Wordless Wednesday (Another Failed Attempt).

Driving to work on Sunday.

Jekyll riding booster seat shotgun.

Thankfully, we never get on a major road and we are never traveling more than 40 mph. 

Like it, or not, I am holding him the whole time. 

Nothing beats a happy patient.

I was a bit concerned about how red his ears were (allergies, infection?).

"Nope," his mom said "excitement."

This little one needs a home.
He is renting a small pad in the lobby.
He purrs on sight, rolls over immediately, and will charm you faster than Casanova on his best night.
And that little mustache!! Oooh, so cute!

My Magie.

Looking coy and a bi devilish!

She was actually attacking my toes.

"Ouch!"

Wren and Magpie, making it almost impossible for me to work.

Until they decided that work was boring.

So they napped, of course.

Little baby Bo. 

Just rescued by a couple who cuddled him, cooed over him, and 

said that they were "going to try to find him a home."

Personally there was waay to much oogling over him for me to believe they can part with him.

"Good Luck letting him go. He's too adorable. I'm a softy too."

A happy to be at the vet pup.

Porter, the IVDD dog. Who motors around with his own little twist, but never stops to feel sorry for himself or wonder why life threw him a wrench.

He is a true testament to,

"Get up, work hard, be grateful, and live in the moment."

Little Dottie.

Here for her kitten vaccine.

Feeling very safe with her mom.

If there was anyway I could do it I would gift myself a kitten every year.

Buddy at his post.

He is the king of musical chairs.

If you get off of yours he will be in it before you can shoo him off.

Elliott and his x-ray. He is four weeks post-op.
He has no limp and he, in true kitten fashion, has healed quickly and completely!
He will be in on Monday to have his pins pulled.

This is Kits x-ray. His brother, who also had a broken leg.
Fixed two weeks ago.
Pin removal (if possible, I am very worried because they are in the knee joint.
I have to try to dig them out on Monday.
Stay tuned for this one too).
Why do I do this to myself?
I will be stressed until they are out.

Happy Hump Day!

If you have a pet related question you can get an answer (and also find me) at Pawbly.com on Twitter @FreePetAdvice or @pawbly.

Is It Possible To Save A Life AND A Limb For Pennies?

There are a few patients, clients, and cases that become indelibly etched in your heart and soul. Some of them are disastrous, heart breaking, and cause you to question why the heck you ever decided to care so much, invest so much, and even try to help people in the first place?

BUT,

there, thankfully, are more of the good cases to keep your spirit fulfilled and to carry you through the train wrecks.

This is Elliott. He is a two month old, never been seen before by a veterinarian, grey and white kitten. He is a sweet gentle boy,

BUT,

he, unlike so many of the other kittens that I see, is healthy, bright, purring, and calm.

His dad is an older man with a story about Elliott. It went as follows; He and his wife had recently bought a home here in rural Harford County Maryland. Unbeknownst to them when they bought the home they also acquired a few cats. Those few cats did what all cats do, they populated.

When they realized they had more mouths to feed, they started a proactive approach to getting the felines under control.

As I listened to his story I relaxed. He was trying and I was beginning to think that maybe for the first time in a long time I wasn't going to have to try to figure out how to convince a person to take care of their pet.
First challenge appears to be diverted.

Elliott was here today because as his dad reported "he has a bum back leg. That bad leg is a mystery as to how it happened. But Elliott won't use it and so he has come to visit us."

The right side is normal, the left has three fractures.
Can you see them all?

An x-ray later we had our answer. Elliott had a broken femur, a broken tibia, and a broken fibula. No wonder he won't use that leg. There aren't any intact bones of his back leg to hold him up.

Second challenge, paying for surgery.

The challenge is all too often the same: 1. Trying to coerce a person to step up to the plate and do both steps; and 2. take responsibility and follow through with a treatment plan.

Today, the gods were smiling on Elliott. His dad loved him, he cared about his injury, he wanted to treat it, BUT, he had a herd to manage and a budget.

In the area of Elliotts injury he has a laceration over his hip.

Here is where I put my BIG disclaimer!!
I did what I hate to admit in public, on record, and in reality do all too often. I sat down and negotiated.

Why do I hate it? Because it sets a terrible precedence. It de-values what I do, it makes it harder to hold future expectations on par, and it further drives my profession into scrambling to make ends meet. It perpetuates the same problems that we vets have been plagued with forever. Why should I work for free? Who else but vets get asked daily for free services AND then are made to feel guilty when they decline? Think about it, how would you feel if everyday at your place of work your boss came to you and asked you to work an hour (or more) later for nothing? And then gave you some guilt trip about why you should after you reluctantly tried to discuss why you didn't want to work late.

In typical never-confess-this-exchange to my husband mode I offered to "try" fix the leg for $300.

To put this in perspective, at a boarded surgeons I would expect they would start the opening bid at $1,000 US dollars.

Me, heck no, I will not only significantly undercut my own services I will also add a mountain of stress onto myslef. Why? because damn it I still can't learn my lesson. I still can't turn a blind eye, and say "not my problem." And, mostly, I liked this kitten and this guy. If he's willing and committed to taking care of his feral cat population I'm willing to throw my best pitch.

We 'hang' the broken leg in the hopes of straightening the broken bones.

Holding both parts of the femur together with thumb forceps (you know them as tweezers) to pin the leg.

There are two stainless steel pins in the hollow part of the bone.
They will stay in for about 4-8 weeks.
Elliott is a kitten and they heal fast!
I am so proud of this that I beam every time I see this x-ray!

Elliott was walking on his leg by the end of his surgery day. He was given pain medications for the first few days and very very strict cage rest. NO running, jumping, or playing!

Elliott will have his pins removed in about two months. When I remove them we will also neuter him.

