy because they are usually exiting the restaurant with a crying kid. Rumble and I are the unsuspecting targets on the patio. I can see the desperation in their eyes as they scan the patio and parking lot for something, anything, for their kid to focus on so they stop crying.

Nope, not Rumble, not today, keep on walking.  I just say no, I’m sorry you can’t pet him. I have encountered some truly aghast four year olds since I put this new policy into place. They are shocked that they can not rush, ride, poke and pet my dog. I had a kid get all up in my grill and say, “What dog doesn’t like kids?!!???” I didn’t respond, but I wanted to say, most dogs do not like kids who are loud, unpredictable, running at them, or who are not gentle or kind, and anyway, you are not touching my dog.

This new policy is not universal because I do think that socialization is important for my dog and he really is a gentle soul and a good boy. I want him to have positive interactions with children. And yes, I recognize that he likely is the most adorable dog in the entire world. I mean, who would not want to scratch his ears and look into his gorgeous eyes? Of course you do. We can even talk about how he is a rescue if you want to. But I reserve this special privilege for the kids that approach softly, the ones that are quiet and the ones that are drawn to the dog because they genuinely love animals.

They are not being pushed over by their parents, they approach on their own and politely ask permission to pet my dog. They are happy to meet him. They want to know his name. This gives me a chance to get him out from under the table and sitting and ready to greet them. He is trained for this. He knows the drill. He wags his tail and then sniffs their ears. He is big on sniffing little kids’ ears. He says hello, they pet him and then, after a minute or so, I tell them that he is done now, thank you. And that is that.

Any dog can bite, no matter how well-socialized or friendly they are. Training and socialization are an important part of preventing dog bites. The part I was missing was preventing interactions that may cause my dog to feel cornered or stressed. It is liberating to realize that my dog is not here for general consumption. I don’t have to put him or anyone at risk because I am trying to be polite. It’s not that I don’t trust him, it’s the humans who have not had basic obedience training that I don’t trust.

The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the position of the DrAndyRoark.com editorial team.

It’s Time To Talk About Declaws

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Some people in the general public would like to believe that declawing a cat is a friendly little procedure where those pesky nails are magically and painlessly removed and the cat is returned to them, neutralized and unable to destroy the furniture.

Even the word declaw, which is distinctly nonmedical, implies that it is no big deal. I think it’s a big deal. I suspect the cat does too. This procedure involves an amputation of the last portion of every digit through the joint. Usually this is done on the front paws. In Quebec, they sometimes declaw all four paws. Mon Dieu! That is messed up.

Despite, or maybe because of my exposure to veterinary practice from a young age, I have always been horrified by this procedure. As a child, I watched the procedure and then watched the cats recover; their bandaged bleeding paws curled under them, and a look on their faces that conveyed pain, betrayal and sadness to my childhood understanding of cat-speak.

I feel depressed just thinking about the way those cats looked at me. I have never been able to shake the feeling that this procedure is just wrong. I decided early on that when I became a veterinarian, I would not do declaws.

I have stuck to this promise to my feline friends. When I was an intern in 1996, the supervising surgeon tried to force me to do a declaw. She said that I had to do it because I needed to know how to do the procedure. She did not believe that as a licensed Doctor of Veterinary Medicine and adult person, that I could make this decision for myself. She lorded her considerable power over me. A pissing match ensued.

It was all unsaid, but I knew that I was facing a decision – kiss this woman’s ass like interns are supposed to (especially interns that want to be surgeons when they grow up) and declaw the cat, or refuse to do it and piss her off forever. I can remember sobbing on the phone to my dad, saying that I just couldn’t do it. (I chose the piss her off forever option and paid the price.)

During the three years I spent in general practice (trying to get a surgery residency) I continued to refuse to do this procedure. I would try my best to educate my clients. I would always start my new kitten exams by asking, “How is the training going?”

They always thought I meant litter box training and that was my awesome segue into how to train your kitten not to scratch the furniture. Then I would give them my amazing new kitten handout with tips to help them to train their kitten not to be destructive and to allow nail trims. I would explain to them what a declaw involved.

