Doctor becomes an owner

I think I'll digress a bit from my earlier series on cruciate ligaments and their treatments to share a bit with you all. Last week my dog, Cookie, was diagnosed with a serious cardiac disease. We can talk about the specifics in future posts but for now I just thought I would use this forum to let some people know what is going on with her. She is well known by my clients as well as my friends as she comes to work every day and camps out behind the front desk in the hospital. She is always with me as she has a bit of separation anxiety and hates to be alone. If you take a look at our web page, there is a shot of her in the community section sitting on my gym bag at the Pet Expo last year.

On Friday, she was sitting behind the front desk, acting normally, when Kate picked her up to show to a client. She immediately noticed that her chest was vibrating. What she felt was a grade 6/6 systolic murmur, associated with her mitral valve. I called in a favor that night and ran her over to my friends house. A quick echo cardiogram on his dining room table revealed the severity of her condition. We immediately started her on cardiac medications and I have a call in to see if there is something that we can do surgically to correct the defect. I'm not sure that there is.

The good news is that other than slowing down a little bit, she is not aware that she is so ill. We had a ton of company over the weekend and she handled it quite well. Her appetite is good and she is still eager to come to work each day. Needless to say, the family and my staff are devastated. I will try to keep everyone up to date, and if people are interested, we can also discuss the specifics of her condition here on the blog.