The Dental

When a veterinarian recommends a “dental”, we are using that word to mean a full mouth exam, cleaning and possible tooth extraction under general anesthesia.

The anesthesia part is the same as in a earlier blog entry.

The full mouth exam involves visually inspecting, probing and measuring the gum pockets of each tooth. We constantly find thing that we did not expect. Either a tooth that we thought was diseased looks pretty healthy after we take off a big chunk of calculus or a seemingly healthy tooth as a deep gum pocket.

We then take x-rays the teeth. The x-rays can find an abscess at the root of the tooth that you can not see when you looked at the crown and gums. A person will complain of tooth pain if they have a tooth root abscess. Many dogs or cats will do nothing different. They will continue to eat, play and sleep. Maybe chew on one side more than the other, but that is hard for an owner to see.

This is an x-ray of normal tooth roots.

This is an x-ray of a tooth with an abscess. The abscess is on the left side of the tooth in the picture. That root has a space around it where the bone has been eaten away by the infection.

We then scale the teeth that will not be extracted. Scaling involves using hand instruments as well as a low-speed scaler.

If a tooth has a deep gum pocket but is otherwise healthy, we try to save the tooth with a pocket treatment that might help gum to reattach. Eventually a deep gum pocket will cause the tooth to become diseased. Food and bacterial get caught in the pocket and will cause an infection that will ruin the tooth. Fixing the gum pocket does not always work but if often worth a try.

Then the teeth that are loose or infected are extracted. Extraction involves using a high-speed drill to separate all the roots so they can be extracted individually and completely. Leaving an infected root can cause problems in the future.

Then all the teeth are polished and we also do a fluoride treatment.

We then give more pain medication and your pet is woken up from anesthesia.

Happy Holidays from Hardwick Veterinary Clinic

Thank you to all our customers and patients for making this year fun and rewarding. Best wishes for an enjoyable and peaceful Holiday Season from the front office staff of the Hardwick Veterinary Clinic (Denise, Rachel and Andrea) and from the back office staff of the Hardwick Veterinary Clinic:

Romeo, Director of Information Technology

Abigail, Director of Human Resources and Homeland Security

Mitzy, Ceremonial Head of State

Alice, Intern (looking for a permanent position, call if you are interested)

Surgery Day

What happens to your pet on the day of surgery? You drop them off, sign a form and leave. What are they experiencing?

Here is how the day begins:

First, we do a presurgical exam. We just recheck our last physical exam findings or examine the pet for the first time. If we hear a murmur or think the patient not a good candidate for anesthesia, we might cancel, reschedule or refer the surgery.

Then we give an injection of 1-3 different medications depending on the particular case. This injection always includes a pain medication and often includes something to make the patient less anxious and another drug to keep the heart rate from going to low during surgery.

This injection takes about 20 minutes to take effect. While we are waiting, we set up surgery and recheck the results of the preoperative blood work to again make sure they are good candidates for surgery.

We then place an IV catheter. This is a very important step for the safety of your pet. If there is a reaction to anesthesia, the drugs to reverse the reaction are best given IV. We also use this catheter to give IV fluids during surgery which helps support blood pressure. Here is a picture of a dog with an IV catheter.

The surgical site is clipped and we trim the nails now also. Always easier when they are sleepy from the first injection.

Your pet is then taken into the surgery room and given another medication IV and this enables us to insert a tube into his or her trachea. The gas anesthesia is given through this tube. This is also another important step for safety. Anesthetics do depress breathing, so if your pet is not breathing often enough, we can breathe for them using this tube.

We monitor oxygenation, blood pressure and heart rate during surgery. The amount of anesthetic agent used is constantly adjusted based on these monitored values. The person responsible for anesthesia watches your pet from the first injection until he or she is awake in their cage.
Here is a picture of the machine we use to monitor anesthesia.

The patient is also on a hot water blanket during surgery so they do not get too cold.

Once we are sure all the parameters are normal and your pet is tolerating the anesthesia well, the surgical site is scrubbed and we are ready to start the procedure. Sometimes we feel as though the steps before surgery take longer than the procedure itself. But all these steps are important to lower the risk of surgery. Our patients wake up well and often seem back to themselves the next day.

Who am I?

Meet Kitty. She was hanging around a client’s house for a while, seemed hungry and it was getting colder. Kitty came to us to be checked before being introduced to the other cats in the house.

We scanned her and she had a microchip with a number! That does not happen very often with stray cats. The address registered for her was in North Carolina. Even though that seemed unusual, we called the number and left a message. Kitty went back home with the client and we thought we would give it a couple of days and if no one called back, we would do her exam and get Kitty ready to move into her new house.

Someone called back very quickly. They had moved from North Carolina to Cabot and their cat was missing for 2 months. They lived about 1/2 mile away from where Kitty (actually named Seven) was hanging out. They were thrilled to get their cat back and our client quickly adopted another cat from the shelter. So, 2 cats got a home due the 1 microchip. The story would have ending much differently if there had been no microchip or if the North Carolina number was out of service.

A microchip is put under an animals skin usually at time of spay or neuter but can be done at other times. Then the owner has to register their contact information with a company and if someone finds an animal, they can scan the animal for a microchip and call the owner if there is a chip. It costs around $40 to implant the chip and with some companies, there is a registration fee and with others the registration is included with the price of the microchip. Many shelters place microchips in the animals they adopt. It is very important to keep your address current with the registering company also.

Flea Control 101

This year, fleas have been a big problem in August and September.

Here are the principles of flea control. Use these concepts when deciding how to deal with your flea problem.

