Vet On a Mission

by Gillian Hick

  Banjax neither noticed nor cared as I clipped the hair from his spindly front limb, noting the yellowed skin as I placed the intravenous line and carefully tapped it in place, to allow me to administer medication and fluids as required over the weekend. His withered body was reeking of the smell of vomit and darkly stained with urine, despite the best efforts of his owners to keep him clean and comfortable since seeing the previous vet.

  The blood results confirmed both my own and the other vet’s suspicions that the little dog’s liver was in dire trouble, but more usefully that it was most likely from an infection rather than a toxin exposure. I quickly added a potent antibiotic to his regime and knowing that the anti-nausea medication would have taken effect by now, was happy to leave him wrapped in an absorbent towel and well-padded by a few layers of vet beds. As I left, he looked both peaceful and comfortable in the soft glow of the heat lamp. I relayed the evening’s events to the owners who were realistic about his prognosis, but grateful to at least give him the chance.

  I waited until the kids were settled in bed before going over to check on my only charge so far for the weekend.

  When I peeped through the small glass window in the kennels door, it looked as though Banjax hadn’t stirred since I left him. He didn’t move when I went in the door and opened his kennel to check that the bedding was still dry. Everything was perfect until I noticed that although the bandage looked undisturbed, the giving set had been neatly sliced through. Clearly, despite his weakened state, Banjax was not impressed with the unnecessary attachment and had simply bitten it off. As it was by now late, and judging by his clinical examination he was in a much better state of hydration than he had been on admission, I decided to let him rest in comfort for the remainder of the night and start again in the morning.

  I got up early to check on him before the kids got up the next morning. I carried him out to the back passageway, where he drunkenly passed some deep orange urine before crumpling down on the blankets. At least he had stopped vomiting, but I was still reluctant to offer oral fluids or food so soon into his treatment. As soon as Amanda arrived at nine, I replaced the giving set and restarted the fluids, securely taping the line in place with multiple lengths of sticky tape. While the busy Saturday morning clinic went on, we regularly checked Banjax, but despite this, before long, the line was once again slashed. There was nothing for it but to employ a full time carer for Banjax. Molly was deeply engrossed in a book when I ran over to the house, but was still keen to come to look after this high-needs patient.

  ‘Just keep an eye on him,’ I instructed ‘and don’t let him bite at his line.’

  With her eight years of life experience, including five in a veterinary practice, Molly was the perfect person to supervise the reluctant patient. I left her perched on the most comfortable office chair, having evicted Striper the grumpy office cat.

  The next time I passed by, I could hear Molly’s voice and peeped in to find her reading aloud to Banjax who, despite his grumpy old man disposition, seemed to be enjoying the story.

  Banjax eventually made it home the following Monday, despite a poorly functioning liver, much brighter, eating and well on the way to making a full recovery. The owners were very appreciative of the care I had taken of him over the weekend, but I had to tell them that really it was Molly who did all the tedious work. They were clearly enthralled by the image of the eight-year-old girl reading stories in the clinical setting to their aged canine, and arrived up at the next visit with some beautiful books for her, along with the most amazing butter scones that Mary herself had made for us.

  Although Banjax came from a long distance away, after his discharge, his owners asked if they could keep coming to us. As Banjax made a full recovery and regained his original form, I felt that the initial referring vet would be somewhat relieved as Banjax, despite his not quite six kilos of body mass, was at times as difficult to handle as any large animal.

  Banjax had attitude and lots of it. It was only when he was well that I realised just how sick he had been to have allowed me to treat him and I was now amazed that pulling his line out was the worst he had got up to. Over his years that followed, Banjax suffered from a number of recurrent minor issues that nonetheless required regular treatment, necessitating regular visits to the clinic. His arrival was always heralded by a remarkably loud snarling from his small body and I was never in any doubt as to when he had arrived. He soon became known among the regular clients as ‘the conscientious objector’. Once in the consulting room, he would keep up the snarling, which increased in decibels every time I touched him until I was finished, at which stage I would remove the muzzle, pop him down on the floor and he would docilely accept a treat from me as though he was the model patient. Banjax was all talk, but from outside the waiting room I’m sure it sounded like I was murdering him. In keeping with his character, Banjax was fussy about his treats, so that in the end his owner had to bring a supply to offer as he would look at me so disdainfully if I dared offer him something that was not to his liking.

