Tales from a Wild Vet

by Jo Hardy

  Mr Bailey’s insurance would cover the injections so he was happy for me to go ahead, but he was less pleased with my second suggestion.

  ‘Hunter is quite overweight, so you really do need to bring his weight down. The extra bulk he is carrying is putting an additional load onto his hips. Overweight dogs are far more likely to get arthritis than slim dogs.’

  ‘Hunter isn’t overweight,’ Mr Bailey protested. ‘He’s got a little stouter with the years, but we all do, don’t we?’

  It was an awkward moment, since Mr Bailey was fairly stout himself, but for Hunter’s sake I persisted.

  ‘Well, no, dogs don’t need to get any heavier as they get older and it’s much better for them if they don’t. I know Labradors love their food and seem constantly hungry, but it’s better not to give in. Hunter really will feel a lot happier and his hips won’t hurt so much if he loses a couple of kilos.’

  Mr Bailey didn’t look convinced, but he agreed to cut down Hunter’s food by about 10 per cent and to come back in two weeks’ time to weigh him again.

  It’s hard to change our habits, whether it’s our own eating patterns or the way we feed our dogs. When you are used to giving your dog an extra treat, or a little bit of your leftovers, then to stop seems like depriving them. To make it easier I try to get owners to see that a slimmer dog will be fitter and live longer. Weight in dogs is a real issue. Of the four Labradors I saw that day, three were overweight. Unfortunately so few Labs are the right weight that some people think they’re skinny and that the tubby dogs are the normal ones.

  The next Lab to arrive was Jess, a young adult, in for her regular vaccinations. She was black, shiny and slender, but her owner, who introduced herself as Marnie, said that some people thought she was a bit underweight.

  ‘No,’ I said, perhaps a touch too ferociously. ‘She’s the right weight and anyone who says otherwise is wrong. Please ignore them, you’re doing a great job with her.’

  My last Lab of the day was Shadow, a glossy black dog of about seven. Her owner, Mr Shepherd, was concerned because she had a lump the size of a ping-pong ball just in front of her shoulder. I was worried; a lymph node swelling could be serious. I took a fine needle aspirate to get some cells from the lump to send off. Shadow had other ideas, though, and didn’t appreciate me poking the needle into the lump. She wriggled straight out of Mr Shepherd’s arms and hid behind him, panting. I made a second attempt, but Shadow wasn’t having it and ran circles around her owner, tying him up with her lead, so I suggested I take her to get a nurse to hold her. As soon as she was away from Mr Shepherd she calmed down and was as good as gold while I took the sample. It always amazes me how dogs pick up their owner’s nervousness and calm down away from them, but of course the owners almost always believe the dog is happier with them. I took Shadow back to Mr Shepherd, praising her and giving her a little treat, and promised Mr Shepherd that we’d ring him when we had the result.

  Sadly the result confirmed that it was a melanoma, a skin cancer that, in dogs as in people, generally has a fast rate of spread into other organs in the body. When Mr Shepherd came back in I explained to him that we couldn’t remove the tumour, the site made it too complicated, and it would almost certainly have already spread. We could give Shadow steroids to slow the growth of the tumour and they would act as anti-inflammatories, too. That way she could carry on until such time as it was causing her too many problems. The other option was to refer her to an oncologist who could create a chemotherapy protocol for her, but understandably Mr Shepherd felt it wasn’t fair to give Shadow chemotherapy when he wouldn’t be able to explain to her why she was feeling so ill. I felt sad for them and assured Mr Shepherd I was always on the end of the phone if he was worried or had any more questions.

  That evening after work I went to a gymnastics class. I’d started going regularly when I got back from Africa because I wanted to do something more than just work, go home, have dinner and go to bed. I was becoming aware that a vet’s work-life balance is pretty precarious. The hours are long, the work is hard and it’s all too easy to let work take over your life. I didn’t want that to happen, so I was delighted when I found a gym class just a few minutes from home.

