Category Archives: Veterinary medicine

My latest cat bite

Not that I think I will be slowly morphing into a human-feline mutant but I was surprised how badly I responded to a recent cat bite I sustained during my locuming in in a small animal practice in Blackpool. Since I graduated from the vet school in 1998 I have had a few bites and lots of scratches from my dearest feline friends but I have never had to seek medical help before.

This cat was a bit of a psycho as it was quite happy looking and content when the owner brought it into the consult room. Besides the fact that it was enormous and very very fat I had no warning what was to happen during the consult. After the owner and I opened the carrier door I even patted the cat gently and he was absolutely fine with it. The facial expression was showing slight worry (over what the hell is going to happen to him at the vet’s) but still relative sedateness.

Because of the enormous size of the cat we had to open up the carrier and before that we had to undo all the clips that held the top and that was quite a loud undertaking. Just as we removed the top the cats suddenly lunged forward – as it was in the direction of my right hand, took a good bite in it and just as quickly lunged back in. It all happeed so quickly even the bite wound took quite a few seconds before it started to bleed – see, even my hand was surprised :-)

What I usually do after a bite is to do the usual initial disinfection by dousing the wound some surgical spirit – gritting teeth and growling un-recognisable rude words, preferably in Slovene, so no one around me understand me.

The next day I thought things were getting better so I decided to leave it only to start having problems in the evening. Luckily I already enquired with one of the nurses where the nearest A&E clinic is. In this case I went to the walk-in clinic in Blackpool.

Please look away if you are squeamish but this is what my hand looked like about 36 hours after the bite

about 36 hours after bite

can’t really see the swelling well but its there, trust me and the wound was suppurating quite nicely and very painful. Luckily the trip to the Whitegate walk-in centre resulted in me receiving antibiotics flucloxacillin that worked really well. But examples like this just show what doctors can get away with in regards to owner compliance compared to us vets. The treatment demanded me to take the capsule four times a day. And you were also not allowed to eat two hours before and one hour after taking the pill. Well, simple maths show you that was 12h of me not eating. I was usually awake for about 16 hours so I had to get my eatin’ done in those four hours throughout the day and still work at a very busy veterinary practice. Of course I couldn’t do that and I had to cheat a few times.

Luckily the medication still worked fine and this is my hand two days after start of treatment

about 48 hours after start of treatment

 

FentonVets_Theatre_2

New outlook

Not written here for a while so I will be brief:

  • Today was the last day at The Fenton Veterinary Practice – my employer for the last 5 years.
  • Starting my own business as a locum veterinary surgeon.
  • I incorporated my own limited company Pet Doc Martin
  • Created a new website PetDocMartin.co.uk
  • Created a Facebook page, LinkedIn page, Twitter page and VetSurgeon page
  • My first contract will take e to London. I will probably write more about it on the Pet Doc Martin website
traveldog

Britanija spreminja pogoje za prihod hišnih ljubljencev v državo

Od 1. januarja 2012 se bodo omilila pravila, ki pogojujejo vstop psov, mačk in dihurjev v Veliko Britanijo. Živali, ki vstopajo iz drugih EU držav (razen Švedske in Irske) ter določenih tretjih držav bodo še vedno morale biti čipirane in cepljene proti steklini, ne bo pa več potrebno opravljati serološke preiskave krvi na titer protiteles proti virusu stekline, čakalna doba se bo skrajšala s šestih mesecev na 21 dni, obvezno ne bo več dajati sredstva za odstranjevanje klopov. Trenutno se pa še dogovarjajo, ali bo še vedno obvezno dajati sredstvo za odpravljanje trakulje. Posodobitev (30-Jul-2011): Pred dnevi je prišla iz Bruslja novica, da se Veliki Britaniji odobri ukrep, ki zahteva, da se živali razglistijo 24 do 120 ur pred potovanjem (1-5 dni). Gre namreč za to, da želijo preprečiti vnos trakulje Echinococcus multilocularis v državo, ki jo je trenutno prosta.

Poleg tega se spreminjajo pogoji tudi za prihod živali iz ostalih držav, ki niso na seznamu. Prej je bila obvezna karantena, ki jo bo zamenjalo obvezno cepljenje, pregled krvi 30 dni po cepljenju ter trimesečna čakalna doba.

Vse skupaj je posledica harmonizacije EU zakonodaje pri čezmejnem prehajanju hišnih ljubljencev. Trenutno velje tudi, da cepivo proti steklini drži toliko časa, kolikor je navedeno na licenci proizvajalca. To bo ostalo tudi po 1. januarju 2012. V Veliki Britaniji večina cepiv proti steklini drži 2 leti in zato se cepljenje tudi mora ponavljati na dve leti. Težava nastopi pri nekaterih drugih državah EU (sam imam veliko opravka z Francijo, kamor potuje veliko Britancev), kjer je cepljenje potrebno opravljati vsako leto. Seveda to velja, kot razumem, tudi za Slovenijo. Upam lahko vsaj, da se bo pravilo veljavnosti cepiva glede na licenco proizvajalca razširilo na vse EU države. Regulativa EC 998/2003 po mojem mnenju čisto na koncu (Aneks 1b, odstavka d. in e. v 2. točki) določa ravno to. Seveda se lahko motim, ker mi je cela regulativa bolj podobna kitajščini :-) .

 

Dodatki:

Wales prepovedal elektronske ovratnike za pse in mačke

Welsh Assembly GovernmentV sredo, 24. marca 2010 je v Walesu v veljavo stopil pravilnik Valežanske Skupščinske Vlade (Welsh Assembly Government), ki prepoveduje uporabo elektronskih (električnih) ovratnikov pri psih in mačkah.