  As Banjax got older, the severity of his ailments became more challenging as he became increasingly debilitated.

  One day, Mary arrived into the clinic unannounced and I could see by her face that something was wrong. We had already discussed that as Banjax had so many issues, should something serious happen to him he was no longer fit for any sort of surgery or major intervention, so I was worried. As she carried Banjax in, there wasn’t a word out of him and in my anxiety I didn’t even think to get his own personal muzzle, which was kept in a drawer with his treats. As I sat on the floor with Banjax, Mary told me how she had been washing up in the kitchen and heard a loud squeal from Banjax and when she came out his was lying flat on the floor and now seemed unable to move one of his front legs.

  As we talked, Banjax picked himself and slowly shuffled over to me and placed his head and the affected leg on my lap looking up at me questioningly. For all the years of hardship he had given us, that one moment of trust and understanding between us melted me like no other in all my years of clinical practice. Banjax clearly understood that I was the person to help him and was asking me to do so. He allowed me to place him on my lap and examine him. Apart from a constant shaking in the limb and tight muscles I could feel no significant abnormality. I suggested to Mary that I would give him a strong painkiller and for her to take him home and keep him quiet and see how he responded.

  Whatever had happen to Banjax, Mary rang the next day to say he had slept from the time he got home. Although he was slightly cautious on the leg the next morning, he was well on the way to recovery.

  It was a few weeks before he next visited, this time with an infection in one of the many cysts and growths that had been appearing on his body in the previous few years. I was almost relieved to hear the snarling as her approached the waiting room. The old Banjax was back and as I gently drained the infection from the growth on his face, he roared and squealed at me, fully reassuring me that he was feeling well again.

  As Banjax approached his late teens, although his attitude never changed, he seemed to fade. It almost seemed that the effort of maintaining his status as ‘conscientious objector’ was becoming too much for him. His muzzle began to fray and although we kept up the old routine of offering his current favourite treat after removing the muzzle he might take or leave it.

  I am glad that I myself was with Banjax when his last days came. We had discussed it many times and, although I offered to call out when the time came, Mary instead insisted that she would bring him up.

  What is slightly strange is that I have absolutely no recollection of that day. I know it was shortly before Christmas. My clinical records outline how he had deteriorated and was neither eating nor drinking. The medications I used for his final visit are clearly recorded.

  On the day before his demise, I clearly remember standing in the yard and having a discussion with a client as to how bitterly cold it was. She looked at me strangely and said that s
he didn’t find it all that cold herself for the time of year. After the clinic, I got into a bath as hot as I could bear it and yet still the cold invaded me, so that even the inside of my head hurt. No matter how many hot water bottles I filled or how many duvets I pulled over myself, I just couldn’t get warm and lay all night shaking with the cold while at the same time being vaguely aware that the sheets on which I lay were soaked in sweat.

  I remember driving the kids to school, then ringing over to the surgery to ask the nurses to cancel all my appointments and crawling back into the sweat-soaked sheets.

  Apparently Amanda rang me later that morning to say that Mary had rung to say that the time had come for Banjax to be put to sleep. Apparently I told them to book her in and to let me know when she arrived. I must have been a state when I arrived over. I assume I got dressed, but I doubt I wore my veterinary scrubs.

  It was almost a week later, when I was back at work although still far from well, that I must have mentioned Banjax. Amanda looked strangely at me and gently reminded me that I had put him to sleep.

  To this day I have no recollection of that last visit with Banjax or of his passing, but in a funny way I am glad I was there.

  Chapter 15

  Exotics

  When Laura, a final-year veterinary student, rang to enquire about ‘seeing practice’ for a few weeks over the holiday, I was delighted. It’s always interesting to have a veterinary student, as their enthusiasm can be infectious and although it takes longer to get everything done, in a nice way it reminds you of how far you have come yourself! It was only when she mentioned that her main interest was in what are referred to in veterinary medicine as ‘exotics’ that I became slightly anxious.

