Straydog UPDATE posted TUESDAY 2/4/03 at ~8:34 p.m. CT

Pat Arnold's Daily Dog Log

TUESDAY FEBRUARY 4 2003

Betsy will have surgery on her leg today

      This morning when I went to pick up Old Davey and the puppy-dogs, Justin, Brigitte and Gidget, following the spay and neuter operations they had yesterday, I, of course, wanted to look in on Betsy too. (Betsy is the Rottweiler who broke her leg yesterday morning as she ran her fence line with her bigger brother, Buddy, who may have just bumped into her too hard.)

      When I arrived at the clinic "Volunteer Shannon," as she has been known by everyone in our rescue group for quite some time, was there too. Shannon had just brought in a stray dog she had rescued.

      Shannon knows Betsy well, and she went with me to see Betsy. One look at Betsy's face (as she was lying there on the thick quilt) let us know immediately that she was in a lot of pain, and we were glad that Donna, the vet technician, soon joined us to give Betsy another injection of pain medication. We helped Betsy stand up so we could take her outside for a short "potty walk" since (according to Donna) Betsy hadn't done anything on her first walk of the day. Walking on three legs was quite a struggle for Betsy, and she was hurting too much to think of going potty, so we helped her back to her kennel.

      Before we left Betsy's side, the pain medication had kicked in, and she was getting drowsy. The doctor was extremely busy, but he assured me he would get to her surgery just as soon as he could today, and that they would keep Betsy on pain medication as needed.

      After the visit with Betsy the vet tech helped me "load up" the van with Gidget, Brigitte, Justin plus Old Davey, and home we came. After we got her, the dogs were glad to be back in their kennels again.

Davey's stools were really good today

      We are thinking this is a sign that his new diet of cooked whole cereal grains and vegetables is beginning to work. Hopefully he will continue to get better and better.

Waiting on call from Dr. Morton

      We'll probably have an evening update tonight after we get the report from the doctor as to how Betsy's surgery went. He assured me he'd have her on pain medication up until the surgery and following surgery. We are anxiously awaiting his call.

At about 7:41 p.m. Dr. Morton called and said everything had gone very well with the operation and that Betsy is doing fine. (Full story to come Wednesday.)