Wednesday, July 15, 2009

Please tell me it can't get any worse

On the 4rth of July this happened, see picture below; if you can't tell that is a 14 week old 3.4 pound puppy with a broken foot and not just one broken bone but all 4 metatarcel bones. Needless to say my Silver Bella budget took a hit. sigh...

My other dog, whom I still love and adore accidentally ran over the puppy when he was coming in his doggie door. I had just happened to show the puppy the dog door just minutes before, helping to set the stage for the horrible accident. All I heard was Walker hitting the doggie door and Coco's blood curtling cries a second later. I knew right away it was broken I just knew not that I have ever seen a puppy with a broken foot or a dog for that matter but I just knew by that cry and the way she held it up close to her it was broken. I called the vet and he didn't believe me when I said I thought it was broken, fractures don't swell up fast but this one did. Her skin is normally nice and pink under her fur but it turned purple and blue and swole up before my eyes. Saturday was a rough night as I decided to wait and see if it was just a sprain, but on Sunday I knew I needed to get her in to see a vet and good thing I did since all 4 bones were broken.
The Nurses were very sweet at the Emergency Pet Clinic off of George Bush and Custer Road in Plano but I will never take my pet there again because the vet was an arse. He left me waiting in the exan room 30 minutes while he left to get an estimate before he would even see her of course I understood when he said he had a pet in the back the took a turn for the worse he had to attend as why he was so late coming back but someone could have told me a little sooner than 30 minutes that he had an emergency after all he said when he left he would be right back. I was already upset and had a puppy on my hands that would not eat or drink let alone walk so when he came back in the room I told him I was upset that I had to wait 30 minutes before I was told he had an emergency and then he went off on me! If I was not already upset with a hurt puppy on my hands I would have shown him what I thought of his bedside manners, but instead I will just tell everyone I meet to NEVER go to the ER Clinic off of George Bush and Custer in Plano because it gets worse.

So after waiting 40 minutes ( plus add 15 minutes of waiting in the waiting room before I even made it in the exam room to be seen and there was NO ONE else in the entire clinic waiting to be seen when I arrived. I actually watched someone poor themselves a bowl of cereal while I waited for the vet to see my hurt puppy) So after the Vet finally came back with the estimate for the possible charges I tell him to take the exrays and then we can decide the next course of action, but no he leaves and sends a nurse back in to ask for my credit card because I have to pay for the estimate chares before they will take care of my puppy!!!! WTH? Exray my puppy's foot first people!
So after telling them between the $775 and $434 estimate I would not leave her there overnight nor did I want then knocking her out they still charge my credit card $775. WTH?! Oh and the Dr told me he did not like my attitude and he could ask me to leave, all because I told him I was upset that he left me waiting for 30 minutes in the exam room before they sent anyone in the room to tell me he had an emergency. Boy did I have to hold me tounge and not go off on him and cause a big scene. I mean I was the upset pet owner because my sweet puppy was hurt. He sure does need better bedside manners, and it gets worse, he gets worse!
Then they tell me they will give her some meds, wait 20 minutes for the meds to take full effect before they exray her so it will be less painfull for her. I am asked to go back to the waiting room and there I hear my sweet little puppy crying at the top of her lungs all over again. I knew that cry and said very loudly that is my puppy crying. The receptionist runs to the back to check and comes back says" they were taking her exray" now I am still calm and I say well what happened to waiting 20 minutes for the drugs to take effect? URGH!!
I get called to the back and I was right she had a broken foot so they will splint her. I tell them do not knock her out, give her some drugs but I do not want them knocking her out, and I am so glad I did because they would have probably killed her if they had put her under. And yes it gets worse. Oh the vet tells me they could keep her overnight but I tell them no I want to take her home. Finally they bring her to me and the only sweet spot to this place are the nurses!
Because they did this and they do this only for special patients.


You see she licked them the entire time they were splinting her up so they had to give her a special pink heart to match her blingy collar. Yes they did finally give her drugs and held her as I checked out of that place but only after waiting yet again for the Vet to come out to advise me what to expect and guess what he didn't do... Yep nothing. He came out started going over the medication and realized the directions on the bottle for the dosage were wrong, so he left to fix them and he never came back out. Finally the nurses give up and basically tell me to take her to my own vet the next day. I left not knowing what signs to look for if things go wrong . I left with a drugged up puppy on some major meds whom I was told would sleep through the night, exrays and tiny pills chopped up in 4 pieces for what I am told is for pain over the next 3 days.
Then since they charged my credit card for the high estimate I had to wait for them to issue credit back on the card because the charges for this wee little ones split, exrays, drugs and vet bill totaled $434.00 and thankfully not the higher estimate of $775.00.
And of course at midnight that night the drugs wore off and she was up acting like a crazy dog all night long. She would run arounf the bed for a few seconds like a crazy puppy then stop and cry/whine and she did this from midnight to 5:45am. I could not console her all night long. I mentioned this to my vet the next day and I stated it was like she was on drugs or coming off some bad drugs, that is when he told me the drugs they gave her were an opiate based drug and she was coming down from a bad high. The drugs they gave her can have side effects on some dogs like she had. He was surprised by the pills I was given and stated he would have never given a puppy those meds or broken specs of pills so he changed meds and I went home full of knowledge of what to look for and what to do next in her recovery, unlike what I got from the ER vet. My vet only chared me $10 for the visit and I boght the new liquid meds.
She will be wearing her cute cast for the next 3 to 5 weeks. I am doing all I can to not bling up her tiny splint and that cute heart. I'm afraid if I glue rhinestones on it and/or glitter it up she will end up with the most sparkly poop around. So belowis my cute little, STUMPY, yep her new nickname. I can hear her coming now. LOL. her cast is the same length as my index finger. But she is well and I am very thankfull she is paper trained right now.
Then what goes wroing next my washer dies this week UGH!! So please someone tell me it can't get any worse.

5 comments:

Suzie Button said...

Hi there, I got teary reading your awful trip to that vet! I have two English Springer Spaniels myself and would feel just as you did! I'm so sorry! My puppy was ill beginning 2 weeks ago and I had to take him several times to my vet here in Garland, TX, and they're just so friendly there. It's so sad to hear such a terrible story. I'm glad your puppy though will recover. And sorry too about the dishwasher, I know, it all comes at once, doesn't it?!! You're probably due for something really great to happen next to cheer you up, so keep smiling, ok?! Blessings! Suzie

karlascottage.typepad.com said...

Poor little baby!! And you too, emergancy vet visits are traumatic for the owners too.

Debe said...

Bless your heart. I can only imagine what you went through at that emergency vet. I hope he gets what he deserves. Glad that baby is recovering now...she is so tiny. Sorry about the washer too. Just wishing you a little cheer...

carpet cleaning Los Angeles said...

Aw! Poor little puppy, I hope she’s recovering with the injury. I tell you it can’t get any worse. there I said it already. Hehehe!

Healthguard said...

That’s terrible! Despite of what happen the puppy still looks oh so adorable. The sock is very cute on her.