The antithesis to these attempts at client education was my boss. She believed that if you are going to declaw a cat, you should do it very young, because kittens tolerate it so much better than adults. She had a point, because declawing a kitten is definitely much easier on them than it is on an adult cat. Declawing a fat old cat is a tragedy.

However, the problem with this logic is that if you declaw kittens, you lose the opportunity to train them. It’s a catch 22. There have been major advances in pain control and surgical technique in the past 20 years that definitely help. Nerve blocks before the procedure, excellent new analgesics and even using a laser scalpel, have all been shown to decrease pain post operatively. That is all great, but I still think it is a rotten thing to do to a cat, and a rotten thing to ask of a professional who dedicates their life to helping animals.

When I was in general practice, I would always try to understand why the declaw was being requested. I once had clients bring in an adult cat for a declaw because Grandma was visiting for the holidays and they didn’t want the cat to rip up Grandma’s thin, crêpey skin. The cat had never been destructive or aggressive. They wanted to surgically alter their cat for Granny’s three-week visit.

I talked them into letting me put some nail caps on the cat. These are little rubber caps that can be glued over the nail to prevent damage to the furniture. They need to be changed every 6-8 weeks but they work great. They also come in fashionable colors. Grandma’s legs and the cat’s toes were spared. It was a Christmas miracle.

For some people, there is no talking to them or educating them. As soon as I tried, they would shut me down. They would say things like, “The only cat I will have in my house is a declawed cat.”  Sometimes it was a husband-wife issue. “My husband won’t let me have a cat unless it is declawed.” There is so much wrong with that statement that I don’t even know where to start. And this is the dilemma that has been both thrust upon, and created by our profession.

There are so many homeless cats and the ones that end up in a shelter usually are soon-to-be dead cats. That is the reality. They are basically a disposable pet and yes, people do dispose of them when they are not enjoying them any more. Usually the enjoyment ends around the time when the couch is getting scratched, the litter box stinks and there is cat hair everywhere.

So what is a vet to do?

This is a horrible position that veterinarians have been put in/have put ourselves in. As a profession, we acquiesce and accept this procedure, with the hope that this means that these cats will have good homes and lives. (This is sometimes true, but not always.) It’s fine to be a vet who refuses to do declaws, but every vet who refuses to do declaws knows deep down that one of their colleagues will have to take on this burden for them.

Our clients demand this service and they threaten us with the promise that they will euthanize or dump their cat if it is destructive or has claws. What if we called their bluff? What if we actually told a client that if they don’t want their pet anymore, they should take them to the animal shelter. A lot of people would probably do just that. A lot of people do that anyway.

This service of declawing was obviously started by veterinarians. Now we can’t/won’t stop. It is banned or simply not practiced everywhere outside of North America (UK, Australia, New Zealand, most of Europe). And there are regions within North America where declawing is banned. So the rest of the world has to deal with alternatives. Why can’t we?

Our North American society is addicted to the convenience of dropping the cat off and returning it with no claws. Instead of training, buying a scratching post, clipping nails, using nail caps, and possibly dealing with the fact that life with pets (and kids) is a bit messy.

My question is, when people start to learn exactly what the procedure is, what are they going to think of us as a profession? Are they going to turn on us? Are they going to say that they didn’t understand that a declaw is ten little amputations? Are they going to argue that this was never explained to them? Are Dr. Google or the Cyber-Bullies going to be the ones to tell them or are we?

I think as a profession, we need to reconsider this procedure and have the conversation. It’s time. When a surgical procedure permanently alters an animal in an effort to protect a couch, I think it is time for some group reflection. What if we all say no to doing this procedure as a profession? What if we were to mobilize and make the procedure illegal in North America too? What would happen?

I suspect that a group of cat owners would stop having cats, another group would use nail caps or train them, a group of cats would be dumped at the shelter, and shelters would continue to be overrun by unwanted cats. Eventually, a new cat equilibrium would be reached.

This issue is polarizing for our profession, which is why we don’t like to talk about it. I believe that all veterinarians are trying to do the right thing for our feline patients, in doing and not doing this procedure. We just don’t all agree on what the best thing is. However, I believe that this conversation and decision should be made by veterinary professionals and not the court of the internet or pubic opinion.

