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TESTIMONIALS... |
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Zachary Taylor
On November 20 around 7 AM I gave Zach, my almost ten year old German Shepherd Dog, and his sister Hobbes their usual breakfast; about one cup of NutroÊLarge Breed Adult dog food along with a large portion, maybe a cup, of mashed sweet potatoes. Zach has never, even as a puppy, been a big eater. He totally ignores canned dog food regardless of the brand, but he loves sweet potatoes. |
At around 9:30 AM I headed down to the highway here on Big Pine to run some errands. When I returned around 11:30 I was greeted at the gate by Hobbes, but no Zach. This in itself is quite unusual; she is usually in the house guarding the couch while Zach is always downstairs waiting for me, no matter how hot or rainy it is. Right away I knew something was wrong. Hobbes had a distressed look on her face; she and Zach are totally bonded to each other, and when I asked her where Zach was she would just tilt her head and look at me imploringly. I rushed up stairs, we live in a stilt house, and there was Zach stretched out on the couch with his jowls just dripping saliva. He was relatively unresponsive; but I got him up and led him downstairs just to see what he would do. He wandered around aimlessly; I wondered if he had had a stroke? He didn’t seem to be in any discomfort, just totally lost. I guess at this point he was already in shock? I quickly called Marathon Veterinary Hospital; they had treated Zach before for minor problems and I knew their great reputation. I told them Zach was in grave distress and was told to bring him straight up. I don’t own a car so I borrowed my neighbor’s and rushed to Marathon. It was obvious to everyone in the office that Zach was in peril. He was put in an examination room and someone came in right away to get the pertinent information. Dr. Mader came in almost immediately following that and after doing a couple of quick tests pretty much ruled out a stroke. He said a heart attack or swallowing a scorpion could cause the symptoms that Zach was exhibiting. He said he was going to reserve judgment until he had done an EKG and had some x-rays to look at. When he returned to the examination room he said Zach had a slight murmur in his left ventricle but that wasn’t the problem. He had a twisted stomach and what appeared to be a large tumor on his spleen. We discussed what I wanted him to do if he found additional tumors on Zach’s liver when he opened him up; wake him or let him go? I told him I didn’t want my dog suffering a slow death by liver cancer and to just let him go. He told me what I already knew, I have lost a dog to gastric torsion before; the stomach surgery was emergency surgery and he would start as soon as I signed the consent. He said if I didn’t hear from him by 3 PM, it must have been around twelve thirty or one by then, I could start calling, and it was OK if I called every five minutes, saying that he didn’t have any children, his pets were his kids and he understood how I felt. Having been through this before sort of thing before, many times; I used to breed German Shepherds and Rottweilers, all I could think as I headed home was I was about to lose my best buddy, and tried to imagine how Hobbes would survive without her. I called MVH around 3:10 and Dr. Mader had just finished the surgery. As he put it; “I have good news and good news.” The first good news was Zach had survived the torsion surgery with no damage to his esophageal or intestinal muscles or stomach damage do to lack of blood flow. The next good news was he didn’t have a tumor on his spleen; it too had been twisted and he informed me that what appeared on the x-ray as a tumor was just blood buildup from the twist. He said when he untwisted it he watched the blood flow out of the spleen and it return to normal size. Obviously there were no liver tumors. Words couldn’t describe my relief. Dr. Mader informed me we weren’t out of the woods yet; he had to make it through the night and it was all right for me to call whenever I wanted to, to check on Zach. I called at around 6 PM, he was resting comfortably and called once more a little before 10, and was told he had been up and walking around and was asleep in his kennel. I called the next morning, Tuesday, and was told Zach would be ready to come home Wednesday. So, Wednesday afternoon I borrowed the car again and went up to get my boy. Dr. Doug told me Zach had to be kept quite, no wrestling with Hobbes until the staples came out. I wasn’t looking forward to that prospect, they still play like puppies, but Hobbes seemed to know, once again, that Zach needed TLC and she left him alone. When I inquired as to the chance of there being a recurrence, Dr. Mader told me it couldn’t happen He had stitched his stomach to his ribcage to prevent it ever twisting again. Zach never once dug at his staples, the precautionary cone around his neck was totally unnecessary, and I only put it on him at night when I couldn’t be watching him. He was leaking urine for a few days, no big deal, I rolled up the rugs, but as soon as I took off the Fentanyl (pain killer) patch on Saturday he started acting like nothing had even happened. After that I had to be fairly strict with them to keep them from getting too rough with each other. Dr. Geri removed the staples on Wednesday, November 29. He was his usual big baby self about that, and he has been fine, better than fine, ever since then. Zachary and Hobbes celebrated their tenth birthday together December 11 and it is truly a miracle that they were able to do that. Dr. Doug, you saved my dog’s life! I will always be indebted to EVERYONE at MVH for their loving, caring, world class treatment of my dog and me! Thank you all! |
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