"Doctor, doctor, my feet hurt all the time." "You're too fat. Lose weight." "You quack, I want a second opinion." "You're ugly, too."
Nothing like starting a post with an old vaudeville joke, is there? But, seriously, folks... If we are given a diagnosis that we don't like, or don't agree with, we are very likely to go to another doctor for a second opinion. If we are offered a prognosis that sounds pretty bad ("You gonna die!"), we are almost certainly going to see another doctor. If the recommended treatment sounds difficult, unpleasant or expensive, we're going to look for somebody else who will tell us something we like better.
But what if everything sounds pretty reasonable, and we're sort of doing okay for a while, and we like our doctor? Only we're not really getting "all better again". What if there were just a slow, very gradual deterioration, and that seemed to be in line with the original diagnosis? And what if that original diagnosis was wrong?
It's not uncommon for me to see patients for a second opinion when the pet's owner is dissatisfied with how things are going. I do my best to resist the temptation to criticize the first doctor's approach, for two reasons. The first is that I don't know what things looked like on that initial presentation. Sure, now that it's been going on for weeks and I know what didn't work the first time, it might look like the other guy really goofed up. It might not have been so obvious the first time around, though. The second reason is that sometimes the owner doesn't accurately communicate what happened the first time around. I try to give that first doctor the same courtesy I'd want if I had been the "first doctor". Again, that's a common situation, and people are working at getting their problem fixed.
On the other hand, maybe I've made a diagnosis and prescribed a treatment, and it all sounds reasonable. As times goes on, the pet isn't doing all that great, but, hey, I'm sure Ol' Doc has done everything he could. Have I?
When I don't hear back from a client, I tend to think that the pet is getting better, that things are going well. I'm saying that if your pet isn't doing that great, it's okay to get a second opinion. Start by getting a second opinion from his regular doctor. I guarantee that if I find out that the pet hasn't improved on what I recommended, I know that I need to take a second look at the situation. Let me take a second look; in fact, demand that I take a second look. If I'm stuck in tunnel vision ("You've had this before? Well, you have it again."), don't feel bad about seeing another doctor, and asking for copies of your record. Maybe the other doctor will find exactly the same thing, and we just have a bad situation. Maybe... maybe one of us will figure out something to fix your pet.
I looked at a sad case this week. Two-years old Labrador Retriever -- looked like she was fifteen. She looked like a skeleton with a big belly full of fluid. "She started having problems after she got run over last year. They told us that the fluid was from kidney damage. She has just gone gradually downhill since then." The kidney damage explanation didn't seem very likely to me. Be that as it may, the one patently obvious thing was that the dog had never gotten any better, had gotten much worse instead.
She tried to stay in a sitting position. If she lay down, she got back up again. When I listened to her chest in a sitting position, I could hear air move. When she lay down, no air movement. When she lay down, gravity was putting something into her chest that kept her from breathing normally. What could be falling into her chest? All that fluid, maybe. How would it get there? Through a hole in the diaphragm. This all started when she got run over. Her abdomen could have been mashed, popping her guts into her chest. That causes her organs to function poorly, she loses weight, has trouble breathing. We X-rayed her chest, and sure enough, it's full of guts and fluid, which are squishing her heart and lungs. Diaphragmatic hernia is the diagnosis. That's fixable.
That is, it's fixable when you're still in good enough shape to survive a nice long surgery. Not so fixable when you are severely dehydrated, haven't eaten in days, and look like a concentration-camp victim. Her owners elected not to gamble on such a poor chance of success, and we euthanized the poor dog. I'd rather have fixed her, but she was starving and suffocating, and her chances were certainly slim.
They liked and trusted their first doctor. They should have asked him for a second opinion. I suspect he might have had one.
Why is my Sheltie reproducing deciduous teeth sat 2 years of age? At least that's what our Vet is saying...
Posted by: Liliam Rajoy | May 05, 2016 at 05:29 PM
Hello, Liliam,
It is possible that there is some failure to communicate here. Dogs don't grow a third set of teeth.
It is certainly possible that there were deciduous teeth that were never shed, and are still present, and causing problems. Sometimes the permanent tooth has failed to erupt, and that can cause a cyst in the bone. Sometimes both teeth have come in, and the baby tooth didn't shed. Then you have two teeth where there is only a place for one. The baby tooth should be extracted in cases like this.
Posted by: Doc | May 05, 2016 at 06:08 PM
My 10 month old goldendoodle had a deciduous upper canine that was scheduled to be extracted but came/broke off before the surgery. The vet says that I should have an xray to make sure the entire root came out as the tooth looks like it was broken off. He is in no pain and his gums look totally fine in that area. Wondering if this procedure is actually necessary as they will need to sedate him to get the xray? Can I just wait to deal with anything if/when it shows up?
Thanks
Posted by: Stacey Thon | August 10, 2016 at 06:05 AM
Hello, Stacey,
Hard call. All the dental specialists say to get it out. Before I had better dental education and equipment, I broke off a number of them. The dogs didn't seem to have problems, but I really don't know how much discomfort it caused the dog over the course of its life to leave it in there.
I've seen plenty of horrible abscessed teeth where folks were unaware of the animal's pain until we extracted the tooth and the pet felt so much better afterward.
The dental guys say to get it out.
Posted by: Doc | August 10, 2016 at 03:54 PM