Showing posts with label vet. Show all posts

While Matt and I were recently dying, Zero decided to further diminish Southern California's dwindling water supply by drinking all of it. Due to our lack of situational awareness, we didn't realize the severity of the situation until Zero woke us up by peeing on the rug two mornings in a row. Then we started noticing the hidden puddles of pee all over the house. Clearly something was wrong with the dog and not just us.

We dragged ourselves, a very excited Reese, and a wary Zero to the vet for a visit with Zero's internal medicine doctor. Based on his symptoms of drinking and peeing twenty-seven gallons per day, she had a diagnosis in mind, which she confirmed with blood tests. His blood glucose level was 527. Like humans, dogs are supposed to have levels in the low 100s. Uhhh, fuck.

Zero officially has type 1 diabetes, also known as "dogabetes." It was most likely caused by years of taking steroids for his IBD (irritable bowel disease). Unfortunately, he needs to take his current steroids as only they successfully control his IBD.

Just for fun, he now gets twice daily insulin injections, one after each meal. Getting his dose of insulin straightened out required glucose curves and more visits to the vet than we were physically capable of at the time. He started out at four units, then it was increased to six, then again to eight. Zero seemed stable at eight, but then his urine tested positive for ketones, which are a precursor to DKA (diabetic ketoacidosis).

The vet lowered Zero's insulin dose to seven units. Guess who started drinking and peeing constantly? Hint, it wasn't Matt. The vet raised his dose, somewhat reluctantly, to 7.5 units, and he seems to have finally stabilized.

Sadly, it is very common for dogs with type 1 diabetes to develop cataracts within about six months of diagnosis. They usually require surgery to restore the dog's vision. Zero's eyes are already starting to look a bit cloudy, but we'll cross that bridge when we come to it.

Reese will eat anything small enough to fit between her jaws, and she'll do it in the blink of an eye. For instance, during the three microseconds it took me to open the gate, she took a bite of mushroom from the one that some mensa candiate pulled out of the grass and left on the edge of the sidewalk. I turned around just in time to see something white disappear into her mouth. By the time I bent over to pry the mysterious object free, it was too late. At least she left behind the telltale mushroom with an incriminating bite-shaped piece missing.

Well, fuck.

Not being a mycologist, I declared the walk over and dragged the disappointed dogs back inside. Matt found out what the suicidal puppy did while I was en route to the phone to call the vet. Not surprisingly, the receptionist said to bring her in immediately, with the remnants of the mushroom if possible. Matt loaded the puppy while I ran back outside to retrieve her leftovers.

The one benefit to emergency vet visits for poisoning is that your furry moron gets bumped to the front of the line. Of course, you get to pay the emergency fee for this nifty benefit, but we'll just ignore that for now.

After explaining Reese's new diet to the vet, I got to call poison control! Poison control, veterinary edition, charges $65 per case number, payable via any major credit card, to offset the cost of offering their services. But if the vet calls, poison control tacks on an extra $25 because they can. So the vet offered us the option of calling ourselves to save the extra $25, and I started dialing.

I had a nice little chat with the lady from poison control, in which I got to describe the offending mushroom in graphic detail. Of course the stupid thing matched three possibilities, one of which was nice and poisonous, and "not uncommon" in our area. Great!

She described exactly how the evil mushroom would soon destroy the poor puppy's liver and the symptoms for which to watch. I took notes. Then she described a host of precautionary procedures to cure Reese of the mushrooms.  I took more notes. Finally, she gave me a website with the email addresses of volunteers who identify mushrooms in possible poisoning cases. I ran out of space on the post-it note. Luckily, the vet picked that moment to reappear and I handed the phone over. I suspected that the professional would do a better job of describing the proper protocols to follow than I had any hope of doing.

First, they induced vomiting. Some poor vet tech got to examine the results and reported a small amount of white chunks. Next, Reese was given activated charcoal to absorb any poison that made it to her intestines. This delicious snack was followed with medicine to protect her liver from doom. And finally, they drew blood to establish a baseline for liver function, which they would compare with blood drawn 24 and 48 hours later.

