30 Day Coloring Challenge day 14

     Happy Valentine's Day.  My day started out nice.  My husband cooked dinner and did dishes!  Dinner was great.  Then we started talking about stuff while I helped clean up.

House Mouse, Warm Cup

 

     I got distracted while I was giving medications to our dog and cat-both pets have seizures-and accidentally gave the dog's medicine to the cat.  I absolutely can't talk and do stuff at the same time.  I should have known better.  Our dog is 20 pounds and our cat is 5 years old and 10 pounds.

     I had to pay $49 to call the Pet Poison Hotline but I was happy they were there to talk to me.  I was frantic.  It had only been a few minutes but I am a retired Veterinary Technician with a background in Critical Care at a very large teaching emergency and specialty veterinary hospital.  Pet poisons was my special area of interest so I know quite a lot about it to start with.  I know for a fact that you can not make your cat vomit at home.  You have to go to an emergency veterinary hospital that has a special medication to inject to make the cats vomit.  I also know that not all veterinary hospitals have the medication.  I was so worried that I would have to take my cat to the "emergency room".

     I was told that the medication can be given to cats (I knew that) but the dose she got was a little higher than would be given even for the most severe seizures.  Thankfully it is relatively safe.  It doesn't hurt their liver for instance.  The dose she got would make her groggy which makes sense, and she might drool which is acceptable to me short term.  The only thing dangerous was that it could make her heart beat very slowly.

     It was recommended that she be monitored overnight at an emergency veterinary clinic so they could monitor her heart rate.  Since that is my old job, I knew that a technician would just take her heart rate every hour during the night and I would be charged an exam fee and a hospitalization fee for something I could do at home.  Now don't get me wrong.  I would have rushed her in if it was more dangerous but I can stay up during the night and take her heart rate for free.  I still have my stethoscope and the expertise to monitor her.  I can look at the heart rates and see if they are going down slowly over time and I know enough not to let it get really low before rushing her in.  If I see ANY trend that shows the heart rate is beginning to slow down I am rushing her right in.

     She got the medicine at 8 pm and it is almost midnight.  Half of the medicine will be eliminated 3 hours after she got it so she probably only has a safe amount in her at this point.  She is doing great.  No drooling and her heart rate has been the same all this time.  She was a little groggy but seems better now.  I was told that her heart could still be potentially affected for up to 9 hours afterwards so I am going to continue to monitor her but I am less worried now.  By the time I have to take my daughter to school in the morning I can let the cat out of the bathroom which is where she is living during the night so I know where to find her.

Gabby

     Thankfully my daughter got her drivers permit and can do the driving to school.  I will be driving myself home from her school and going straight to bed!