Injured Dogs

Those two sad-looking, T-shirted field spaniels are Lea (on the left) and Mo’i (on the right). Within the space of a week, both of them managed to cause a late-night trip to the emergency veterinary hospital!

First was Mo’i. We had a mole removed (and tested for malignancy); a routine procedure. It was benign, which is wonderful. But the six stitches that closed the wound were to much for Mo’i — he chewed them out one evening. We discovered him with a gaping wound and no stitches — so off to the hospital we went.

Then just a couple of days after that, as we were getting ready to go to bed, we discovered a huge swelling on Lea’s front-right shoulder. We knew darned well it hadn’t been there just a few hours prior, and we were concerned about that fast growth. So off we went to the emergency veterinary hospital again! They diagnosed it as an infected abscess, and she had minor surgery that night to drain it and explore for the cause (suspect: foxtail). But the exploratory surgery found no cause at all, so we don’t know why she suddenly developed this alarming infection…

As I write this, Mo’i is almost completely healed — enough that he’ll be running in an agility competition this Thursday. Lea had her drain removed a few days ago, and is healing nicely — but it will be a couple of weeks before she can run again.

And the T-Shirts? They’re wearing them as a way to keep them from biting out their stitches. The only other way to keep those stitches intact is with a great big conical collar (the “Elizabethan collar"). The dogs really hate those things, so we prefer the T-Shirt route…