Dr. Sandra Truli Springer, Holistic Vet House Call Services
Truli Holistic Veterinary Services: 877-DR-TRULI
Pet Stories
Brandy survived two days with a wooden spike digging into her back from the inside!
Doc Truli answers the phone on an autumn Saturday night.
“Is this the Doc?”
“Sure is, how can I help you?”
“Brandy’s panting real hard, standing in one spot, and hasn’t wanted to eat or drink all day. She’s a big, fat yellow lab. She usually loves to eat.”
Removal of dental tartar on the visible surfaces of the teeth has little effect on a pet’s health, and provides a false sense of accomplishment. The effect is purely cosmetic.
I’ve noticed many people are looking for dentistry information for their pets. There is one board certified dental society, the American Veterinary Dental College in the United States, and a second Academy of Veterinary Dentistry, which has less stringent membership requirements. Both are sources of official information about dentistry.
There is a practice which concerns Doc Truli greatly, so-called Non-Anesthesia Dentistry. This is an evil wrong perpetrated on pets, sometimes under the roof of an animal hospital. The American Veterinary Dental College has issued a position statement speaking out against this practice. I have included the text at the end of this post, in its entirety, or you can go to the Academy site and read it there.
Here’s how Doc Truli first learned of this “practice:”
My assistant was gently holding him, when a crack opening up in his skin over the shoulder on the left, and the skin just slid back 4 inches like cellophane pulling off a loaf of bread.
Sometimes I must treat a patient without knowing the exact diagnosis. Sometimes thongs go upsettingly wrong.
When we started Nicco on the prednisolone and antibiotic, I still did not have a diagnosis why he was jaundiced, anemic, attacking his own blood, and many, many tests had come up negative or inconclusive. With the prednisolone, Nicco ate better, felt better, the anemia started to resolve, the jaundice resolved. We were on to something good!
If I am right, prednisolone (steroid) will save him. If I am wrong, and it is an unidentified infection, steroids could kill him.
Nicco was anemic, jaundiced, dehydrated, lethargic, not eating, full of fleas, and generally looking like crap. (Yes, that’s the official scientific term.)
So, the quest for the reason began. First, I determined Nicco’s Minimum Database Laboratory, which at my hospital consists of a complete blood count, with microscopic cytologic examination of the blood, 12 chemistries of the blood, including liver enzymes, kidney-related toxins, electrolytes, proteins, calcium, sugar, a urinalysis chemistry and microscopy. In this case, we also checked for diseases that ticks spread, because many of those disease can cause bleeding internally, anemia, and jaundice.
No feline leukemia or feline AIDs on his tests. Continue reading “Treating a Sick Cat With No Diagnosis”
…without figuring out the underlying cause of the jaundice, we were doomed to fail.
Nicco was a very sick kitty cat. Thin, dehydrated, yellow with jaundice, fleas running everywhere, Nicco, the white short-hair golden eye wonder at could barely manage to croak a little meow of confusion as I lifted him out of his cat carrier and onto the hospital scale.
Of course, disconnecting dogs entangled at the neck is dangerous and difficult. That is why preventing the accident becomes paramount.
At the end of a busy Friday, a red Porsche convertible screeched to a halt and a frantic guy came running into the animal hospital.
“Help me, you gotta help me, my dog, my dog is choking to death! I just went to pick him up at the kennel and this other dog’s stuck on his choke collar! Help me, please, he’s dying!”
Veterinary dermatologists believe up to 50% of cats and dogs suffer from allergies in the U.S. alone!
No solid data for ranking in order of severity exists. However, let’s group the Mastiff Breeds all together, or they might just take over the list!
Continue reading “Doc Truli's Top 10 Dogs Predisposed to Allergies”
In Simon’s case, his left lower canine tooth avulsed so it stuck out of his lower lip at almost a ninety degree angle. Talk about painful!
Sometimes cats need emergency tooth extraction. In Simon’s case, his left lower canine tooth avulsed so it stuck out of his lower lip at almost a ninety degree angle. Talk about painful!
To top it off, Simon was 18 years old. Anesthesia carried inherent risk for him, but there was no way he could go on with that tooth like that! Continue reading “Cat's Tooth Was Just Hanging Out!”
In Simon’s case, his left lower canine tooth avulsed so it stuck out of his lower lip at almost a ninety degree angle. Talk about painful!
Sometimes cats need emergency tooth extraction. In Simon’s case, his left lower canine tooth avulsed so it stuck out of his lower lip at almost a ninety degree angle. Talk about painful!
To top it off, Simon was 18 years old. Anesthesia carried inherent risk for him, but there was no way he could go on with that tooth like that! Continue reading “Cat in Desperate Need of Tooth Removal”
Her parents thought it was normal for a dog to have irregular bowel movements because they get into so much “stuff” on walks, and in the backyard.
[Caution: kinda gross subject matter, but super important.]
Heidi was a salt n pepper 6 year old miniature schnauzer with recurrent bouts of soft stool and
occassional little spit ups of vomit in the morning. Usually she ate well, but about once a month, she would not touch her dinner.
Continue reading “Mini Schnauzer Familial Hypertriglyceridemia”