Tag: AeshaD- Animal Care

Sadly, today was our last day at TVRH. Although it was upsetting to leave, we were really excited to spend yet another day there. The staff didn’t fail to make this day memorable. Today we watched 3 surgeries: An orthopedic surgery, a mass removal on a tail, and a toe removal. The last two surgeries mentioned were done on the same dog. It was pretty gory to watch a toe being cut off, but it was nothing I’d ever seen before. It was so cool to watch something being amputated because I’d always wondered what that would be like. The mass removal didn’t take very long. The surgeon just cut the bottom of the tail and removed the mass which wasn’t located very deep in the tail. It was a great end to an amazing WEP and I’m really glad I could experience all these interesting things during it. I hope I can go back and visit the TVRH staff who made us feel so welcome while we were there and continued to allow us to watch about everything they did.

In the picture below are two amazing vet techs, Laura and Steve, giving a dog anesthesia to prepare him for surgery.

I guess not all days at the veterinary hospital can be buzzing with energy and constant incoming patients. Today was a very slow day at the hospital, with only a couple of admittances and no surgeries at all while we were there. Since there wasn’t anything for us to watch, Adrienne and I decided to read up on some stuff using the staff’s books and also ask the staff certain questions. Today we learned a lot about parvo or parvovirus. This is a highly contagious disease which when elicited cause bloody, very liquid diarrhea and vomiting. This virus lives in the soil and can also be spread by the excretions of a patient that has the illness. If not treated soon enough, the patient will die, like a Labrador puppy that we saw a couple days back. Vets have to take extra precautions when treating these animals because it is so contagious. They even have a separate room for these animals.

This is the machine used to administer anesthesia before surgery. The white rocks that are in a container not visible in this picture is propofol which causes the animal to fall asleep. The gas used is isoflurane and this is a general anesthetic.

Today was a relatively slow day at the hospital. The morning was filled with simple blood draws and check-ups. The afternoon was when it got interesting. Today, Adrienne and I were able to watch yet another surgery, but it wasn’t like any of the other ones we had seen. Today, the veterinary surgeons were faced with the task of removing an object from the stomach of a very naughty puppy who had scavenged in the trash a day before. As a result, the puppy had been vomiting and needed surgery. The surgeons told us that the ultrasound only showed that the object was round and they had no idea what it was. That’s when the vet techs starting making guesses of what it was saying that it could be either a ball or a small fruit pit. We watched as the surgeon cut open the dog and started searching the colon/large intestine for a round object. She finally found it very obviously lodged in the middle of this organ. Once she found it, the vet techs immediately stated that it could possibly be a squeaker from a toy. When the surgeon cut open the intestine, she proved the vet techs right. The puppy had swallowed a squeaker! Once she removed it, she sewed the opening she made and she also sewed the stomach of the puppy to the body wall  to keep it from flipping (a common occurrence in larger dogs). I wasn’t able to see the puppy after he came out of her sleep, but I bet he felt a lot better without trash stuck in his stomach.

(Not the dog that received surgery)

Today I saw what made being a veterinarian the hardest: having to put a dog down. The moment I walked into the hospital today, there was a Great Dane lying on the counter and he looked pretty sick. There was a couple of vet techs crowded around him and one doctor who was giving him a check-up. The Great Dane had muscle atrophy, an old prostate, a bloated (maybe turned in) stomach, and was 12 years old (way past the age that Great Danes usually live). He looked extremely tired and it just seemed like he couldn’t live his life out happily even after surgery. The owners knew that the right thing to do was to put the dog down so they didn’t even discuss surgery. They immediately skipped to euthanasia. It was really sad to have to see a dog in that state and that’s when I realized that it’s more important to put an animal out of its misery rather than try to make them live a little bit more with their pain. It was sad, but it was the right thing to do and the Great Dane lived a really long life.

Along with this, we were also able to watch an FHO surgery of an 11 month old Maltese. The picture above shows some of the things people have to wear when entering and watching a surgery.

