Top Tips for Coping with Night Shifts

So this is a blog post I have wanted to write for some time and thankfully the moment has arrived! I hope you find it of some interest/use. The tips and strategies that follow with respect to coping with night work are a combination of my thoughts and tips gathered from members of the Veterinary ECC Small Talk community via email – THANKS so much to those who contributed. Right, let’s get on with it…

Ever seen dialysis disequilibrium syndrome in tomcat urethral obstruction?

Ostroski CJ, Cooper ES. Development of dialysis disequilibrium-like clinical signs during postobstructive management of feline urethral obstruction. J Vet Emerg Crit Care 2014. 24(4):444-449.

Dear Puppy, Please Don't Drink So Much Water Or You Might Seizure?

So this is some interesting stuff – well, I think so anyway! I want to thank my good friend Kate Russell for raising this with me as well. The basic question at hand here is can a puppy drink so much water in a single episode as to cause water intoxication and a hyponatraemic seizure?

Choppy Choppy! My Top 5 Surgery Tips (N. Kulendra DipECVS)

STOP THE PRESS! This blog edition is my first ever guest blogger post! Love it. Here Nicola Kulendra, European Specialist in Small Animal Surgery and a dear friend and colleague, shares some of her top surgery tips for you. Also be sure to look out for the free PDF giveaway at the end which contains some other points relating to Soft Tissue Surgery (that is my creation, not Nicola's).

Syringe feeding: Yes, No, or It depends?

A while back I recorded a podcast on nutrition in sick animals with Dan Chan DACVECC DACVN, Head of Emergency and Critical Care (ECC) at the Queen Mother Hospital for Animals, Royal Veterinary College, UK. The podcast is linked to at the end of this blog post. One of the things we discussed in that podcast was the use of syringe feeding.

Angiostrongylus vasorum (canine lungworm)

I have just published a podcast on Angiostrongylus vasorum which you can find HERE. Coincidentally a couple of papers have recently been published in The Veterinary Record on this and I thought I would provide a summary of their main findings in this blog post for those who cannot access these papers. I won’t be commenting on methodology, just transcribing from their manuscripts!

Fluoroquinolones and the Feline Retina

A short while back someone emailed me to ask what my recommendations are when it comes to using fluoroquinolones in cats with respect to the potential for retinal damage and blindness. She had been discussing the issue with colleagues in her practice and there was no consensus which was not helped by the fact that the formularies and other book resources they had available did not entirely agree with each other – quelle surprise?!