Emergency Care for Pets: Essential Tips with Brittany Magill

Speaker 2 (00:00.174) So tonight's guest is a very actually very good friend of mine, Brittany McGill. Brittany is a licensed veterinary technician. And tonight we're gonna talk to her a little bit about emergency situations and different aspects on what to do, what to have, what would constitute as an emergency, all of those fun things. So Brittany, would you like to formally introduce yourself? Yeah, hi, my name is Brittany. thank you for having me on your guys' podcast. I'm super excited. as Elise said, I'm a licensed veterinary technician based out of Mare, Arizona. and I started my own business back in May as a concierge vet tech. So I actually go into people's homes and do tech appointments in your home, more comfortable for you, more comfortable for your parents. pet, that kind of thing. and then I also will freelance with local vets in the area who do house calls and can also do things like pulling bloods and giving medications and injectables and that kind of stuff for vets if I'm basically given a a prescription to do so. Okay. That's ac that's a really cool business. I'm sure out here too with the large retirement community. I'm I bet you're pretty popular with those guys. Yeah, I definitely. I just got in with Touchmark up here in Prescott and have been gaining a lot of ground there. So Exactly. Yeah, I'm I'm sure I'll have days in my ca calendar where I'll just block it out for touch mark and spend the whole day there. Speaker 2 (01:35.659) Go door to door there. Speaker 2 (01:45.558) That's good. Brittany, is this something that you thought of and saw as an opportunity or do other people do this and I just don't know about it? I haven't seen anybody else doing it. the vet that I take my dog in for routine veterinary care kind of stuff, she has a friend who used to do it down in the valley, but has since kind of retired that and more moved into pet sitting. but yeah, I haven't seen anybody up here doing what I do. Yeah, that's awesome. so so can you just kind of tell us a little bit about what kind of things constitute an emergency and what the average pet owner should be looking at as markers to indicate that something might be wrong when it's not obvious, you know. Yeah. Speaker 1 (02:42.806) Yeah, absolutely. so aside from, you know, the obvious major personality changes and that kind of stuff, things that you wanna be looking for in your dog is maybe being off of their food for more than a day or two or a decreased water intake. You know, you wanna make sure that you're watching The output as well as their input. So is their stool a normal consistency? No weird colors, no increased frequency in either urination or defecation. another one that you want to be paying attention to that can lead to a host of different issues is their breathing. so excessive panting can actually be a sign that your animal's in pain. so you want to pay attention to that. if there's excessive panting, if the the quantity or quality of their breaths change. So instead of having that nice deep breath in and a a slow breath out that's kind of rhythmic, if it's stilted or there's a strange noise coming with it, then that would really constitute an emergent situation. Those are really great tips. I think a lot of people don't always pay that much attention to some of those things. it's really a good idea to just really know what your dog's baseline is. yeah, especially with poo. you know, we are all horse people, so we are you know, with horses you always look at poop. Yeah. Speaker 1 (04:19.757) Completely. Speaker 1 (04:30.581) Yeah. Exactly. immediately and you check whether or not they're eating. So you're very familiar with what their manure looks like. And I think with dogs we sometimes don't stress that enough that you've got to know what is normal for your dog so that you know something's abnormal. Right. Yeah. Yeah. I think the other thing with dogs and poo is I mean, growing up, we didn't walk our dogs to take them out. We just turned them out in the backyard and we're like, all right, go your thing. So I think that's where a lot of that gets missed. And I'm not saying like you have to stalk them every day to make sure like, you know, they're consistent. I know Carl is like I pick up Winnie's poo every day 'cause we live at a condo and like you you have to. And I always take note 'cause that's the kind of person I am. And I Yeah. Speaker 2 (05:18.712) Tell him about it and he's like, I don't think we need to talk about the type of foods our dog is having every day. I'm like, No, it's important. Like what if it changes? What like we have to know what day it changed. Like, you know, did it change in the morning? Did it change in the afternoon? Those kinds of