Tag: Veterinary Medicine

June 6th- Puppiiiesssss!!!!!

It was another sad start to the seventh day of the Work Experience program, as the first appointment of the day was for a dog that was extremely sick. The dog had cancer on its belly with open wounds and it was determined that the cancer was equivalent to that of stage four cancer in humans. The owner decided to euthanize the dog to spare it any pain and suffering, making it quite a sad but educational moment. The day improved dramatically after the initial consultation because the next patient that we got to see was a puppy golden retriever who was very curious and wanted to talk to everyone. In fact, while the doctor was going over the course of treatment for the puppy, Madi, Nell, and I were petting the dog in the examination room and giving it lots of love. The day continued to get better as the next thing that we did was go into surgery on a chocolate lab. The chocolate lab had been seen 3 years ago for a tibia fracture and after three revision and correction surgeries and three years later, the leg was still not healing. We know that the leg was not healing properly because when you looked at the inside of the leg, you could actually see the metal plate that was placed in there three years, meaning that the skin hadn’t formed over the fracture, leaving it susceptible to a multitude of injuries and possible infections. Therefore, the dog underwent an amputation of the hind limb. Even though it was sad to watch part of the dog being cut away, the doctors and vet nurses assured us that the dog would feel much better now that it was free of the pain the leg was causing. Despite the sad and tearful start to the day, we learned a lot!

Day 7

Today was my first day at the Triangle Veterinary Referral Hospital. I arrived at around 8am and met up with Katrine and Madi S. shortly after. The first thing we did was join everyone in rounds by listening to the updates about the animals who had stayed overnight. Our first consult of the day was for a dog in very poor condition. The dog had an equivalent of stage 4 cancer which was restricting it from going to the bathroom. The dog hadn’t eaten or drank anything in almost a week and was vomiting multiple times a day. The family decided to put the dog down that day to end all suffering. It definitely was not a good way to start my first day, but it is apart of the job and is good to experience. Our next consult was much much better. The dog was very upbeat running around the office, but unfortunately was healing from some fractures that had occurred the week before. While the doctor talked to the dog’s owner, we got to sit and play with the dog which was a good turnaround from the last appointment.

We then watched an amputation surgery. I know this sounds very sad, but we were reassured that the dog would feel significantly better after having the operation. After lunch, nothing big happened we just wandered around seeing all the little things going on around the office.

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