  I used to do gymnastics when I was a child. I was really competitive and loved it, but when I was 11 I broke my arm doing a back flip and had to stop. Now, 14 years later, I had decided to give it another go and I was really enjoying it. The gym was international standard, training several next-generation potential Olympic champions, and watching them go through their paces was awe-inspiring. There was a great big tumble run with a foam pit at the end. I was practising forward somersaults, the idea being to land on your feet, with the foam pit there as a safety net. It was going quite well and I was, rather ambitiously, thinking of adding a half-twist to my somersault when, a few days later, Tammy put paid to my gymnastic hopes.

  I was working her carefully through a three-month rehabilitation programme to strengthen her injured leg without over-taxing it. I had started trotting her in straight lines and every time we rounded for a turn I would bring her back to a walk, so that she wasn’t putting extra strain on her leg. The trouble was, Tammy was having a stroppy day and didn’t want to slow to a walk, so each time we turned and slowed down I had to pull tightly on the reins to get her to obey. After several tussles she decided she’d had enough. She planted her feet and reared up, then leaped forwards, wrenching my shoulder really hard.

  I felt a jolt of intense pain and I was pretty sure, based on where the pain was, that I’d pulled the rotator cuff, which meant that there wasn’t a lot I could do. Time would heal it, but for the next few weeks, and possibly months, it was going to be sore and gym would be out. I was really cross with Tammy. I loved her dearly, but sometimes our relationship was more love-hate than anything else.

  The following day I went to the races with Becky. Lingfield Park racecourse is not far from home, and I had fond memories of spending a week working there with the vets when I was on my final-year rotations. Back then I had spent several evenings helping to check all the stunning thoroughbreds before the races and then leaping into a car with the vet to follow the race, roaring around the side of the track at breakneck speed, just in case there was an accident.

  This time we were spectators, there for the fun of watching the horses fly around the track, marvelling at their grace and beauty and yelling for our favourites. I wasn’t planning to bet, because I always go for the horse that looks like a sure-fire winner, nice and energetic with long legs, and then it loses. But before we left Mum gave me a tip: ‘Pick an average-looking one,’ she said. ‘The one that looks like nothing special. They’re the ones that win.’

  I took her advice – I have no idea where it came from, as she has never bet on a horse – and won on every single race. Three of my choices came first and the other came second. I definitely owed Mum a box of chocolates.

  Back at Downe the following week I had a day of equine consults, which turned out to be a lot of fun. I set off for the first call feeling a bit silly in my little car. I was pretty sure most owners and stables would expect an equine vet to turn up in a four-by-four, or at least a big saloon. Instead, they were getting me, in my modest but much-loved sporty silver hatchback.

  My first stop was to see Chico, a gelding, for a vaccination. He was a beautiful chestnut horse and his owner, Mrs Grey, was a lively and energetic woman in her mid-sixties, but as I stood chatting to her, holding Chico’s rein, he gave me a playful nip.

  ‘Ah, sorry, I meant to warn you that he does that if you stand too close,’ she said.

  ‘Thanks,’ I said, rubbing my arm. ‘It’s fine, he didn’t hurt me, but I’ll watch out in future.’

  ‘Come in and have some tea and biscuits,’ she invited. ‘You must meet my dog, Perro. I’ve been training him and he loves showing off his tricks.’

  I couldn’t resist, and Perro didn’t disappoint. A charming collie, he went happily into his routine: spinning in circ
les, begging on his back legs and, as a finale, shuffling himself, sitting his bottom on the floor, paws in the air, across to Mrs Grey, who urged him on with coos of delight.

  ‘Oh good boy,’ she said when he arrived at her knee. ‘Isn’t he doing well? It’s such fun teaching him. We’ll be on Britain’s Got Talent next!’ Then she roared with laughter.

