Pink Bunny

We had a couple of brothers in last night. Two terriers, happy and hyperactive that had been vomiting. They were in the same kennel, and although identical, they had different collars on so we could id them. Provided they did not swop collars to fool us, with the way they were behaving l would not put it past them.
Both were on Antepsin l over drew the amount needed, this allows for "paint effect". The 3 of us had a game with the yummy white stuff that l just knew they wanted to try. I lifted them out one at a time and medicated them. Sure enough they did not let me down l got smeared, the walls did and each other as they spat out the yummy white stuff. Oh well not the end of the world they got some and the other drugs were via injection so l know that they went in.

Diabetic dog is no more. After a long consultation between vets and his family it was decided that it was to much for him to cope with and overcome. He had no quality of life and was unlikely to ever pull through, he had just to much going on with his old body.

Siamese cat had great fun yesterday and was back in sweet mode, well 90% of the time. I gave him a small pink fluffy bunny cat toy. He hauled it through the kennel door as soon as he saw it. I was impressed he appeared to take the same dislike to the toy l had been messing about with during change over that the vet had. I thought it had been rather sweet still no accounting for taste. He proceeded to "kill" it for about 20minutes, snarling, biting, ripping and drowning it in spit.

I had to do a discharge last night explaining to owners how to inject their diabetic cat and how to look after the insulin, used syringes and basic info. The full talk hypo/hyper etc was to be given by their vet in a couple of days when they went back at a sensible time not 22:00 and when they were more confident with all that was going on with insulin injections.

All went well until l got to the end and the husband said well think we have it all sorted at home we even have a can of coke cola in case he goes low. I think my eyes crossed and l shuddered.
"Noo no just put that in a brandy or something and drink it yourself, do not give that to him at all" in l hope an emphatic not squeaky voice, while trying to think how the vets would feel about having a caffeine poisoned, inhalation pneumonia elderly cat with diabetes to treat.
"Get your vet to arrange a suitable commercial alternative or keep some glucose handy but for gods sake no coke"

I use a bottle of sterile water as practice and after a few pale looks from the husband who had a dislike of syringes and needles it went smoothly. Finally they decided that they were ready for a few practice injections of bagpus so l went and collected him.

I gave him a quick apology beforehand as l wanted the first injection to make a point in a controlled situation, that even if he gave a yowl it was not the end of life. I had my 2 trainees use the same insulin setup for a couple more practice runs before the first sterile water injection was given.
The resulting yowl got the response l wanted. They leapt 6foot into the air and he glared at them. l was able to explain why and they got the point, blunt needles hurt.
The second injection given l have to say rather bravely by the husband given his dislike of needles good old bagpus did not even blink, smiles all round, and the important confidence boost had worked.

They went off happy to start their new life of 2times daily injections. If they are unable to give them for the first few days then they are fine to take him to the vets and do it under supervision but both were happy with how things were.

We have a possible IMHA cat in or the posh name of Immune Mediated Haemolytic Anaemia. His PCV% (volume of red blood cells in a set amount of blood) was 8% it should have been around 30% at its lowest.
Unfortunately his brother was the wrong blood typing for transfusion but one of our donor cats fitted the bill, post transfusion he defiantly felt a lot better.

We had to send blood off to confirm what he had. Some sensible labs put in their info brochure what you place the sample into EDTA, Serum tube, slide or whatever, not this lab.
So l went off and trawled the net trying to confirm what tube they wanted blood in for Coombes Test. I checked labs we knew did the test, nope, general searches nothing. Finally in desperation and so we did not send off about 5 tubes in the hope one would be right l tried the labs own site and found the info, great half an hour wasted cause they wanted to save on printers ink.