When we finally made it home, we took close-up pictures of the offending mushroom and went to the internets. The website to which the poison control operator directed me didn't list anyone who was anywhere near Southern California. After a bit of debate, we chose the expert with the Stanford email address under the theory that it was the most prestigious sounding of those located in the state.

The expert replied the next day with the good news that Reese's preferred nosh was not poisonous. He did, however, decry the quality of the pictures. But that wasn't nearly as important as the no dead puppies part of his message.

Matt noticed the email address from which the expert replied - cern.ch. As in those guys who tried to destroy the universe with their Large Hadron Collider. Since we no longer had to worry about Reese keeling over, this email address was hilariously funny. Unfortunately, most of the jokes were so horrible that I will not risk ruining the internet with them.

No puppy story is complete without pictures. Lots and lots of pictures.

I'm on the right

A less vomit-inducing meal

She never stops barking, even in her sleep

Reese's opinion of Zero

Dog fight!

I will sit on you until you shut up!

Pre-chomp...

Chomp!

Since returning from our adventures on the high main, Zero and I have been locked in a battle for who has the most doctor visits. I may be winning in the number of unique doctors category, but Muttley has the gold for overall quantity.

He was absolutely fine when we picked him up last Wednesday. By fine, I mean eating, bouncing up and down, and being a small fury pile of squirmy. Come Thursday morning, he apparently changed his mind. MilkBones were no longer good enough for him. I shrugged it off as I had more important things to worry about, namely my own appointment with Herceptin for which I was already running late.

Come dinner time, Zero still showed no interest in getting out of bed, much less walking all the way into the kitchen for food. He's been picky about morning MilkBones before, but never apathetic about dinner. I offered him the god of treats, a chicken strip. He barely sniffed it before turning his head away. Well, there was only one thing to do in this situation. "MATT! The dog's broken!"

Trip number one to the vet commenced soon after. Zero didn't have a fever, but he did have a history of expensive gastrointestinal problems. The vet prescribed anti-nausea and appetite stimulating pills and told us to email her in the morning.

The anti-nausea pill shoved down his throat by the vet's assistant had him acting normal before we even made it home. Not even the appetite stimulant could convince him to eat, however. After refusing breakfast, it was back to the vet for him.

Zero was even less appreciative of that car ride, so it wasn't much of a surprise when he turned out to have a fever. The vet still couldn't give an official diagnosis. She did speculate that it might have been a virus from three weeks of daycare, or possibly Irritable Bowel Disease (IBD). A blood test showed nothing, and an ultrasound showed inflamed intestines. She gave him fluids and sent him home, with the same email me in the morning instructions.

The dog clearly didn't want to go back to Dr. Vet, so he did try to eat a bit. Just not enough for him to go back AGAIN for the third day in a row. Luckily, his temperature was back down. More fluids, more keeping an eye on him.

Finally, Zero got the point and started eating again. Granted, he would only eat chicken strips, and not that much, but it was food. I strongly suspected that he figured out that ignoring the main dish would get him extra dessert, but his lack of jumping up and down squashed that theory. Upon hearing of this on Monday morning, Dr. Vet suggested we get a thermometer and take his temperature at home. Since I was at work and not taking any part of this, I agreed whole-heartedly.

Apparently Zero recognized the thermometer from his adventures at the vet and immediately hid. Sadly, hiding under the coffee table with his backend hanging out isn't very effective. Especially when someone is trying to measure his temperature... rectally.

Matt discovered that dogs can clinch their butts shut, but he managed to get the thermometer in there. His temperature? 96.7. In other words, failure. Dogs normally run around 101-102. Take two! This time Matt took no prisoners and really shoved it in. Luckily for both of them, the thermometer read 100.5.

Come Wednesday, Zero was still not eating, except for chicken strips. Fine then. We tried to avoid it. We really did. But now there was nothing to do but shove an endoscope down his throat to do a biopsy. Of course, we could have just opted to go straight to treatment, but if it was a virus, the steroids would have done a number on his immune system and muttpie would have been in trouble. So on with the freaking expensive rotorooter down the throat!