I saw Elliott tonight for his first re-check post op. He is happy and he is walking on his leg!!

go Elliott!

Best of luck Elliott and family!

Update:

Elliott had his pins pulled on Monday the 9th of September. They came out easily and his bones are all healing splendidly!

In a matter of minutes Elliotts pins were removed.

Elliott has a few more weeks of rest ahead of him, but I expect a fully functional leg in spite of his three fractures.

If you have a question about Elliott, or fracture repair in a kitten please find me at Pawbly.com

Mr. Elliott's Dearly Departed

It was a typical slammed busy booked, (OK, truth be told, overbooked, again), night of evening veterinary appointments.

There is some debate over how many appointments a veterinarian should optimally see in an hour. I think 20 to 30 minutes is ideal, but I typically get booked at 15 minute intervals, with walk-in emergencies on top of that, on the two nights I work. Seeing appointments every 15 minutes causes me great stress. It is too much information to attempt to keep straight in my head as I run from room to room and patient to patient. It is the eternal juggling between keeping prices affordable, assisting our clients with their emergencies (even though our appointments are already booked), and providing a thorough examination, diagnostics, and treatment plan in a timely manner. I have yet to find that ‘perfect’ balance, I continue to run around like a chicken with its head,,,,(goodness, that is a terrible saying for a veterinarian,, umm, maybe I’ll just say  “run around like a crazy person” instead?).

In the middle of the hysteria the receptionist came to corner me in the pharmacy. I sensed her still presence and I knew she needed my full attention..(Argh, getting further behind by the minute).

I looked up met her eye to eye and then she smiled.

“OK, don’t laugh, and I’m not kidding.” She said suppressing a giggle.

“OK.” I replied, begging her internally to talk faster.

“Mrs. Elliott called, she is very upset, she said her husband is on his way down here with his fish who just died and he thinks he is responsible for it, but, she wants us to tell him that it wasn’t his fault, that it died from a bladder tumor and, he wants his fish to be privately cremated.” She was of course laughing by half way through the first sentence.

I, however, was not laughing as I was still trying to comprehend what she had just described.

I was mentally trying to sort through; a man is coming to the clinic with his fish?? His dead fish?? Who died from bladder cancer?? Is that possible?? Where do I find the bladder in a fish?? Oh my god, is it like a goldfish?? Is someone going to come into the front office with a fish in a baggie for me to,, umm,,,examine?? Private cremation for a fish?? There was too much odd information for me to try to process to laugh. I was just hoping that she was kidding.

I looked at her after a moment.

When she realized I wasn’t laughing she replied, “Well, I told you that I wasn’t kidding.”

“As soon as Mr. Elliott gets here put him immediately in an exam room and come get me.” I could at least try to save him from the gawking clients as he stood at the front desk holding up a goldfish in a baggie.

I didn’t have any time to research ‘fish bladder tumors’ in a book, so I was going to have to wing it should that topic arise when Mr. Elliott arrived.

A few minutes later my receptionist found me again and notified me that Mr. Elliott was waiting for me in room two. I had seen him enter the waiting area, he was carrying a attaché sized folded towel in his arms. OK, nix baggie fears.

I entered the room and looked at Mr. Elliott’s tear streaked face. I was going to be further behind then I had planned, but this man needed a shoulder to lean on and I was going to switch into low/slow gear to help him.

“I know this sounds silly, I know that no one could understand this,” he whimpered and paused. “But I loved that fish, I did, he was a really special fish.”

“My wife and I have a 75 gallon tank in the living room. We went to the aquatic store and the salespeople told us that they had a fish that liked to be petted. So my wife went over to the tank, stuck her arm into the water, and he bit her. I knew right then and there that he was the fish for me.” We both smiled, and my receptionist finally got her laugh from me.

“I brought him home that day, and every day since he has followed me back and forth in his tank. And when I go over to the tank he comes to my hand and I would just pet him. He loved that. That fish knew me.”

He lay his towel on the exam table and gingerly opened it.

In the middle of his carefully folded towel lay a ten inch long purple pink bulbous domed large headed fish. It was quite beautiful and it was certainly not your average 'goldfish'. I watched closely for any signs of life, just in case he asked, but sure enough there was none. (I was relieved he didn’t ask me to check for a pulse or a heartbeat. I wouldn’t have known how to do either).

“No, Mr. Elliott I don’t think it’s silly. You loved your fish and I think he loved you to. I understand how hard it is to lose something you love.” I gave Mr. Elliott a hug. "I know the pain you feel when you lose a pet you love. I have loved and lost a rabbit, a pig, a sheep, and many dogs and cats, and no one can tell me that the love for one kind of pet is greater than another."

There was a long, slow, still few minutes as he stood next to his fish and gazed with adoration at him.

I took another deep breath. “OK, Mr. Elliott here is where I am stuck.”

He looked at me perplexed.

“I don’t know how to be any other way than honest with you, but I am concerned that I will make you more upset.” I was dreading my next few words. I couldn’t bear to further upset an already grieving man.

“Dr. I want you to be honest.” He replied. I believe he was still fearing I would mock his fish.

“Mr. Elliott I can send your fish to be cremated, and they will gladly take your payment for it, but once he is cremated there won't be any ashes to return to you.”

“Oh!” his eyes opened wide!

“Oh!” he said again. “Fish have no bones! There won't be anything left of him for me to keep!” His tone changed from grief to resolve.

“Yes.” I meekly replied. Somewhat baffled by his sudden transformation.

He re-wrapped his fish quickly and adeptly.

“OK, I’ll take him home and bury him. Thanks Dr. Magnifico. I’ll be OK.” And out the door he went.

He was off in one direction, and I was off to find my place in the evenings appointments.

Mrs Eliott was nice enough to pass this along..

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