things you're good to know. Just you know, store that in my brain, lives there rent free. Yeah. Speaker 1 (05:37.172) Exactly. And I remember when Winnie was still little and I had days off during the week and I would go and walk her for you. I'd kind of send you poo updates for I did, I know. Honestly, it was the best dog walker I had. It was great. I never had to worry. So Brittany, I just found out that you had Winnie to take care of during the week and I got her on Fridays. So I didn't I didn't really realize that you were the person who was taking care of her and that's a really nice connection for us. Yeah, absolutely. She was fun to walk. There she was a character for sure. Yep. whole army of people looking out for this dog for me while I went to the office a couple days a week. She was little and she couldn't quite hold yeah. Well she's so cute. Like how could you guys not love spending time with her? She's perfect. Obviously. Yeah. Anyway, back to business. Speaker 1 (06:23.87) Yeah. Speaker 1 (06:30.062) Exactly. Speaker 3 (06:36.702) So back to the topic at hand. I actually have I have four adult dogs right now and a puppy. So it's actually quite hard for me to watch them, especially in the morning when it's dark out. Yeah. Because I'm really just watching the little girl to make sure that she stays safe. So I don't always catch things. So, you know, it really can be challenging, but I have a pretty good feel for what my dogs are doing. Yeah. Speaker 1 (06:57.826) Right. Speaker 3 (07:06.264) Yeah. So I think most people who have a yard too periodically go out to clean it up. So in that instance, I mean I would assume it'd be every couple of days or so. so in that instance you'd be able to kind of take note if anything's different. Yeah. Maybe. I mean my parents just mowed over it, so I don't think they ever knew what it was. What? Speaker 1 (07:36.264) That might be a little bit harder, yeah. Yeah, they hard with They just fertilize the yard. Yes. So what other tips do you have? Anyway. Speaker 1 (07:51.182) some other things that people can pay attention to that they might not normally kind of be looking at is their nose. So dogs, their nose, you know, is is should be wet pretty much all the time, along with the mucus membranes just right on the inside of their lip there. That should be a nice, it should have a nice glean to it. It should be nice and wet all the time. So if that's kind of dry or tacky looking. if it's not that nice pink color, it's more of like a red or a white, paler color, then that's something that's concerning. another thing is ears. pet parents can look in their dogs and their cats' ears. and any malodorous kind of scent coming out of there can be indicative of an underlying issue. you can also see there might be a buildup of earwax and gunky stuff, particularly in dogs that have floppy ears. So those are just a couple of other things that pet parents might not already be kind of scoping out, but are easy enough to look at. Yeah. And since the podcast is called Poodle People, I would just remind all of our poodle owners that they probably should be lifting those ears every week and checking on them. Yeah. Speaker 2 (09:18.582) And cleaning them. Clean your dog's ears. Especially poodles. There's a lot of hair in there. Yeah, I just about to say there's a lot of hair and wax and all kinds of stuff can get stuck in there and burrs too. You don't want burrs going in there. that's another thing is excessive head shaking's an indicator that there might be something going on in in their ears. yeah. I forgot about the head shaking, but you're right. That's too. Yeah. Yeah. So go ahead, Karen. Go ahead. I was gonna say so you don't see emergencies, right, Brittany? Speaker 1 (09:52.87) Correct. Right. Yeah. so there are four things that veterinary technicians cannot do that only doctors can do. and that is prognosing. So that's basically looking at an animal and predicting that it's fine for a specific treatment. diagnosing, so actually saying this animal is sick with this disease process, we can't prescribe any medications and we can't perform surgery. so yeah going with if I were to do emergencies I would have to have a veteran veterinarian at least on the phone with me to kind of walk me through any kind of treatment or triage process. But yeah, just doing that on my own would be going against those those governing statutes. Gotcha. So what so like a regular vet versus an emergency room vet, like which which should you call and when? Yeah, so anything that is abnormal, you definitely wanna just try and call your vet on the off chance that they might be able to get you in since they'll have your whole pet's history and your pet is familiar with their office and that kind of stuff. things like