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Now I am sure there is a comedy response, but as I am rubbish at telling jokes, let alone making them up I will just stick to the facts.
Biggles the Great Dane is a very lucky dog. When I first met Biggles he was very different to the happy healthy dog you can see in this photograph. He had been sick for the previous day, and was feeling extremely sorry for himself. When he was examined it became clear that there was something hard in his stomach area, an ultrasound scan and xray supported these findings, and we decided that Biggles must have eaten something he shouldn’t have done! At this stage we knew that he would need surgery to explore his stomach and intestines, but he had to be carefully stabilised to ensure he would survive the anaesthetic. This is a major operation, especially in a dog his size but, and this is where the luck began, his owners had the foresight to get him insured. This meant we were able to get permission for surgery, without them having to worry about how the bill was to be paid.
Once Biggles was asleep his stomach began to swell up with gas and fluid, a common condition in Great Danes called ‘Bloat’. Quickly the nurses passed a tube through his mouth into his stomach, and litres of fluid and air rushed out. Rachel and I were then able to concentrate on finding the blockage. Initially it all seemed straight forward, we found the part of his gut that the foreign body had lodged, but it was so damaged we knew the whole segment of intestine had to be cut out for any chance for Biggles to survive. As we prepared to do this, imagine our surprise when we found another lump higher up! Fortunately this material was more mobile so we could move it to next to the first area, and removed all of it in one go. After stitching the 2 ends of intestine together (having removed approximately a foot of gut) we were just thinking about the end of the operation, when careful feeling of his stomach revealed another big lump, can you believe it, a THIRD foreign body and assorted bits and bobs. Once this had been removed by cutting into the stomach, we closed him up and he had an uneventful recovery a full 3 hours after Rachel and I started. Intestinal surgery can be very hazardous, as any spillage of gut contents into the abdomen can be fatal, and there is a reasonable risk of surgical site breakdown, so the following few days Biggles stayed with us for medication, monitoring, and TLC, until we were happy that he was on the mend.
And the identity of the swallowed items, yes you have guessed it…. A Seal pencil case, a Reindeer toy and part of a plastic chew. All slightly different colours from the original (apparently the Seal was white with blue spots), but fully intact!!
The moral of the story?
Don’t let your Great Dane eat a pencil case & please, please consider insurance!
Emma Cartwright, Veterinary Surgeon, Drove Veterinary Hospital
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