[Dailydrool] Dan update

[Randee White]

Well, it's been a long 7 days, but here's the story.Dan went to surgery on Friday afternoon.Instead of taking 3-4 hours, the operation was done in 2.The mass turned out to be even larger than it looked on the CT scan, but it was encapsulated which was a nice surprise, since cancer is usually not. A couple of large nerves and the carotid artery needed to be tied off but that was more or less expected. I went in to see Dan afterwards and of course he was sedated, so I left for the night . I went back on Saturday morning and his heart rate was in the 200s which is way too fast.They took a chest x-ray and he had aspirated and had pneumonia.One of the nerves that was cut controls the swallowing reflex so his gag reflex was slow and he had inhaled some saliva over night. So at this point he was getting IV fluid, IV antibiotics, oxygen, and continuous cardiac monitoring.His wonderful vet tech on Saturday let me spend almost all day sitting in the cage
 with him.He knew I was there because he turned around to get in his cuddle position against my leg, heaved a big sigh and went into a deep sleep.He finally returned to a normal heart rate on Saturday night. Sunday was more of the same. So, he's been at the vetspital slowly getting a little better every day. I should be able to bring him home this afternoon.He gave me a very pitiful look when I left yesterday.So there's the whole sordid tale.It's been an adventure.Luckily I don't think he'll remember much of it as he was pretty sedated until yesterday.He looks pretty funny as most of his neck and chest were shaved circumferentially, all four paws were shaved for the EKG leads, an area under his tail was shaved for the blood pressure monitor and he's had IVs in all four legs.Actually, he probably doesn't look as bad as I've made it sound, but he does look a little mangy! Unfortunately, I still don't have the pathology report. The surgeon promised it would
 be back today.I'm keeping my fingers crossed that it's not too bad but realistically, it probably will be.The one thing I still don't understand is that in all the time I've spent there, I've not seen any other people visiting their animals.  

Randee and The White House Gang, happy to be getting my boy back home. 


PS: Once everything with Dan gets settled down, I'll be updated everyone on the adventures of Ricky and Lucy, the two adventurous pups who are in the process of auditioning for OEBE status.
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