Category — Pets

Dr Ferox's family dog incognito

In the last week of my final veterinary exams, the ones that decide whether or not I deserve to be a veterinarian, I knew there was going to be trouble. For one tihng I had been scheduled the very hardest exam at the last possible timeslot on the last day. Everyone else would be partying long before me, and I would be stressing out for several hours more than everyone else.

That was scheduled for Thursday afternoon. However, it was on the Monday, not fifteen minutes after my previous exam, that I got a phone call from home.

“Oh, the dog looks quite sick. We were out at an open day yesterday and he wouldn’t drink then. He had a vomit last night, and this morning but we’re not sure what we should do.”

This wasn’t such an unusualy phone call for me. Parents have a habit of expecting free veterinary advice over the phone from their kids, and usually it’s a reasonable situation. I’ve been woken from my slumber with calls about the dog coughing after being in kennels, and mild bouts of diarrhoea, but hte important thing was that the dog had never looked sick before, he’d always been bright and happy.

The only real response to give when an animal looks empathically unwell is to send them to the vet for an exam. However, my parents wouldn’t take such direct advice, and it took them until the next day to take our sick dog to the vet. So on Tuesday the dog was finally seen by a vet, put on fluids, and had an Xray.

That afternoon I got a phone call. The dog was being sent to the vet clinic at uni, all the way across town, for intensive care.

Damn it family! Less than 48 hours to my most terrifying exam and you’re sending an apparently critical dog across town so that I can keep you informed. Why didn’t he go to the vet on Monday? [Read more →]