  Far from being actually exotic, in veterinary terms, ‘exotics’ are classed as basically anything that, in small-animal practice, is not a cat or a dog. In my days in Ballyfermot with the Blue Cross, a pillowcase could be opened to reveal a five-foot python or a bucket could contain a dinner-plate size turtle, but due to the location of Clover Hill Veterinary Clinic, in the depths of rural Wicklow, approximately eight-five percent of our patients were dogs with the vast majority of the remainder being cats. The small remaining percentage was made up of the occasional rabbit or guinea pig, which I tried to avoid like the plague, not out of any aversion to them, but simply because I was violently allergic to them. As a child I was equally allergic to all animals, but despite the advice from the medical profession and my mother’s despair, I persisted with animals at any opportunity until my immune system got used to it or maybe gave up on me. Unfortunately, as my contact with these furry ‘exotics’ was so limited, a simple toenail clip would leave me burning with a rash and hardly able to breathe for the remainder of the day.

  Even less commonly seen than the ‘small furries’ was the wild-life – the occasional hedgehog or poisoned fox, the fledgling birds, which were despairingly hopeless, or the occasional call out to a deer – usually the result of a road traffic accident. Although I felt in many ways unqualified to care for these patients, I always enjoyed working with them; knowing I was their only option consoled me to some extent, and actually a reassuring number of them recovered and were eventually returned to the wild.

  I did tell Laura that it was unlikely that she would see any exotics in her three-week stint, but by sheer luck, I did have one case that might be of interest to her. A few months previously, we had inherited a pair of chinchillas via the usual ‘friend of a friend’ scenario. The teenaged children had lost interest in them, and the parents had never had any, so Charlie and Mandy were looking for a home. It was unfortunate that Molly, Fiona and Jack were there when Donal mentioned it over the dinner table and even more unfortunate that one of their childhood favourite books had contained a full-colour picture of one of these silver-grey, captivatingly adorable creatures.

  Of course we had to take them. It simply wasn’t worth the argument and, in fairness, adding two chinchillas to our menagerie of existing dogs, cats, ponies, goats, ducks and hens wasn’t going to make a huge amount of difference. What I did learn about keeping chinchillas is that, although not a great children’s handling pet, they are, as far my experience went, relatively hypoallergenic as their dense, silky fur didn’t seem to have any effect on either me of or the kids, who had inherited a, thankfully much milder, version of my allergies.

  It seemed that Mandy and Charlie were content in their new home as although their previous owners had assured me that they had never had young despite being together for almost four years, about six months after arriving with us, I was woken by squeals of delight from Fiona who on waking, had handed the pair their customary breakfast of a dried apricot and when Mandy jumped out to take hers, a tiny grey fluff-ball tumbled out from under her. The fluff-ball was promptly christened Puffle, in honour of the ongoing Club Penguin craze. Mandy and even Charlie had everything under control and my intervention was not needed as Puffle got bigger and fluffier and, at an alarmingly rapid rate, started to resemble his parents.

  Of course the problem then arose that as Puffle grew, keeping her with her father – I was reasonably confident that she was a female – was not going to be an option. Equally, much and all as Puffle became a family favourite, becoming incredibly tame by being handled by the kids (who in fairness to them had better animal-handling skills than most children of their age) at the same time, I didn’t want an army of fluff-balls. So reluctantly I told myself that Charlie was going to have to be neutered. I have to admit I was slightly embarrassed, for all the times, I would silently raise my eyes to heaven as the clients came in with their pets’ conditions already diagnosed by the powers of Doctor Google that I did have to scan the internet, in my defence, through some well-established veterinary professional websites, in relation to the correct procedure for anaesthetising and neutering a chinchilla.

  So when Laura the vet student rang that day, I decided I could hold off the procedure for three weeks until her planned dates to carry out the surgery on the unwitting Charlie.