head shaking, probably not going to be a super emergent situation. There's probably there might be just some stuff down in there. that can be taken care of easily. but big things like, you know, if your horse get or your sorry, your dog used to horses. if your dog gets hit by a car or you drop a pot on their head or they get run over by a horse or something like that. That would be something that you would definitely just want to bypass your regular vet on and go straight to an emergency vet. Speaker 1 (11:59.09) that's open 247, hopefully. there are some that have regular business hours, but I think most are open 247. so those kinds of things if your dog has been off feed for a day or two, maybe try calling, giving your vet a call. They might try to give you some advice over the phone. ask you some questions about what's been going on and and they might say, Okay, that sounds a little bit serious. We can get you in tomorrow or you you might need to go to the emergency vet, that kind of thing. Okay. I I also would would just point out something that's really obvious, but is such a great tool. And I'm old enough to remember when we didn't have it, but you can take a video of your dog. You think your dog is a little bit funny tonight, but you're not sure if your dog is panting and maybe it's not, you just can't quite decide. You can always take a little bit of video of whatever is going on and either send it to your vet. Yeah. Speaker 3 (13:06.674) or look at it the next day or in a couple of hours and just compare so that you're not relying on your memory. Yeah and I I think that that is so powerful. I mean, I take videos and send them to my vet all the time. Yeah. You know, he's a saint. But it's so helpful that I can just send him things and say, you know, do I need to come in tomorrow or just watch it myself. Yeah. Speaker 2 (13:25.876) We love it. Speaker 1 (13:35.69) Right, absolutely. Yeah, that's great advice. and also if your dog is kind of intermittently doing something that is concerning, a really common one that isn't a problem is the reverse sneeze. But the first time anybody sees that, they, my god, my dog is gonna die. so in that instance or something like that, taking a video of that so that y you Right, so that you can take it in and show the vet in case the animal doesn't experience any of those signs or symptoms while they're actually in the office. I think the first time I had kennel cough, I had no idea I had kennel cough. So I took my dog to the vet and now stay home. Yeah. Right. Right. Yeah, we don't want that here. Speaker 2 (14:32.302) That's yeah, that's a rampant one too. Like it you think about Kennel Cough and it plagues your whole house. It is that's a nasty one. Mm-hmm. So in the event that maybe you're either in route to the vet or like an emergency vet or you're like you're seeing an emergency happening, do you have anything you recommend keeping in like a little emergency kit at home? You are Speaker 1 (14:58.198) Yeah, absolutely. so I have kind of a a list for two different scenarios. the first is if something happens, and you need to get your dog into the vet. so like if your if your dog ingests something that they shouldn't go through the trash or get into chemicals or whatever, there's you can actually give dogs peroxide. under direction of your veterinarian. they will give you the correct dosage for your animal. but peroxide will be a pretty quick acting a medic. So that that will make them actually vomit up whatever they have ingested that they shouldn't have. So that would be for things that aren't caustic materials. So that would be like your chocolate, your onions, your human food things that dogs should not be eating. activated charcoal would be for if they ingest any caustic materials. So your cleaning materials, bleach, Windex, that kind of stuff. And what activated charcoal does is actually stops the absorption of those materials and it also coats the throat and the intestinal lining and everything. but obviously you want to just use those under the direction of your vet. So you would call your vet, say, Hey, my dog ate 15 pounds of chocolate. What do I do? if you say I have peroxide on hand, then they can give you the dosage to give your dog and then still take the dog into the vet. and same goes for that activated charcoal. other good things to have on hand, Benadryl. some dogs, puppies really like to chase bees and chomp down on them. Benadryl can help with that swelling. and then still take them in in case they have some other kind of adverse reaction, in addition to just the normal swelling that happens. satirazine, that's the general form of Zertec, is a good one for just general allergies. Speaker 2 (16:55.962) Yeah. Speaker 1 (17:19.834) so if you know, runny nose