August 31, 2010

August 31, 2010

Some firsts happened to me in the last couple days.  My first emergency call was last Saturday during the day when Dr Ballard got backed up with a bunch of calls he sent me out on a colic.  It was pretty routine really and nothing to exciting happened.  A grey arabian named Ben that was pretty much better by the time I got there so I just passed a naso-gastic tube and gave him mineral oil and palpated him and felt nothing abnormal.  My first night emergency was this Sunday night when Dr Schur didn’t want to come back up to this part of town.  It was a horse that had been bitten by a dog.  I expected a wound or two that I would clean up, give some antibiotics and a tetanus shot and be done but it turned out to be a lot more than that.  The horse was Crissy a small black mustang 14 years old.  She was not broke to ride but was gentle.  She has a pit-bull that is another one of the many out there that are great with people but can snap and really do a lot of damage like I saw with Crissy.  She must have been running around in her paddock for quite a while fighting off the dog because she had hundreds of bite marks on all her legs.  On her chest and thighs there was strips of skin hanging down and large chinks of muscle exposed underneath.  She was very sore and didn’t like to walk.  The dog also was in bad shape.  She was happy but had all of her teeth kicked out and who is to say she didn’t have broken bones but she sure didn’t act like it.  It wasn’t going to end well for her because there is not much hope for a dog that if given a chance would attack like that.  Heaven forbid that she do that to a human being if she gets wound up.  Not much to tell about the job, I trimmed up the flaps hanging and left some antibiotics and instructions to keep the wounds clean and call if she still is lame because this could mean that a joint or tendon sheath was bitten into and is infected.  I have called a couple times but haven’t been able to talk to the owner.  The other day though, I did drive by and saw Crissy standing in the back yard looking normal so I can assume hopefully that all is well.