Another one of those days off to a routine sort of start. Alison, my receptionist advised me as I peered through my microscope that our good friends at the county animal control office were on the way in with a dog injured in a dog fight. As the reader might imagine, these are fairly routine reasons for a visit to the clinic. I acknowledged her with a grunt and thought; probably a few puncture wounds, a gash or two, perhaps, as I returned to my stare down the ocular lenses of the microscope toward a sheet of blood cells.
I had just finished thinking about that sick hawk’s blood counts when I heard the commotion surrounding the scramble of several people rushing into my exam room. Kathy, my tech, didn’t need to say a word as she rushed into the lab. The look on her face said The Lords Prayer in one syllable.
My exam room was about five steps away and I still hurried. Buddy was lying prostrate on his left side, all four legs in rigid extension. The little red Dachshund had a look of sheer, unadulterated terror frozen on his face. I looked at the concerned faces of those crowded around the table for an explanation. Buddy had been attacked by a much larger dog while walking in his yard. He had apparently gone to the aid of his sister as she was approached by the big lab. Some growls and cries were followed by screams and it was over. Buddy laid in the autumn leaves struggling, but unable to stand.
Buddy was in a condition known in the medical books as spinal shock. His spinal cord had sustained some serious trauma as was evidenced by the neurological signs that I mentioned. His eyes spoke the unfathomable pain of red-hot ice picks piercing his neck. Before I continued my assessment I went to the locked box where the narcotics are kept and fetched Buddy the first good thing to happen to him that fateful day. I drew up about double the dose that I would normally use as I thought Buddy was about to die, either because of the severity of his wounds or because euthanasia was his best option. If this was his day to die, I was going to make darn sure he didn’t die in pain.
Those types of drugs hurt when they are injected. I hoped to get a little whimper as I injected into his rear leg. My heart began to sink as he made no reaction. Loss of pain is a bad sign for spinal patients. The neurons that carry the pain signals to the brain lie deep within the spinal cord. His lack of a reaction suggested the damage may be as bad as I feared. I maintained my best poker face and finished my assessment of his wounds.
Have you noticed that if you are in severe pain, not toothache pain but broken bone kind of pain, that your brain doesn’t bother to let you know that you that you have a nagging hangnail? It is all relative, right? Buddy’s brain said what difference does it make if your butt is on fire from an injection if your spinal cord, the holy grail of all nerves, is burning like a blow torch? He felt the injection alright but it just doesn’t matter sometimes. I hoped that was the explanation for his lack of reaction as I wrestled with my next move. I really didn’t want to talk to these people now. I could not hide my concern with any sort of soothing, encouraging words. I gently scooped Buddy up and we went back for X-Rays while I gathered my thoughts.
I have a really cool digital X-Ray machine that I bought to provide quality images of all the little wild critters that I enjoy caring for. It allows us to manipulate the images to show minute detail through contrast enhancement and magnification. As Buddy’s image hit the screen, my eyelids slid shut, I exhaled and dropped my head. Buddy’s first thoracic vertebrae was split right down the middle. No image enhancement needed. I have a considerable amount of experience with spinal patients and all my instincts and experience said this little dog’s life was over.
However……. you kind readers should relax, this is a happy story. Y’all beat me up when I tell too many sad ones.
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acquaintance and, as you can probably guess, it is covered in fur or feathers. “Hootie” is a male Great Horned Owl and is the first of his kind I have ever formally met. He found his way to the clinic because of a fracture in his wing. Most of the owls are injured or killed flying low across the highways at night. They appear out of the darkness and are hit before a motorist can even recognize the impending collision. 