starts or whatever, not nothing else too concerning going on, then a a satirazine or a Zyrtek can help out with that. But with all of this, talk to your vet about it first. Don't just start giving your dog any kind of medications 'cause Brittany said so on the podcast. Definitely. yeah, d hear that everybody? Talk call your vet first. We know it's tempting. Just call them. They'll be nice, we promise. Yes. and then things for like cuts or if your dog rips off a toenail or something like that. have some antibiotic ointment, gauze squares or rolled gauze, vet wrap, the same stuff that you would find in a normal human first aid kit, you can throw into your doggy one. so you can kind of protect that wound. until you can get your dog into the vet. And that's not something that you should do in lieu of taking your dog to the vet because they'll need antibiotics if they have a cut. just to take prophylactically to prevent anything from happening. but just to keep it nice and covered and clean and have that antibiotic ointment already on there to help prevent anything. from getting in kind of more of as a physical barrier than anything else. Speaker 3 (18:53.326) Okay. And then the other list that I would have would be for a natural disaster. so here in Arizona we get wildfires or the flash flooding, not too much earthquakes or tornadoes or anything like that, but Pretty tame. Right. As far as natural disasters go here. Yeah. But in places like Kentucky where Karen is where they they see like tornadoes and other yeah kind of scary weather. Exactly, yeah. so for the more scary places, I would recommend kind of having a go bag made up for your animals. so collapsible food and water bowls, pre-prepared food baggies, or if they're on canned food, a couple of extra cans of their food, nice good, sturdy leashes, collars, what are those harnesses. bottled water because you might not have access to fresh water. a blanket or bedding that either you have cuddled with or they have cuddled with or both so that they have that familiar scent if you need to evacuate the area. One or two of their toys definitely want to have copies of their medical and vaccine records for evacuations. Speaker 1 (20:19.818) so if you do need to take them in somewhere, then you'll be able to bring their entire history with you. And then any current pictures or videos of them in case you do get separated from them or need to place them in a kind of short term housing situation, like the Red Cross will go to natural disaster for relief and they will bring a team of veterinarians, technicians, rescues, that kind of stuff. And they'll not only pick up the strays that they find or the lost pets that they find, but they'll also kind of act as a doggy and kitty hotel. that's really good to know. Speaker 3 (21:04.622) I will admit I'm not quite ready for a disaster. Sort of, but not quite. Yeah. And let's just hope that doesn't happen. Right. Yeah. And I don't think that it's something that most parents think about too much is what to do in those kinds of situations. Yeah. Speaker 3 (21:27.694) I think more and more we need to so Elise will probably remember that I used to always fill my milk jug that I had washed many years ago and filled with water and I keep it in the car all the time because I have this paranoia of being out with the dogs and needing water. So I always gallon of water with me. Yeah. Speaker 2 (21:52.737) yeah. Yeah. take a bottle of water with a bowl every time we leave the house with Winnie, especially in the summers here, but just any time 'cause it's so dry, it's so easy to dehydrate, even in the cooler temps. Yes. Kentucky it's not as big a deal, but that is my, you know, like I have leashes and bottles in the car. Speaker 1 (22:13.772) Yeah. And that's a great starting point. and especially in places where the weather can be a little bit more temperamental. especially here in Arizona, you know, it's it's dry, but it can get very, very hot. And then in Kentucky, it can get very, very humid. and both of those instances, pets are at a very high risk for heat stroke. so a good way to prevent that is to just keep them hydrated to help keep them cool. Yeah. And then I was gonna ask you, just because we are a poodle-y poodle, we are poodle people. We're talking about poodles. like a more poodle focused podcast. And Karen and I both have standards. Karen has five of them and I have one. would you mind talking a little bit about GDV and bloat? Speaker 1 (23:13.334) Yeah, absolutely. So bloat and gastric dilation volvulus, GDV, are terms that are kind of used interchangeably. but bloat is kind of the precursor to GDV, which is potentially a life-threatening situation, especially once it gets to the GDV stage. so bloat is a buildup of gas. in the