 A Singapore male, Cross-bred, 11 years old, trim and in excellent bodily condition looking like 5-year old (see white teeth in the photo), well looked after by its owner. What's wrong with it? An ulcerated strawberry-like tumour (see excised tumour on triangular piece of paper) on nose around 1-inch diameter has grown over past few months and the owner thought some injections might vanquish the growth. Photo of dog just after surgical removal of tumour above & behind right nostril. Although it had dinner at 7 p.m. yesterday, it vomited the chicken and gizzard after tranquilisation with xylazine intramuscular injection. It was intubated and given halothane gaseous anaesthesia but it vomited yellow gastric mucus twice. The endotracheal tube was removed and a pentobarbiturate injection IV had to be given to proceed with surgery. The dog was going to vomit again. The surgery was less than 5 minutes but the vomiting & cleaning up took >30 minutes! The skin tumour on nose could have been quickly and easily removed in less than 10 minutes of general anaesthesia when it was just a small nodule of less than 2 mm. Singaporean owners tend to wait till the tumour becomes much bigger annoying the dog before they see the vet. Tumour then becomes ulcerated and infected. There are pet taxis to transport your dog/cat if you have no time to see the vet. Older dogs under anaesthetic are at a greater risk and an earlier operation (the dog being younger) would have been less risky. Veterinary surgeons prefer shortest possible period of anaethesia and this case should not take more than 10 minutes of anaesthesia. This dog survived but do not take unnecessary risk with your pet. More than 12 hours fasting before general anaesthetic is insufficient for some dogs as food was still in the stomach. Vomiting of food during general anaesthetic is a risk to the dog as it could inhale the vomitus leading to inhalation pneumonia. Histological examination was not wanted by the owner as the dog is already old. Gaseous general anaesthesia is best for
surgery in older dogs as they wake up within few minutes after removal of the anesthetic
gas. |