  ‘My God, this is so amazing,’ she declared on the first morning, as I brought her over to the house to visit our surgical patient. ‘I’ve never even seen one of these. I can’t believe I’m getting to hold one.’

  Thankfully, I didn’t have to put Charlie through the stress of a car journey, or admission and hospitalisation – I simply bundled him into my coat pocket to bring him over. I had already set up my anaesthetic chamber, having carefully bored a hole in one of Jack’s old Lego boxes through which the inlet pipe delivered a mixture of oxygen and gaseous anaesthetic. Laura was as excited as the kids would have been if I had let them watch, but due to my complete lack of experience, I had decided against letting them be involved in the procedure.

  ‘Look at his whiskers,’ she enthused, despite my guidance to be absolutely quiet as we sat in the darkened room. In fairness his whiskers and nose were twitching dramatically as he sniffed the unfamiliar gas. I was almost holding my breath watching as Charlie gradually succumbed to the anaesthetic gas. Within minutes he was comfortably sleeping. Preparing the surgical site was more challenging than I had anticipated as, apart from his less-than-one-pound body weight, the hair was incredibly fine, but at the same time dense in a way that made it difficult to either clip or pluck. Eventually the site was prepared, with Charlie carefully swaddled in bubble wrap on a heated table to prevent his tiny body losing heat. Laura watched, enthralled, as I carefully palpated the surprisingly large scrotal sac and worked to manipulate the testicle from its normal resting place in the abdomen, through the inguinial canal, into the sac through which we would make our surgical incision to remove them.

  The most difficult part was the stitch up due to the anatomical difference which meant that more internal sutures were needed to be placed than for a cat or dog, to prevent the intestine herniating through the canal. By the time I got to the last few skin sutures, I could sense that Laura was bursting to speak. Seeing that Charlie’s breathing was calm and regular a
nd with Amanda assuring me that the heart rate was regular, I offered to allow Laura to place the last couple of sutures.

  ‘Oh my God, I absolutely can’t believe you’re letting me do this,’ she exclaimed as she scrubbed and gloved under my direction.

  The bursting enthusiasm dissolved slightly as I watched her hand shake as she held the tiny rat-tooth forceps and had to make a few attempts before grasping the edge of the remaining incision. Although I wouldn’t usually allow a student to suture on their first day seeing practice, I knew that this may well be her first and last chance, perhaps for her entire career, to say she sutured a chinchilla!

  I was beginning to regret my decision as she took several attempts with the tiny curved needle before finally managing to pass the razor-sharp pointed needle, threaded with the fine suture, material through the flimsy skin. After placing the two tiny suture, her hands were shaking even more but Charlie recovered uneventfully apart from taking a sneezing fit, his whiskers again twitched violently as he recovered in his little box, now inhaling pure oxygen to flush the anaesthetic gas from his system. By the time the kids came home from school, Charlie was happily back in his kingdom and eagerly grabbed the peanut treats as though nothing unusual had occurred. I was relieved that for the moment, I could honestly declare that I had a hundred per cent success rate with chinchilla anaesthetics should a client ever ask!

  Thrilled and all as Laura was to not only observe the surgery but to even play a part in it, her three-week stink was only going to get better. She was enthusiastic and diligent as we made our way through the week of itchy poodles and anal glands, lump removals and routine neutering and she was quick to learn so that I was able to allow her to do more as the week proceeded. By Friday she had neutered two tomcats on her own which, in fairness, is a much simpler procedure than with a chinchilla. Just after lunch on the Friday, I got a call from a Marc Ruddock – an unfamiliar name to me. When Amanda mentioned that he was ringing from the Eagle Trust, Laura nearly jumped off her seat with excitement. As Marc introduced himself I remembered that some months ago, a member of the public had brought in the body of a red kite that had been found at sea by the life boats. He was a wildlife warden and asked if I could radiograph the body to check if it had been shot or not. Although saddened by the lifeless body, I was happy to help, knowing that the radiographs that I had taken of my only other previous kite encounter, for the same reason, had provided enormous entertainment for my days of giving school talks.