Delivered Pups! Documents Away!

We are continuing on with the Fix St. Croix mission.  I have been able to find and send copies of all the documents needed for a temporary license to practice in St. Croix (thanks to my Cracker Jack Staff).  Now I just have to wait to see if everything goes through.  It should, but you never know about these things.  Sometimes you will run into a "snag" of some type… we will see.

Troubled Little Young Pug!

I ran into a case this week of the reason that I am going to St. Croix.  We had a very sweet but very young little pug show up at the hospital and she was in trouble.  She was in active labor but unable to produce any pups (the technical term is Dystocia).  We took some radiographs and discovered that she had 2 very large pups that she was trying to give birth to for the past 6 hours. 

  There were birthing tissues hanging out the back end but no pups.  I also used the ultrasound machine to make sure the pups were alive. Sure enough there were 2 little hearts pumping away!  After trying to have her deliver naturally, it was painfully obvious that surgery was our only option.  We went to work.  Folks, I can't emphasize how great my staff is when it comes to emergencies.  Everyone knew what they had to do and everyone jumped into action!  The trick to delivering live pups is speed!  We had her down on the surgery table and pups delivered within 5 minutes after starting anesthesia.  The pups were stimulated to breath by the staff and they were cleaned up and kept warm while waiting for the Mom to be closed up.  The ovarian hysterectomy and the closure took much longer due to all the extensive development of the vessels and the huge uterus.  The Mom did fine and we introduced both pups soon after she was recovered from anesthesia.  They were bruisers and the instinct to nurse took over. 

  Both pups weighed over half a pound!  That would be like have 10 pound twins for you ladies out there… Yikes!  The miracle of life is a miracle, but the casual breeding of dogs is not good.  It should not be entered into lightly as there are many potential complications.  I am sure that if more people were aware of these complications, they would keep their furry companions from breeding.  In this case everything turned out OK (so far).  It was a very dangerous and expensive event for the owner and the Mom, not to mention it will be a long 6 to 8 weeks of tending to these pups  before finding them new homes.  It could have been avoided with a simple spay between 4 and 6 months of age.  Ah, "hind sight is always 20/20".

Well its time for a second cup of coffee and then back to work.  Thanks for all the support out there, its great to hear from you.  Stay tuned for more developments.  Bye for now, Robin.