Update on Nadi (my dog)'s hospitalization

Some of my friends think that I am overly attached to my dog. I disagree with them. I think I am exactly the right amount of attached to her. Do I treat her like a human child? Yes I do because that is how I see her. She has been the only form of consistency in my life for the past 8 years and there isn't a whole lot I wouldn't do for her.

The past 4 days have been very stressful and scary for me and presumably for her but at least for now it looks like we have a good outcome. I also learned a lot about the local veterinary options and will not make this mistake again because had I not gotten a second opinion, Nadi very well could have died in her sleep.

We are back at home now as she was discharged from the animal hospital yesterday. She has mostly just been chilling and we have to be very careful about what she eats and she is on a soft food diet for the foreseeable future. I'm sure she doesn't mind this change at all because like most dogs, she prefers the gravy covered dog food over the hard kibbles anyway.

You may recall how I was singing the praises of this first local vet that I went to because they were so cheap. Well a bargain is only a bargain if it works and when I went in there on Monday telling them that my dog can't breathe and I thought there was an obstruction in her airway they didn't pay much attention to that information. They told me that they checked and that there was no obstruction and then did a bunch of bloodwork and told me that she has a blood parasite called e.canis. They then began treatment for this but her breathing was not getting any better.

After being scared and frustrated for two days of zero improvement I decided to go to the well-known and expensive international animal hospital that is here in town for a second opinion. It wasn't long after we got there that the vet did an X-ray and immediately determined that there was several blockages in her throat and that they were hopeful that they could remove them without cutting her open. They were up front with me though and told me that if there were complications removing the obstructions with whatever gozmers they use to make this happen, that I needed to be prepared for the fact that their only choice going forward from that would be to cut her open and then the recovery was going to be a very long road.

Thankfully, they were able to get everything out without putting her under the knife.

4 bits of bone and cartilage were blocking her throat and according the vet one of the pieces was about 1 cm from entering her windpipe and this would have been very very bad and could have resulted in her death. It was estimated that around 80% of her airway was blocked by this and to me it is just remarkable how Nadi refused to die. I don't think she slept very much for around 2.5 days because there was no way for her to lie down that didn't hurt. She would just stare at me all day with this "why aren't you helping me!?" look on her face.

She had to be put under for the procedure and I got to see her for about 20 minutes after she woke up. Her level of excitement was just amazing to see and it was kind of funny to see her wandering around the lobby all "drunk" from the anesthesia. She kept walking on her own ears and bumping into things but man oh man was her tail a-waggin'! The best part was that she could now breathe a lot better.

The cost for all of this was something that I was a little afraid of but in the end I was kind of surprised at how little all of this cost.

I went there with the VND equivalent of around $800 with me and was worried that this was not going to be enough. When discussing the options with the vet before they did anything I told them "Don't consider cost, just do what you have to do to keep her alive." I would spend all the money I have to keep my baby alive and the icing on the cake is that my fears of a bank-breaking bill was all unwarranted. This is just over $200.

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The really frustrating thing about this was the level of wrongness that the first veterinarian had achieved. They insisted there was no blockage in her throat, which there clearly was. They were treating her for e.canis with a load of drugs via an IV in her leg. Turns out that after 2 e.canis tests performed by the new clinic that she does NOT have e.canis and to make matters worse, they installed the IV catheter incorrectly and the fluids that they pumped into her simply ended up stockpiling in her leg. This fluid had to be drained from her paw.

Looking at the reviews of this place online that I should have checked before I even went there I see that there are plenty of people with experience in the first clinic being incompetent.

There were several reviews in there about people bringing in their dogs for routine treatment only to have the dog die from drug overdose at the hands of the vets there. The people go on to say that not only did they kill their animal, but they were completely unapologetic about doing so.

When I contacted them to inform them of all the things they had done wrong and even showed them the above picture of the obstruction they insisted did not exist, their response to me was to not respond.

I suppose this is one of the dangers of having your dog overseas with you. I realize that it is unreasonable for me to expect them to all speak English but I was extremely clear about how she had just eaten some chicken bones which almost has to be a very common problem with dogs. Their answer was to completely ignore my information and then start treatment on a disease that she didn't even have in the end. If I had stuck with the first clinic, Nadi would still be in pain right now and no amount of shoving liquids into her paw was going to change that.

The bad news for her is that I am no longer going to be sharing my dinners with her anymore. So she just has to be disappointed every time I eat. I may let her have a bit of soft cheese in a few days but as far as cleaning my plate is concerned... those days are permanently behind us.

The good news is that I think she will make a full recovery. Last night she woke me up because she was barking at something in her dreams and this says to me that she is sleeping soundly and not having any trouble breathing.

We go back to the vet for a checkup tomorrow because apparently there are some lesions in her throat and something called necrotic tissue.

The best news is that there is zero chance she is going to face an untimely death at this point. I am extremely thrilled about this.