No one was surprised when Dr. Vet reported a visual abnormality. The official results would take two days, but she was confident enough in the diagnosis that it was time for Zero to start steroids. The first dose was injected immediately, and it worked nearly immediately. When we picked him up forty minutes later, he was already acting normal. Then, lo and behold, he ate dinner!

He also ate breakfast, more dinner, and more breakfast before the shocking results came back. Zero officially has IBD! He'll be on steroids for the near future, and quite possibly for the rest of his life. Personally, I think he did it on purpose, just so he could get a delicious Pill Pocket twice daily. The nerve!

Friday was a day of disasters. It all started when I made a rash decision to walk the mutts. We hadn't even left the courtyard when an evil space monster from the Andromeda galaxy jumped out from behind a stone wall. With no warning, the devious being, which resembled a white poodle mutt, attacked. Zero took the first blow and ended up on his back with the creature from the blue lagoon on top. I had no idea what to do, except to try and pull Zero away by his leash. I was in a bit of a hurry to get the hell away, pulling both leashes with me, but Cerberus got in one last chomp. Unfortunately, it was on Tawny's tail. The worst part is that Cujo was on a flexileash (the thin leash that extends out of a plastic handle for somewhere around 20 feet) the entire time and his owner did nothing. And I mean NOTHING. Didn't move, didn't pull El Chupacabra back, didn't say a word. Her psycho "pet" was barking and attacking completely unprovoked (unless you count happening to walk by as provocation), and she stood there! Seriously, who does that?

After my initial round of panic, Naomi, who thankfully was already on her way over, helped me take the mutts to the vet. Zero's nasty looking stomach wound turned out to be superficial, but due to the area x-rays were required to check for abdominal bleeding. If the external injury had been worse, the vet would have recommended exploratory surgery to visually inspect the area. My eyeballs fell out when the vet first said surgery, but Naomi promptly dusted them off and popped them back in while the vet said it wouldn't be necessary. As for Tawny, the vet had to shave part of her tail to get at the puncture wound. With the fur gone, it really looks like something took a bite out of her tail, but as long as no one goes near her tail, she doesn't seem bothered by it.

After we brought the mutts home from the vet, Naomi and I went shopping. There's nothing like a bit of retail therapy after absolute chaos and bleeding tails.

Later that day, the phone rang an ominous death toll. As I ran for the office phone, my socked feet lost traction on the hardwood floors. SMASH! My right pinky toe was rather displeased with its violent introduction to the base molding it had previously only viewed from a distance. The worst part? It was an automated marketing call from Verizon.

Late Friday afternoon is NOT the time to injury oneself since doctors tend to have stopped making appointments for the week. In other words, I spent the weekend hobbling around on a swollen and oddly colored toe. But I did wake up early today to get an appointment, and get an appointment I did.

The doctor took x-rays of my foot and pronounced my toe to be officially broken and me a klutz. Here are the before and after x-rays:
 
I highlighted the newly-formed gaping chasm in red for your viewing enjoyment.

As of press time, Matt is yet to be injured. I can't help but expect a fork-wielding koala bear to attack him in the shower tomorrow morning.

Zero's initial round of blood tests indicated that he's perfectly fine. However, since the blood was drawn about an hour and half after the "incident," he still has to go back tomorrow just in case. He's still acting like his normal hyperactive jumpy self, so I think he's fine. But, alas, back to the vet with him.

He has a cute red bandage on his front right leg that somehow has stayed on for two days despite his best efforts to chew it off.

And now back to your regularly scheduled Yom Kippur starvation (1 hour 28 minutes to go).

I have a job at Sports Composite DE, Inc. as a Java Web Developer. I love my awesome job. I love my awesome 7 minute commute. I love how I come in early, before almost everyone else, at 10am.

I did NOT love spending the morning at the vet because Zero got into last night's leftovers and ate a ton of red onion. I'm sure he didn't love the vet performing a full inspection, inducing vomiting, and drawing blood for a full panel. And I'm sure he won't love going back on Sunday for a recheck, including a red blood cell count. For those that don't know, onions damage red blood cells in dogs and cats, which can lead to anemia depending on the amount eaten. YAY!