The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the position of the DrAndyRoark.com editorial team.

Clients Behaving Badly: A Day in the Life

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Recently, I saw a dog for a sarcoma. The consultation was arranged after the owner was yelling at our staff in the waiting area that he needed be seen immediately for the tumour that had been growing on his dog’s leg for the past year and was not bothering the dog. However, he had spent thousands at our hospital and demanded to be seen at once. He was told that we did not have a surgical oncology appointment available, but that he could be seen by one of the emergency doctors if he needed immediate assistance. He refused, he only wanted to see a surgical oncologist, nothing else would do and he was belligerent with everyone trying to help him.

He saw me about a week later, during a scheduled appointment. We discussed recommendations, and he argued with me about each one, telling me that he didn’t think that the workup that I recommended was necessary. In the end, he decided not to treat. As our consultation was drawing to a close, the owner nodded my way and said, “Oh, and I need some more Heartguard”. I asked him who his family veterinarian was and he said that he didn’t have one. I told him that I did not manage heartworm prevention because I am a surgical oncologist, not a general practitioner. He was not amused.

When I left the room, he asked the student to get him some heartworm medication (which she cannot do because she is not a veterinarian). Quick tangent: When my own dog developed his Florida-Allergy Dermatitis, I took him to a veterinary dermatologist (because I don’t know anything about managing itchy dogs anymore either.) The dermatology technician asked me what he was on for heartworm prevention and I said, “Advantix”. She told me it doesn’t get heartworm. I said, “It doesn’t?” then burst into tears. (Note: Rumble was negative for heartworm on two consecutive tests and is on appropriate prevention now.) My point is that I don’t even script heartworm prevention for my own pets anymore and I don’t prescribe it to my surgical oncology patients either. My other point is that I do not love being treated like someone’s Heartguard bitch. No one does.

My colleague recently told me about a stray dog that was found and brought in to the emergency hospital where he worked. The emergency doctors and technicians located and contacted the owner, who could not come and pick up her dog until the end of the day. The dog was fed, watered, walked and kept safe until his owner could collect him. When the owner (finally) came to get her dog, she was not charged anything for this good Samaritan service, but still, she complained that her dog’s nails had not been trimmed during his big day at the vet, because “That’s what vets are supposed to do.” That really happened. Who are these people?

I also recently saw a 62kg Labrador Retriever with a pathological fracture due to osteosarcoma- that is, a broken leg due to bone cancer. It’s hard to describe how obese a 62kg lab is (ed note: 136 pounds), but we had a long discussion with the owner about how I was not sure how the dog was going to do after limb amputation, but that this was the only treatment option. We also could not do a test called a bone scan to look for spread of the cancer to other bones (which I always recommend) because he was so painful and his leg was broken, we needed to address this right away and then consider a bone scan later. I also told him that I didn’t think the dog would walk for at least a month. I gave a guarded prognosis and we also talked about euthanasia, but he wanted to try.

We did an amputation. The dog proved me wrong and after some serious heavy lifting by myself and the other clinicians and staff, we had him walking with sling support within a few days and he went home. We were so happy! Then, a couple of months later, I received a personal letter at work. Usually personal letters at work are nice thank you notes from grateful clients. The letter was from this owner, he detailed that his dog had died, likely due to spread of the cancer to the spine. He closed the letter, “I hope that everyone involved received their commission. Just another business transaction.” He signed it from his dog and enclosed a picture. He also enclosed one of the super cute bandanas that I give to all of my cancer patients that say “Cancer Survivor”, only he had cut out the word “Survivor” so it just said, “Cancer”. The whole thing had a creepy serial killer vibe and was intended to make me feel awful. It did. Interestingly, academic surgeons do not make a commission and there is zero financial motivation in our casework. It is one of my favourite things about being an academic clinician.

We recently had another client whose dog had had a lung lobectomy for lung cancer and an adrenalectomy for an adrenal tumour. Everything went great and she was very grateful. When we sent the dog home on a Friday, he was discharged with all of the required medications. She then called on Saturday and said that we forgot to give her one of the medications. My intern was positive that she had it and went to great lengths to talk to her multiple times to spell out the medications on the phone and to give her instructions. He was patient and kind.