stomach and it progresses or can progress fairly quickly into GDV, which is a essentially when the stomach is filled with gas, food, or fluid, and then it twists on itself, so that both the entrance and the exit for the stomach are both blocked off. So the dog can't vomit, can't burp, can't get rid of it going out the way it came in, and they can't defecate either. so that's obviously a very painful experience for them. exact causes are are kind of unknown, but there are some correlations. poodles are obviously more susceptible to it, along with other large deep-chested dogs, so your greyhounds, great Danes, setters, wimarones, Basset hounds, Doberman pinchers, all of those kinds of dogs are more susceptible to it, especially after they exercise after a large meal or a large water intake. and then dogs that have kind of more of a high anxiety or fear setting as their baseline. can also increase their risk of of developing bloat and then GDV. Some illnesses can also cause it. The so any illnesses that decrease intestinal motility. and then some medications can too. The most common one that would be used in home would probably be diphenhydramine or your Benadryl. So watch that if you if you do give your Speaker 1 (25:35.342) pet Benadryl and and it's a one of those large deep chested dogs, just keep an eye on them. anesthesia decreases intestinal motility. So after they've had any kind of surgery, you want to watch them closely and just kind of slowly start to feed them and give them water. I know that that's a common discharge instruction after a pet's been anesthetized, but You just wanna make sure that you're reintroducing food and water slowly so that their system kind of gets more accustomed to it. and then other illnesses or d disease processes that can kind of correlate with GDV is liver disease, hypothyroidism, and some electrolyte imbalances. So Yeah. It is a lot. And it sounds very scary. and I mean it can be pretty scary, but luckily there are ways to kind of prevent it that or mitigate it that I'll I'll get into. but I do want to go over some of the signs and symptoms first, just so that people can be aware and and watch that. so probably the most obvious is going to be a swollen and distended belly behind their rib cage. So where that area that's usually nice and soft and squishy, that's gonna be pretty round and pretty firm. it's probably gonna be pretty painful painful if you go and try to palpate it at all. That's they're not gonna like that very much. they're going to have an increased heart rate. cold body temperature on their extremities. So their ears, their paws are gonna be pretty cold. They're gonna be producing a lot more saliva because their body's gonna be telling them that they need to vomit, but they can't. going along with that will be unproduct unproductive retching. So they're going to be trying to vomit but they can't actually get anything out because that that Speaker 1 (27:53.996) That part is twisted off. It's it's closed off. and then your pale mucous membranes are gonna be coming into that too. and all of that can make them pretty restless. They're gonna be pacing, they'll probably be whining, they're gonna have some extra anxiety, they might be more reactive to things. and then eventually if if you kind of bypass all of those other signs or just think that they're having an off day, eventually they're going to collapse and and kind of head into some septic shock. And that's due to the compression of major blood vessels and arteries that are in that area. that is there it's cutting off their blood circulation. so that's that's a pretty dire situation. And once you get to that point, unless you're lucky enough to catch it where it's just bloat before the stomach flips, the only treatment for GDV is surgery. So where the vet will actually go in and manually flip that stomach to where it should be in its proper location in the body and proper orientation in there. That sounds horrible. Yes, yeah. And that would that'd be a long kind of recovery for them 'cause it's a you know, stomach incision. So they're gonna have to be on basically bed rest. They're not gonna be allowed to be running around and playing and jumping and being a normal dog. So, and it's pretty invasive. Speaker 3 (29:40.174) So if you suspect bloat, what do you do? Mm-hmm. I would call the vet immediately, regardless of if you have any question or not, especially if you have one of those breeds that is predisposed to it. because if you catch it early enough, then you can kind of help them along with some supportive care, it might not necessarily turn into a GDV, but in the event that it does, you'll already either be on your way to the vet or in the vet's office and they can react immediately to it. And the success of the