  After a cup of tea, during which Mrs Grey asked me, with real interest, all about my training, it was time to get going. My next stop was to see a horse that had gone lame at a stable a few miles in the opposite direction. The stable owner, Edward, took me through to see a pretty mare called Dixie. I started by checking her hooves with a hoof pincher, a tool which squeezes the top and bottom of the horse’s foot. If the horse pulls away or twitches it indicates pain. Dixie seemed fine, so I felt all the way up her legs and watched her trot in a straight line on concrete. All fine so far, but when I did a flexion test, in which you bend each leg for a minute to stress the joint and then ask the owner to trot the horse, I could see obvious signs of lameness.

  ‘I think her problem is in her right fetlock,’ I told Edward. ‘It’s not dramatic enough to be a fracture or joint infection, but it could be arthritis, given her age, or possibly just a sprain. The choices are to see how she goes with pain relief and rest, or to refer her to an equine hospital for more tests.’

  Edward opted for the pain relief and rest, promising to get in touch if Dixie didn’t improve in a few weeks’ time. As we walked through the stables on our way out, I started in surprise as I spotted one pony – and my heart leaped.

  ‘Luna!’ I said. ‘That’s Luna, I’d know her anywhere. She was my first pony.’

  ‘Yes,’ Edward said. ‘That’s Luna, she’s a lovely little thing. Her owners keep her here and spoil her rotten. She’s getting on a bit now, well over 20, but still very active.’

  I went over and nuzzled Luna. I was sure she recognised me. My parents had bought her for me when I was 10 and I’d had her for two years. She was a lovely little jet-black cob with fluffy white feet and a long white blaze down her nose. It had been a huge act of generosity from my parents, but they could see how much I loved riding and I had begged non-stop for a horse of my own. And they felt that at least I would be doing something active and outdoors.

  For two years I spent every afternoon after school at the stables with Luna, grooming and riding her. It was a wrench when we sold her to buy Elli, but I was ready for a bigger horse and we couldn’t keep them both. Luna had gone to a lovely woman who had clearly looked after her beautifully.

  Edward was right, at 22 Luna was getting on, but horses can live into their thirties and she looked a picture of health.

  ‘I’m so happy to have seen her,’ I said. ‘It’s lovely to know where she is and that she’s doing so well.’

  I was still smiling and thinking about Luna when I arrived at my last call of the morning.

  ‘I’m impressed that you’ve got here on time,’ the owner, Sally, said. ‘Most vets seem to be at least half an hour late.’

  ‘We do all try to be on time,’ I said as Sally led me towards the stable. ‘It’s just that you can’t always predict how long a call will take.’

  Sally led her horse, a black stallion named Merry, out into the yard. I was there to vaccinate him, but he had some other health issues, too. ‘He had arthritis diagnosed a few weeks ago and I’ve done very little riding with him since. He mooches around the field during the day, and at night I keep him stabled. He has a very easy life,’ she said. ‘But now he doesn’t seem to want to lie down.’

  Horses can sleep standing up, but they do need to lie down for a couple of hours each day to get a deeper level of sleep. Without that they become sleep-deprived. It’s fairly common in old arthritic horses to see sleep deprivation, but it’s very scary when you see it for the first time and you don’t know what it is. If a horse is sleep-deprived and it falls asleep standing up, it often falls into a deep sleep, which causes them to rock dramatically and then fall over. Injuries such as grazes on the knees or fetlocks are a regular occurrence. I suggested to Sally that she give Merry a sachet of pain relief every day in the evening so that he felt comfortable enough to lie down to sleep. Also it would benefit him to be out in the field overnight instead of in a stable, as often older horses are not able to get up easily in confined spaces and, knowing this, they don’t lie down.

  As I left the stable to go to my car Sally nipped into the house and came out with a box of eggs.

  ‘From our chickens,’ she said. ‘To say thanks for being on time.’

  ‘Thanks,’ I said. ‘There’s really no need.’ But Sally insisted.

  I’d really enjoyed my morning visits. It was lovely seeing Luna and I’d got a box of eggs as a bonus.

  Back in the surgery, after a quick lunch, I was presented with a snuffly tortoise called Horace. He was only little, just six or seven years old, which is still a toddler in tortoise terms. They’re the world’s longest-living animals; most live to be at least 90 and it’s not unusual to find tortoises well over 100 years old. Some have even made it past 150.