She called back again and talked to an emergency doctor, insisting that we had not sent her home with all of the medications that she needed for her dog. The doctor apologized, went over the file and called in the prescription to a pharmacy. She then called again on Monday and went over things again, realizing that she did have the medication in question all along. She then filed a complaint through our online system that we should have never called in a prescription for a medication that she already had, insisting on being reimbursed for the second prescription that she did not need.

I called her to discuss. When she realized that the lady on the phone was the same person as the surgeon who had “saved her dog’s life” she became hysterical. She said that she didn’t want me to get into trouble and didn’t want a complaint against me because she was really happy with everything that I did for her dog. I told her that we are all the same people and I just wanted to resolve things. She was clearly mortified that this seemingly anonymous complaint method had found its way back to me and was going to get me in some sort of trouble. She started crying and asked if we could just “drop it”. I told her that would be fine.

You are probably thinking, wow, that is some crazy stuff, you must have saved these stories up for years! But no, these are just a few things that happened recently that I can think of off the top of my head. Clients who lie, yell and push to get what they want is becoming so common that I could literally write a blog called “Clients Behaving Badly” about it every week.

It’s frustrating because being a veterinarian is hard enough. Being a good clinician and trying to help our patients to be as healthy as they can be, watching animals suffer at times, and letting them go when we can no longer help them is all pretty challenging. In short, being a veterinarian is hard. When clients behave badly, it makes our first task, caring for the patient, much more difficult.

So, to all of you naughty clients out there: We know you are stressed, we know this is your fur baby. We are here to help you. Mistreating your veterinarian will not make the care better. It might make it worse. If you really feel like your veterinarian is not on the up and up, you should not entrust them with your pet’s care. Trust is the foundation of our veterinarian-client-patient relationship. I honestly do not want to do surgery on a dog or cat with an owner who does not inherently feel that they trust me and that my sole motivation is to work in their pet’s best interest. I know it is hard to be good, but please don’t make a stressful day for you even more stressful by bringing your bad behaviour.

Be good. Sit, stay.

The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the position of the DrAndyRoark.com editorial team.

Can I be a SuperVet and have a Superlife?

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Sarah Boston, DVM, DVSc, Dipl ACVS
Guest Author SARAH BOSTON, DVM, DVSc, Dipl ACVS

Can I be a SuperVet and have a Superlife? The latest Tweet from #SuperVet would suggest no, you can’t. @SupervetNF is a friend and colleague. I admire him for many reasons, but his latest tweet got me thinking. It said:

“The patient always comes first, and that may be at the cost of your own personal life. If you aren’t prepared for that, it’s not a vocation, it’s a job.”

This may all be in the name of reality show greatness. (I should disclose that I would like nothing more than to have a veterinary surgical oncology reality TV show. Maybe I’m just a bit jelly.) However, I think that this quote represents a dangerous idea for our profession. Let’s unpack this a bit.

I agree with the first part, the patient should always come first. The patient should come before money, our own opinions, interdepartmental squabbles about whose case it is, and even the client’s wishes. I have always said that when I am faced with a veterinary medicine dilemma, focusing on the patient always keeps on the right path. Always? Always.

The next part is the concerning part for me, “that it may be at the cost of your own personal life”.  This is rather dramatic, isn’t it? Is it not possible to do both? Can we not set up our practice in a way that always takes excellent care of the patient, the client and the veterinarian? And it’s also a little judgey. It suggests that if you don’t sacrifice your personal life, then you are not putting the patient first and you are not a supervet.

The second part, is also troubling, the hairsplitting definition of job versus vocation “If you aren’t prepared for that”. Most veterinarians feel a calling to work with animals and to help people. Most fulfill the vocation part of the test for moral high ground in their occupation of choice. Most veterinarians have sacrificed a lot, just to be veterinarians. Do we have to keep sacrificing every day, just to prove that what we are doing has a greater purpose. I would argue that we might be healthier as a profession if more veterinarians treated their job like a job. It is a job by most definitions of the word job. It would be better for everyone to just do their job, not worry about everyone else’s job, and then go home from their job to their real life. Can we just call veterinary medicine a profession or a career and leave it at that?

supervet

The sentiment of these statements perfectly summarizes the danger that we continue to face in this profession. These two sentences, meant to inspire, are a recipe for compassion fatigue. These sentences tell us that those in the profession who care enough to sacrifice their personal lives are better than those that set boundaries, because then it is just a job. This is the philosophy of the Compassion Fatiguers (#CompassionFatiguers).