Ti ovratniki se v večini primerov uporabljajo za odpravljanje neželenih vedenjskih navad pri psih. V skupščinski debati so utemeljili pravilnik s tem, da so ti ovratniki nepotrebno mučenje živali in pogosto ostanejo orodje lenih in brezbrižnih lastnikov, ki ne znajo odpravljati neželenih navad pri svojih hišnih ljubljencih na noben drug način.

Storilca, ki krši ta pravilnik lahko doleti zapor do 1 leta (51 tednov) in/ali denarna kazen do £5.000 (~€5.700)

Wales je prva država/pokrajina znotraj Velike Britanije, ki je uvedla takšno prepoved. Organizacije, ki se borijo za zaščito živali, se zavzemajo za takšno prepoved v celotni Britaniji.

That these collars are no gentle persuasion tools can be discovered by watching people trying them on themselves. In this video the guy tests it on himself and it starts at about 3.30 min, but you can watch the whole thing, I don’t care. This other video is shorter and its tested by a girl.

Both the above videos are actually very funny as they are done under consent, but it does have a serious back tone as dogs probably wouldn’t be so prepared to wear them.

Aja, pardon, sem šele zdaj opazil, da sem gornji del začel pisat v angleščini. Se mi ne ljubi zdej spreminjat.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-9fQq3CuXro#t=3m29s
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sq996M-zgvU

Stranded sheep in the Blue Lagoon

The Sunday between Christmas and the New Year I spent hiking around Pembrokeshire and this time I went for walk no. 12 (Around Ynys Barry) taken from the book mentioned in some of my previous posts There is a local attraction called the Blue Lagoon that is just a few minutes away from the Aber Eiddy (also known as Abereiddy) car park where the walk originates from. The lagoon is actually an old man-made slate mining pit. The wall between the pit and the sea was later blasted to open it up making an artificial bay for ships to find shelter in high tides in case of rough seas.

A bit of trivia:  The Aber Eiddy Blue Lagoon was also used as a filming location for the video for the techno anthem Silence by the Canadian group Delirium (Featuring Sarah McLachlan). By the way the video was also filmed at Newgale beach.

As I entered the lagoon I saw a sheep on the cliffs about halfway between the top of the cliffs and the lagoon floor. I though it was a ledge that the animal accessed to get to some grass and didn’t think much about it. A few days later I overheard a colleague at work saying how her dog got fixated on a sheep on the cliffs while walking and it transpired that she was walking the dog in the Blue Lagoon and that was quite probably the same sheep. I went to check as soon as possible half expecting the sheep to be gone or even worse, dead. To my surprise she was still there and I took these pictures:

Stranded sheep in Aber Eiddy
 



The problem is the rocks are vertical and very slippery below. Above, from the top of the cliff, there is a very steep slope. I managed to report about the stranded sheep to the RSPCA and they confirmed they have already received reports about this incident and that there is also a farmer that is checking it daily. This all happened yesterday, Saturday January 3rd. Today I went and checked it again and it is still there, alive. This makes it at least 9 days since it has been stuck on that ledge.

Does anyone else know anything more about it? The RSPCA call centre mentioned that a rescue is considered but also mentioned health and safety which fills me with a bit of a worry. I don’t want to start an upset but I don’t want to see an animal suffer further and am quite willing to go and get the sheep myself. I have tried out rock climbing a couple of times and this should be an easy climb/descent with the proper equipment. The only problem would be restraining the sheep and convincing her that I its supposed to be rescued and should not feel threatened.

I have also tried contacting the local newspaper to get them involved. So far no reply. I would appreciate any suggestions or help. Will post any updates as they arise.

Update Monday, 4th January 2010 at 13.15

Checked on her again yesterday at about 2pm. Was still looking relatively OK. Just spoke to the RSPCA inspector. A rescue is planned this week. The farmer who is checking up on her is the owner so if all goes well she should be back with her hers by the end of the week unless she has any medical condition that needs to be treated first. Apparently sheep often get stranded in those parts and a lot of times will get themselves out of trouble.

Update Tuesday, 5th January 2010 at 19.20

Sheep still OK, were a couple of people from the RSPCA that were trying to get some food down to her. The problem today were very strong winds and icy snow. The snow was only up on the junction with the Abereiddy road which is where I had to leave my car. When I arrived I though the snow would be on the beach as well – there is a rather steep road just above Aber Eiddy. The B4330 was quite slippery on the way there as the snow was just starting at about 13.40. I left Aber Eiddy at about 14.40. This was a photo of the road:

The Abereiddy road after the snow on January 5th

The Abereiddy road after the snow on January 5th

I came home at about 18.40. That is 4 hours later!!! The trip should have taken me about 45 minutes!. This was the route I took and my average speed was 5 miles per hour. The problem wasn’t the very icy B4330 – that part took me about an hour to the Ford roundabout. It took the rest to get from the roundabout at Ford to Johnston. Nuts!!! That part had an average speed of  1.7 mph (3 hours for 5.3 miles).

I have received some news from a journalist from the above mentioned local newspaper. She received information that the rescue was planned for tomorrow but due to the adverse weather conditions I doubt this.

Update Thursday, 7th January 2010 at 19.30

Received a call from the Western Telegraph newsdesk this afternoon. The reporter had learnt that the sheep was successfully rescued yesterday, Wednesday, January 6. I was just trying to get some feed arranged for her for tomorrow but it now wont be necessary. Great!

Update Thursday, 8th January 2010 at 19.35

Talked to the RSPCA inspector today who told me the sheep was so cooperative that it didn’t need sedating and lifting it up was not such a problem. There were also another two sheep further along also on the cliffs but they could have possibly got themselves out of trouble but they helped them out non the less.

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