Sunday 6 February 2011

Dog Days...


But in the canine-crisis sense, rather than the languid mid-summer bucolic one. We noticed last week that the senior four-footed was looking off-colour (but put it down to his age, rather than anything else) and after a couple of days of not eating, which for him is unheard of, we whisked him off to the vet on Friday morning...just to be sure that it wasn't anything serious. Not a moment too soon, it transpired, as a blood test showed that he was dangerously anaemic, and an emergency blood transfusion was organised within minutes of getting to the surgery. Fortunately, we'd taken the junior four-footed with us for the trip, and before he knew it, he'd been scooped up onto an operating table, and was giving half a litre of life-saving blood, to be immediately pumped into his partner-in-crime. Had we left it a couple of hours later,  according to the vet, then it would very likely have been too late...


It can only have been rat poison, which works by causing internal bleeding, and eventually causes the system to collapse entirely. Where he'd picked it up is entirely a mystery, though - not in the garden here, for sure, and generally when they're out the four-footeds are kept firmly on a lead. The senior FF does have a habit of nipping through to the church field next door whenever he can, though, for a general scavenge and forage, and that seems the likeliest place where he would have picked it up. Both Don Guido and Loredana say that nobody has been putting any poison down there, though...and so the matter remains officially a mystery.


Senior FF was allowed to come home yesterday morning, although his blood count is still pretty low, and he has to go back on Tuesday for another blood test. He positively rattles with pills at the  moment (he's on a course of coagulents for the next month, and antibiotics as well, for a week or so), and so it's lucky that he actually quite likes taking medication - it makes him feel important, I think, and makes the junior FF quite jealous that he isn't getting any of whatever it is.


Bit of a close call...


Tonight's Dinner


Will be at Pergoletta  in the Via dei Belli Torri. Sarah is here for the weekend (arrived in the middle of Emergency Ward 10!) and she's treating us.



3 comments:

Anonymous said...

I'm so sorry to hear of your near disaster, just as well you know your animals well. Best wishes for a speedy recovery to Senior F.F.

suej said...

Oh Pomiane! Not you too! (We're just getting over slug bait poisoning.) Hope senior 4F is soon well on the way to full recovery. Will you need to support his liver? I've been reading all about the benefits of milk thistle for helping the liver to heal. Best wishes to all of you. Sue

Pomiane said...

It wasn't looking great....but then all the latest tests came up with good results, and so it looks as though we need not fear the worst. He's now on a course of cortizone as well as the Vitamin K pills....which clearly has such a rejuvenating effect that I'm thinking of going on a course myself!
Many thanks for your thoughts; much appreciated!