Under the watchful eye of a vet

That Tuesday started like most days. But by noon, it took an agonising turn with Pippi throwing up a few times. It all went downhill in a couple of hours when a puddle of blood lay on the carpet followed by an intense snivel. In the next hour, our panicked selves were in the waiting room of the vet, who ran a battery of tests and scans on Pippi and came up with an out-of-the-blue diagnosis of pancreatitis—a painful inflammation of the pancreas triggered by food but with no known specific cause. With notes to switch his diet, we came home in a few hours with a bag of medications for nausea and pain.  

Pippi’s food hadn’t changed, but the scavenger gene in him is easily lured by a discarded chicken bone or a nugget on the roadside. In our heads, we blamed it for this painful diagnosis. As I looked up low-fat, gut-friendly options for food, Pippi sipped on his healing broth, recovering from the pain. When we thought he was almost out of trouble, the vomiting came back with a vengeance. As Pippi whimpered in pain, I caressed him hoping tomorrow would be a better day. Without a 24-hour emergency vet, hope was our best bet. 

Humans have precise language to express bodily pain and suffering, but our cross-species communication skills collapse when it is about pets’ pain. We hear the whines and whimpers, see cues in the eyes and sense their pain but knowing exactly what’s happening inside is guesswork at best. When clouded by panic, everything becomes muddy. The fact that animals are evolutionarily adept at hiding pain doesn’t help. 

At daybreak, Pippi pooped blood. When the vet saw a severely dehydrated, almost immobile Pippi and learned about the previous pancreatitis diagnosis, he sat us down and broke the news: things could go either way because pancreatitis is a vicious, life-threatening condition. Pippi was immediately put on saline to rehydrate his body after which the vet would run a battery of tests and scans, again, to see what was happening. We were sent home. On that sombre, long drive back home, it was all silence and tears. 

Veterinary care has come a long way in the last decade. Vet hospitals, which once were dingy, fetid and gloomy with just one person running the show, have morphed into sophisticated, well-equipped and welcoming buildings—akin to our hospitals—with in-house high-end imaging devices and laboratories. In big cities, there are now 24/7 hospitals run by a team of vets and veterinary technicians treating everything from cancer to severe trauma, which only a few years ago, was a sure death sentence. Vet care has also become more therapeutic and compassionate. 

The bills have, unfortunately, ballooned too, raising questions about exploitative practices and corporate greed in the vet industry. With pet insurance entering the scene, pet parents are more confused than ever about how best to care for their pets without spending a fortune. In many parts of the world, countries are talking about regulating vet care and fixing prices so businesses don’t weaponise our endearing love for our pets into a money-making opportunity.

On that fateful Saturday, after life-saving hydration, the vet stabilised Pippi and put him under an X-ray scanner, which revealed a tiny, sharp bone fragment obstructing his intestine. Surgery was on the table. But we had to wait for Pippi’s blood work to be better. By evening, when we visited the hospital to talk about the next steps, we couldn’t believe it when we saw Pippi wagging his tail and running towards us. He now wanted to go on his evening walk, and the vet smiled and obliged. As we walked a few steps, the offending piece of bone came out at the rear end. Surgery averted, and pancreatitis ruled out, Pippi was back home after spending a night under the watchful eyes of the vet. He received a hero’s welcome. 

Not every story ends the way this did for us, but we are grateful to this vet for sitting us down, sharing his knowledge and expertise, and giving us agency in every step of the process. As pet parents, we indeed owe the long time we now enjoy with our pets to them. But what about the huge bills that come with it? That’s a story for another day.

Tailspin is your monthly column on everything that’s heartwarming and annoying about pet parenting. The writer is a science communicator and mom to Pippi, a six-year-old rescued Indie. She posts on X @RamanSpoorthy