There are 3 methods of control: killing the adults, making the eggs and/or larvae not develop into adults and physically removing adults and immature forms in the environment.

Killing adults only is not a long-term flea control strategy. Many of the products on the market are targeted only to adults. While these products can be less expensive, you are not spending your money wisely. The bulk of the fleas in the environment are eggs or larvae. An adult flea lays up to 3000 eggs in her life time. Needless to say, killing the live fleas you see will not solve your problem long-term.

However many animals are very sensitive to flea bites. In this case, killing the adults will make your dog or cat much more comfortable.

Inactivating the immature fleas is a good long-term control strategy. Some of these chemicals are the least toxic products available. But this method alone does take longer (1-2 months) but once it works, you are in good shape long-term. Sometimes you might have to add in other adult killing products if your pet suddenly comes in contact with many adult fleas.

Many products are combination products-they kill the adults and also target the immature fleas.

You do not always have to ‘bomb’ your house. Mechanical removal (vacuuming, shaking out or washing bedding), along with targeting spraying if the problem is severe and treating all the pets in your house if often enough. If you have indoor pets with fleas, you need to continue flea control year round. Eggs will continue to hatch in your house when conditions are right. And even the best vacuum cleaner on the market will not get every egg.

There are many products on the market. Talk to your veterinarian and let them help you design an effective flea control strategy.

A Complicated Spay Surgery

Most animals are spayed when they are young. This is done in part because the surgery is technically easier. There are also health reasons as well as overpopulation issues playing into the early spay recommendation.

One of the things that can happen if an animal is not spayed is they can get a uterine infection. This can make the animal very sick and in some cases if untreated, can cause death. A sick pet is also a riskier candidate for anesthesia. And the infected uterus is fragile and can break open during surgery spreading the infection all over the abdomen.

Here is a picture of a normal cat uterus:

Here is a picture of an infected cat uterus:

Both cats did well after surgery. The cat with the infected uterus had to go home on antibiotics. She did not get too sick because her owners noticed the problem quickly. But her surgery did cost about three times more than the routine spay.

The Case of the Leaky Cat

A cat was brought in for an appointment because she was straining in the litter box and had blood in her urine. She dripped urine during her physical. Some of the things that could cause this problem are: a bladder infection, urine crystals, bladder stones or a bladder tumor. We took an x-ray and found bladder stones.
Here is the x-ray showing her bladder stones:

Sometimes stones can be dissolved with a special food. The owner switched the cat’s food but the stones remained unchanged after 2-3 weeks on the food and she was leaking more and more urine.
We did surgery to remove the stones.
Here is a picture of the stones after they were taken out of the bladder:

The urine leaking decreased dramatically after surgery but took a while to go away completely. This cat developed these stones due to urinary tract infection. She had to be on antibiotics for a month. And we switched her food to try to stop this problem from happening again. But bladder stones can form again.

Char Cole the Cat

Char Cole came to us a few months ago as a very sick kitten. He has ulcers in both his eyes from an upper respiratory infection. His eyes were painful. But you could tell what a sweet kitten he was. Here is his picture when we first met him.

We started Char Cole on 2 different eye medications. One was an antiviral drop that had to be put in his eyes four times a day. His owners did a great job with his medication. In 2 weeks his eyes were looking much better but not 100% normal. And in another 2 weeks, he looked like a normal cat. Here is his latest picture.

Viral eye disease is very serious and can lead to loss of vision or even the eye. We vaccinate against this disease in cats. Attentive owners and aggressive treatment contributed to Char Coles success, along with a little luck.

How we treat an abscess

Cats frequently get abscesses. They get in fights and when the wound seals over, the bacterial are trapped inside and form an abscess. It is easy to never see the original wound as puncture wounds are small and under fur. Sometimes you cannot even see the abscess. Owners notice it when they pet the cat. Here is a picture of a cat we treated today with an abscess. The swelling is about the size of a lemon but it is hard to see under the fur.

If an abscess is open and draining, often a course of antibiotics will cure the infection. But if an abscess is sealed over, it is best to drain it. Sometimes if the pocket is large, we put in a drain to keep the area of sealing over and reforming the abscess. Here are some pictures of the abscess after we clipped the fur and of us lancing, draining and flushing the abscess. The cat was sedated for the treatment.



This abscess formed a large pocket under the skin, so we put in a drain. The drain keeps the abscess from reforming while the antibiotics kick in. Antibiotics alone won’t cure a sealed over abscess. It has to heal from the inside out.

Drains show up well on x-ray too!

This cat did well. He went home on 2 weeks of antibiotics and an e-collar so he does not pull out his drain. The drain gets taken out in about 3 days and while abscesses can reform, most animals do not need to be retreated.

Hobo, the lucky interloper

We have a client who is managing a feral colony. She is spaying the females and neutering the males, she feeds them and provides shelter. Last summer she noticed one of the kittens was sick. She called him Hobo. Here is his picture when he first came to us.

We treated him for a cold and sent him back with the owner. Hobo was a thin, weak kitten. He came back about a week later and was even sicker. The owner also noticed that he was not one of the colony kittens. He did resemble a couple of kittens in the colony but the owner still sees them outside and this kitten has been in her house as he was so sick. This time he had a very swollen neck and his tongue was swollen. We sedated him, flushed out the abscess under his tongue and sent him home on a different antibiotic. Here is his x-ray which shows his jaw being very swollen. We were unsure how he would do as he had a hard time eating due to the swelling.

Hobo did great. He is now a healthy indoor cat. We saw him last week and he was a perfectly normal cat. He will live a long safe indoor cat life. The owner has not idea how this one sick kitten snuck into her colony and then into her heart. Here is his most recent picture.