It is both judgment and justification for the self-judgment that always comes when we give up more of yourself than we care to. This sentiment is not healthy. It leads veterinarians to feel that they are selfish if they want to have a life outside of work and that if they are not willing to give this up, they are less than veterinarians who sacrifice. They just have jobs. This feeling can also lead to depression, suicide, compassion fatigue and burnout.

This feeling is a lie.

We can take great care of patients and of ourselves. But it requires setting boundaries and feeling a bit counter-culture to our profession when we do this. Dedication to our patients is admirable, but martyrdom is not. We can’t take care of our patients or clients unless we take care of ourselves. Our veterinary influencers need to teach the new generation of veterinarians this mantra, or they will end up just like us, and that is not a good thing. For me, creating these boundaries feels a bit like swimming upstream over a waterfall and around a hungry grizzly bear. But we have to try to make it to the top of the stream. If we can, there is a whole school of tired salmon up there waiting, spawning big ideas.

The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the position of the DrAndyRoark.com editorial team.

Fuzzy the Cat – A Christmas Story

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Sarah Boston, DVM, DVSc, Dipl ACVS
Guest Author SARAH BOSTON, DVM, DVSc, Dipl ACVS

It was Christmas, 1997 and I was living in Edmonton, AB. There were three vets at the small animal practice where I worked. The boss and owner was named Sue, but I’ll call her Schmoo, because that is what I called her when I was not speaking directly to her. My husband decided to go back to Ontario to be with his family. Then Schmoo decided that I would be working for the holidays. I was (mostly) okay with this, as I have never been a very Christmassy person.

The other two female veterinarians that I worked with had children and you know how it is. People with children always seem to think that they have the right to more time off at Christmas (and evenings and weekends). What would a childless person possibly do with their time-off? Christmas is basically meaningless if you have not experienced this miracle yourself in a slightly less immaculate fashion.

The practice was closed over the holidays, but there were patients that were boarding with us. I had to check on them once a day and to make sure all was okay during their stay. We were not on-call for emergencies because there was an emergency clinic in town for this. The sick pets that were at our hospital over the holidays had options. Either be transferred to the emergency clinic for continued care or be transferred to Jesus. (Sorry, bad vet humor, but it’s true).

Some people try desperately to get their dying pets to make it through the holidays. Then bring them in for their post-Christmas euthanasia. This is not a good plan. Pets are really not that into celebrating the birth of Christ or any other holiday fun. Keeping them alive when they are terminal or suffering in the name of having them for Christmas is something that most people will regret after the fact.

It was the afternoon of December 24th and every case had been appropriately transferred (home, emergency clinic or Jesus). I was doing a last check of the boarding patients and working on paperwork when I heard Schmoo on the phone talking about a blocked cat. I heard “Yes, that’s fine, you can bring him here.” Not only was she allowing the cat to be transferred here, but she seemed to be trying to convince the person on the other end of the phone to bring him. This was bad, very bad.

Schmoo got off the phone and told me that her sister was bringing her cat in to the hospital… from Calgary. The cat had blocked the day before. This is a condition where male cats develop crystals and sludge in their bladder, likely due to their commercial diet. The crystals and sludge then accumulate and obstruct their extremely small urethra that runs through their extremely small penis.

FuzzyFuzzy the cat, was doing just fine. The obstruction had been relieved and he was in a veterinary hospital in Calgary, with a urinary catheter in place. It is possible that the vet in Calgary was trying to clean-out the hospital for the holidays, just like I was, and encouraging Fuzzy to find another place to convalesce for the holidays. Schmoo and the vet in Calgary convinced Schmoo’s sister and Fuzzy was en route to Edmonton.