surgery is really based on how quickly you can get them into the vet. Got it. So now I'll be paranoid. Karen will be watching all five dogs like a hawk at all times, just in case. Speaker 1 (30:36.958) I Do give the little girl a pass because I think she's too small to bloat, but maybe I'm wrong. But it doesn't seem like something that would really happen to puppies. It I'm that'd be a question for a vet. but yeah, and male dogs are also more prone to having G D V. so not to say ignore your girl dogs at all, but maybe watch your boy dogs a l a little bit closer, just just a little. I didn't know that there was a correlation there. That's really interesting. Yeah. Yeah. Speaker 3 (31:13.752) Don't already obsess over Alfred's His hair, his food. Now you're gonna be looking at his stomach to make sure it's distended. Right. I was gonna say, I know there are there's not like a ton of preventatives, but there are I mean controlling like when they exercise and eat, like the breaks between the two and those kinds of things. I got Winnie a gastropexy when I spayed her, which is where they basically like kind of tack the stomach to the abdominal wall so that her stomach physically can't fully rotate. I'm the paranoid kind of person that definitely did it. And I've seen where a lot of other people have started to do that. so hopefully that's an a good good step in the right direction as far as relatives go. But yeah. Yeah, absolutely. And to kind of go along with that, the gastropexy is definitely kind of the gold standard in prevention. just because you are going in there and making sure that the stomach can't physically flip around. and it's kind of I think it might be somewhat stolen from equine medicine. where horses can have the same kind of a thing happen, particularly after giving birth, where their part of their stomach will flip over on itself and and one of the things to rectify that is a colopexy. so it's the same along the same lines. But yeah, that's kind of the gold standard for prevention is to go ahead and tack that stomach down so that it can't physically rotate. Speaker 1 (33:02.546) other things that you can do to kind of help prevent that is what you said is feeding them, making sure that they take a little bit of a rest before going out and exerting themselves. other things you can do is make sure that you're feeding at least twice a day. so splitting the normal amount of food that you would give them in a day into at least two different feedings, so morning and evening. If you're able to, you can split it up even more than that, just so that their stomach isn't getting so full to capacity. and then fostering a relaxing and comfortable home environment, especially for those more anxious type dogs. just making sure that they have a nice place where they can go if they need to get away from any kind of stressors, whether that be a quiet room that they can go to or a crate for them, something like that. And then also making sure that they have a calcium rich meat meal within the first four ingredients of their dog food. So something you want to look for is to make sure it's chicken meal, salmon, beef, whatever your protein source is. making sure that that protein source and especially if there's two or three different sources in the first four ingredients that'll help not only their nutrition but also making sure that the they're they're Speaker 2 (34:42.893) Okay. I didn't know that about the protein content. That's or the calcium content. That's a really interesting I didn't either Karen, I think we lost. no. She's fabulous, but now I am so scared. Don't be scared, it'll be okay. Speaker 3 (35:01.42) do we call her back? I ti I just text it. She's real too. Good. She's she and I go we would hang out all the time. Like all the time. She's great. I love Brittany. And we've seen her a couple times since we've moved out here. She's either been in the valley and we've seen her or like we went up and there she is. We're sorry for Brittany there you are and and it got all weird. And I should have put it on no do not disturb, but I'm doing that now. Speaker 2 (35:26.126) no. Speaker 2 (35:32.248) Okay. All it's all good. We were like, wait, where'd she go? It's okay. We can cut we can cut the the weird part out. It's all good. I'm trying to remember what you said about but yeah, I thought I just I think that's really interesting about the calcium content. I've never And here Speaker 2 (35:53.4) thought of I know calcium and phosphorus are really important when they're little and you're growing, especially for dogs our size to make sure that like the ratio is enough, not too much, and it's in the right percentage range, but I've never thought about it beyond that. So that's very interesting. Yeah. do you know this