  Horace’s owners, a charming little boy named Ryan and his very nice mum, were worried that the tortoise was off his food. I explained that he had a cold. Tortoises have a very good sense of smell and, like most animals, when they lose their sense of smell they lose interest in food. There’s just one antibiotic that’s licensed for exotic animals and it’s called Baytril. I told Ryan to put a little bit of the Baytril syrup on a piece of lettuce, or better still to inject it into his favourite strawberries, and hopefully he would soon be fine. With Horace back in his cardboard box, Ryan thanked me politely and carried his pet carefully out, his mum following with the bottle of syrup.

  My last visitor that afternoon was Sonny, a lovely yellow Labrador. A friendly, smiley dog with a big waggy tail that never stopped. He was three years old, so still young, and his owners, a young couple who were as friendly as their dog, were worried because he’d had two seizures. They’d brought him in after the first one and had been told to wait and see if there was another. Vets never start epilepsy treatment after just one seizure because there are a lot of potential causes, such as low glucose levels or having something toxic in the blood, so it could be a one-off, but Sonny’s blood tests at the time didn’t reveal anything abnormal.

  In Sonny’s case, unfortunately, he’d had a second, longer seizure only a week later, so his owners, Becky and Jake, had brought him back. A second follow-up blood test showed that there were no glucose or electrolyte abnormalities in Sonny’s blood and there was no history of contact with toxins. When that’s the case, and the dog is between the ages of two and five, then the cause of multiple seizures is generally epilepsy.

  Many people don’t realise that dogs can get epilepsy. When a seizure is coming on the owner may notice the dog acting strangely, or seeming upset or nervous, repeating motions, hiding or demanding extra attention. At this stage, which can last for anything from a few minutes to a couple of hours, the seizure is beginning in one part of the brain. As it spreads to the whole brain the dog will go rigid, its legs straight out and head back, before starting to seize. It will lose consciousness and usually become doubly incontinent. Although its eyes may be open, it won’t be seeing anything. This stage usually lasts no more than a minute or two, but for the owner it can be alarming to watch. After the seizure the dog will probably be rather quiet and behave strangely again for several hours to a day.

  Luckily there are good medications for treating it. The medication won’t cure the epilepsy, but in a lot of cases it will significantly reduce the number of seizures.

  I explained all of this to Becky and Jake and did my best to put them at ease. Hopefully, I said, Sonny’s epilepsy would be brought under control. I asked them to keep a diary of his seizures – how often they occurred and how long they went on for – and explained that it’s not a good idea to touch a dog having a seizure, as it may unintentionally bite. They s
hould remove all furniture from around him, though, and make sure they were timing the seizure, and if it went on longer than two minutes they should rush him to the vet. Once the pattern of Sonny’s seizures was established, I explained, we would be able to increase or lower the medication and get it to the right level. There was a fairly new drug that was having good results and was very safe compared with older epilepsy medication, so Sonny would be put on that to begin with.

  ‘Will it be for the rest of his life?’ Becky asked, her eyes full of tears.

  ‘I’m afraid it will,’ I said. ‘I know it’s a shock, but you will get used to managing it. He’ll need tablets every day. But just like many people with epilepsy, most dogs that have it lead full and active lives.’

  I couldn’t help reflecting as I drove home that man’s best friend does share many of man’s maladies. They may be on four legs and be descended from wolves, but in so many ways they are still just like us.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  The Trouble with Cats

  If dogs are pretty easy to read, cats can often be complete mysteries. Unlike dogs, they roam away from the home on their own in a world that is totally separate to ours, and most of the time we have no idea what they get up to.

  Cats like to be independent. They don’t need to be walked or taken outside, they prefer to patrol their territory and be their own bosses. They don’t like too much interference or fussing. And they absolutely hate going to the vet.

  An owner will arrive with their cat in a crate, open it up on the consulting-room table and, predictably, the cat refuses to come out.