You would think that if you invited your sister’s cat to spend the holidays recuperating at your veterinary hospital as a favor to your sister, that you would be the one taking care of him. So did I. Instead, Fuzzy became my responsibility over Christmas. So I tucked Fuzzy in for the night with his urinary catheter and his intravenous fluids. Christmas morning, I went in to see him and he was still doing great. He had had the urinary catheter in place for over 48 hours, so I decided to remove it.

In retrospect, this was not a great plan. Though I couldn’t leave it in until we opened in four days time. I went back to check on him again that afternoon and he was crying and straining in his litter box, with a bladder that felt like a big hard orange. He had reblocked. Treating this obstruction would require general anesthesia to recatheterize and unblock the urethra. There were no technicians on-call to help me because it was Christmas and because normally you would go to a fully staffed emergency clinic if you had a blocked cat on Christmas Day.

So I called Schmoo. Partly to ask her for help me and partly to let her know that her sister’s cat had a life-threatening urethral obstruction. Schmoo then gave me an earful about how I should be able to anesthetize the cat and unblock him on my own. Blah blah blah twelve people at my house blah blah blah Christmas dinner blah blah blah I can’t help you.

I got to work anesthetizing Fuzzy myself. Yes I could do it alone, but you can’t monitor anesthesia and unblock a cat at the same time. When this happens, patient safety is severely compromised and I was not keen to be responsible for the anesthetic death of my boss’ sister’s cat. I was working on trying to catheterize him when Schmoo showed up, pissed off at I don’t know what and coming to help. Only at this point I didn’t need her help anymore. I think she was just breezing in to improve the optics of the situation. And to maybe try to relieve her guilt for being such a bitch to me on Christmas. Too late. The cat was anesthetized, lying on his stomach, cat-butt hanging off the table and I was trying to get the catheter back in his urethra.

Schmoo came over and palpated his abdomen. Which was unnecessary and offensive because it suggests that I didn’t know how to diagnose a blocked cat and that this might all be some sort of elaborate Christmas practical joke that I was playing. She was squeezing his bladder just as I was able to pass the catheter through his urethra into his bladder. She then said, “Oh, I can’t really feel his bladder any more”. It wasn’t apparent if this was because his obstruction had been relieved or if something had happened to his bladder.

Then she turned to leave and said, “Well, it looks like you have it all under control. I have to go, there are twelve people at my house, waiting for Christmas dinner.” and she left. Some urine drained from his bladder, but not as much as I thought I would get. I think that Schmoo might have ruptured Fuzzy’s bladder. I think that she knew this because she is the one who was holding his bladder when it popped like a water balloon.

If I could redo Christmas 1997, I would have resigned on the spot or just taken Xrays of the cat right then and there.

Here are the reasons I didn’t:

  1. I was a relatively new vet
  2. Surely she would have stuck around if she thought that she had just ruptured her sister’s cat’s bladder (surely). I was doubting what had just happened.
  3. I didn’t have anyone to help me take him to surgery anyway, so I wasn’t sure how diagnosing a ruptured bladder would be useful.

Fuzzy did not recover well from his anesthetic. Actually, he never fully woke up. This is likely because of the toxins that were in his system due to his bladder rupture. So I did what so many vets have done before in small towns or before the advent of the big city emergency clinic. Fuzzy came home for Christmas. I set up a little ICU in my bathroom and kept his urinary catheter in place to drain his bladder/abdomen of urine and I kept him on fluids. It was like A Weekend at Bernies, Christmas Edition, only Bernie was played by Fuzzy the Cat.

FuzzyFuzzy and I had a rough night. I barely slept because I was sick with worry. While Fuzzy slept too much because he was suffering from life-threatening azotemia. Boxing Day morning, December 26th for our American Friends, the hospital was still closed. I called around for technicians until I found someone to come in to help out. We used the urinary catheter in his bladder to inject a material that shows up as white and took Xrays of his abdomen. Instead of remaining in a bladder-shaped bladder, the contrast material was throughout his abdomen. My superb technician started getting Fuzzy ready for surgery.