Friday was a pretty exciting day. Not only did I get to see two surgeries, but I was also able to see how Vets handled smaller and less common animals. It was wellness day which meant that the vets could bring in their animals and get them checked. One of the nurses brought in her pets and I was really surprised. She brought in two hedgehogs! Their names were Pamela and Cynthia and they were very grouchy. Three vet techs had to help get them into the correct position but even then, the hedgehogs kept rolling into balls and hissing. In order to solve this problem, the owner brought an anesthesia tank towards the hedgehogs with a cone at the end of the tube. She took the hedgehog ball and covered it with the cone while the gas came through and calmed her down. After the hedgehog was at ease, another vet tech pressed its small belly to search from some problems and the owner helped to cut her nails. They were so adorable! After this Adrienne and I were able to watch a splenectomy which was really interesting. It was cool how the Vet could take out the whole spleen (which is way larger than a human spleen) without harming the dog in any way. I can’t wait till next week which will probably be filled with more surgeries and maybe even more interesting animals. (Not the same dog that got the surgery)

Today was our first day at the Triangle Veterinary Referral Hospital. It was really different than what I expected. The word hospital caused me to imagine a giant building that was a couple stories and had doctors running around frantically. Instead, the building was relatively small with many rooms on just the one level and had a very calm environment. There was a central area where all the vet technicians worked and there were surgical rooms and check-up rooms for clients.

Today, Adrienne and I were lucky enough to sit in on an abdominal mass surgery. We watched as the dog was put under anesthesia and entered the surgical procedure. There were two vet technicians helping and one veterinary surgeon. There were many layers that were placed over the dog until only the part that was being dissected could be seen. As a courtesy to the 4 people viewing the surgery, the surgeon allowed us to take a close look at the internal organs of the dog and pointed out the different ones. He pulled out each organ carefully making me wonder firstly how he would get them all back in properly and also how the dog was still living while the surgeon was pulling all of her organs out. In order to remove the abdominal mass, the surgeon cut a portion of the dog’s intestine and then stapled and soldered the two pieces of the intestine together so there were no holes. He then placed all the organs back into the dog and sewed the wound back up and the dog was returned to her crate. It was so interesting to be able to watch this surgery take place, for I always believed that I would pass out at the sight of organs or blood during any surgery. It made me even more interested in veterinary practices than I ever was before.

 

Today, Adrienne and I got to work with another dog training organization called Dog Training Camp, USA. It was pretty different from Teamworks Dog Training in that they didn’t always do their training at their location and they also didn’t emphasize positive reinforcement as much. Today we took the dogs they were boarding/training on a walk in Waverly. We walked the dogs in circles in order to get them prepared for the walk we took and also to calm them down a little bit. What I noticed that was different from Teamworks was the fact that this camp taught their dogs to walk with them and sit by tugging at the collar around their necks. This was quite different from the positive reinforcement we saw at the other location. Although I wasn’t that keen on tugging on the collars, I admired how the dogs knew exactly what to do when their owner did that action. They instantaneously sat down or stopped walking. My favorite pup there was a beagle named Chance who was very lovable and was always opening to cuddling with Adrienne and I. He was absolutely adorable! The walk was really calming and the dogs seemed pretty worn out by the end, but it was pretty cool to be able to compare the two different types of training methods.

The first day of the work experience program was absolutely incredible! Today, Adrienne and I got to visit a location in Raleigh called Teamworks Dog Training where dogs go to get trained and sometimes stay months at a time while their owners are away. We got to learn some amazing things about how to train dogs using clickers and positive reinforcement. We also learned about the things owners should and shouldn’t do to their dogs. For instance, I learned that you should always advocate for your dog and let others know of your dogs likes and dislikes. The staff members were so nice as to allow us to participate in some of the training activities such as recall and basic training. They offered Adrienne and I treat aprons and clickers so that we could train and reward the dogs for their amazing tricks. We worked with many different dogs including some therapy dogs and we even got to watch many of them play with each other. Overall, the first day of our work experience was a lot of fun and I can’t wait for the next two weeks!