I called Schmoo again and said, “You know how you thought you might have ruptured Fuzzy’s bladder? Well, you did.” She then replied, “Do I have to come in to help you?”.  I told her that it wouldn’t be necessary, I wasn’t calling her for help, but I thought she might want to let her sister know that Fuzzy was going to have surgery today.

Fuzzy’s surgery was surprisingly uneventful. I closed the large rent in his bladder and we recovered him with intravenous fluids and the catheter stayed in place for the rest of the weekend. On Monday, when the hospital was fully operational again, Schmoo and Schmoo’s sister came in to retrieve Fuzzy. They all ran over to his cage saying, “Fuzzy!” That was the only thanks I got. That, and Fuzzy not being dead, for which I am still grateful. They never even acknowledged that I had spent my Christmas trying to save their cat.

I learned some valuable lessons with Fuzzy that I still keep with me today.

  1. There is always a disaster case like this, every Christmas. There is no fighting it, so you might as well just go with it if you are a veterinarian working over the holidays. Fighting it will just make you miserable (or more miserable).
  2. The other lesson is one that has helped me through adverse events, holidays, difficult clients and colleagues, and guilt trips (usually self-imposed), and that is to always focus on the patient, no matter what else is going on. Doing what is right for your patients medically and ethically will always lead you to the right answer.
  3. If you work for someone that treats you like this, it is time to find another job. Which I did.

Merry Christmas!

The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the position of the DrAndyRoark.com editorial team.

The World’s Most Horrifying Christmas Sweater

by

My parents had a black standard poodle named Connie. Connie was short for Lady Constance of Boston Manor. (My parents are British and funny and love dogs.) Like most standard poodles, Connie needed regular grooming at what my mom likes to call the “poodle parlour”. Somewhere along the way, my mom learned that you could save the hair from each dog grooming/shearing session and eventually get the hair spun into wool and then the wool made into a sweater.

A poodle sweater.

People actually do this and one of those people is my mom. My mom, who loves projects, set out to make a poodle sweater. I don’t know how long it took, but she diligently saved the hair from each grooming, then took it to the spinner and had a sweater made. For me!

It was my special Christmas gift that she had planned all year. (Side note, my mom is of Jewish descent and loves Christmas more than anyone I know. It’s confusing.)

My husband (then boyfriend/common-law) and I were living out west that Christmas and we were both working over the holidays. We didn’t have enough time off to go back to Ontario. (Very upsetting for my Jewish/atheist/Christmas loving mom.) I received my Christmas package that morning and opened my sweater. Then, during our Christmas phone call (after the Queen’s Christmas address), my mom explained the unique origins of the sweater.

I definitely had an appreciation for all of the effort and thought that goes into the making of a poodle sweater. I hate writing this or even thinking this, but I was not nearly as excited about this extraordinary gift as my mother was. I loved Connie (rest in peace), but I had never lived with her because my parents got her after I had left home (actually it was my parents who left home, but that is another story). She was never my dog, so having a sweater made of her hair was not sentimental for me and something about it was a little bit creepy. I tried on the sweater and went to the bathroom to check it out in the mirror. It was a big chunky blackish-brownish sweater. I was most impressed by how warm it was. Dog hair is an excellent insulator. Who knew?

sweaterI then put the sweater away and went back to whatever it was that we had planned for the rest of the day. When we came back home, I went to the bathroom. Much to my dismay, there were little black curly hairs all over the bathroom counter, in the sink, and on the floor. I had only lived with my boyfriend for a short time and I was horrified to think what had gone on in this bathroom. I was thinking, “Dude, if you are going to trim, trim, but you’ve got to clean up after yourself! This is disgusting!” I held on to that haughty righteousness for a while and then I looked down at the short black curly hairs that were covering every surface of the bathroom and I realized that these were not a product of overzealous man-scaping. They came from the sweater. My mom had made me a special pube sweater for Christmas and it was shedding pubes everywhere.

I didn’t wear the pube sweater much because of the pube shedding problem and because it was weird. When Lady Constance of Boston Manor was laid to rest, I returned the sweater to my mom, its rightful owner. It was her dog and I think that what my mom really wanted was for someone to give her a gift that was so full of thoughtfulness and love. And so I did.

The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the position of the DrAndyRoark.com editorial team.