may be getting too technical, but like, is there a percent on the bag that you look for for that kind of thing? Or are you just looking for like a little bit higher than normal or I'm not sure about a percentage, but just making sure that it's in the first four ingredients, that meat meal or a meat product. and I could get really super technical in it, but you want to make sure that you are getting something that is a either meat, just like chicken thighs or salmon. or a meat meal, so chicken meal, salmon meal, beef meal, something like that, and kind of want to stay away from more of the chicken byproducts. And all of that is governed by a separate AFCO, which is the food governing body for sure for dogs. but each one of those has a specific percentage. that it has to meet of what that that product is. So I can't remember right off the top of my head, but just straight up beef is going to have more a higher percentage than your beef meal, which will have a higher percentage than your beef byproduct. So you want to try and stay with just your straight up beef or whatever meat it is. or even the meat and meal because those are gonna be your higher percentages of what that product actually is in the food. Speaker 2 (37:53.026) Gotcha. And to be clear, like as far as protein goes, we're talking about animal proteins and not pea proteins, correct? Correct. Animal proteins, yes. Gotcha. I just wanted to ask 'cause I know that's a hot, hot topic in the veterinary world with the pea protein. And I know it is protein, but this is like obviously calcium comes from like the the animal thing. Yeah. Absolutely absolutely. and then also to I'm I don't know if you've talked about this on any of your other podcasts yet, but you definitely want grains included in your dog's food. unless your dog has a specific grain allergy, which is something that you wanna talk to your vet about, but this is kind of getting away from poodle specific and getting more dog general, but dilated carb cardiomyopathy. So heart disease has been linked to food that does not have grains in it. So you you definitely want to have grains included in your dog's diet unless they have a specific grain allergy. or you've Speaker 1 (39:13.624) consulted with your veterinarian or a licensed nutritionist about what you're feeding your animal because essentially that dilated cardiomyopathy will be shortening your dog's life. Yeah, which nobody wants. We want them forever, of course. Right. Yes, yeah. Well, we may have to have you back on at some point to talk about the nutrition bit because I know you're into that and Karen and I are both very hyper aware of what it Talk about Doc Boot time. Speaker 2 (39:47.244) Yeah, that's like I think that grooming and like my dog did this weird thing today. What do you think I should do about it? Are like the top three topics between Karen and I on all of our text arts and all of our phone calls. And this podcast. We talk about what to plan for this podcast all the time. But yes, those are that's it. Those four things. Well, that's that's really interesting. And I honestly I learned something tonight about the I love it. Speaker 1 (40:06.955) I love it. Speaker 2 (40:14.178) the GDV and the bloat with the calcium content. I'll have to l make sure that Winnie's food is into that because I'm just one of those paranoid people. And I will say, like my ba my basis behind getting the gastropexy ahead of time is I figured the preventative operation would be way cheaper than the reactive operation. because I mean it's you're you're already you're starting with a healthy dog at Absolutely. Speaker 1 (40:41.805) Right. down from there, like you know what I mean? Yes. versus just trying to get back up to a hundred percent. Right. But in case anyone's considering it, I did it. I thought it was worth it. especially if you have a female dog and you're looking into it. I mean it's it's the same incision. Right. They just go up towards the up towards like the rib cage area where everything Yeah. Versus, you know, down below where they would take the uterus and ovaries. So Yeah. Speaker 1 (40:53.538) Yes, yeah. Speaker 2 (41:10.798) We've got a female, you're considering it. Same surgery with the males it's little more involved. Yes. And on top of that. Yeah. And on top of that, too, if your dog does suffer from a GDV, then not only are you going to be going in there, you're gonna be stressed out. you're gonna have the cost of the emergency, you're gonna have the cost of the surgery, but every single dog who comes in with a GDV is also going to be treated right off the bat for sepsis. So you're essentially going to be paying for two different disease processes because sepsis is so common with a GDV. Okay, I hope I can sleep tonight. Not like Speaker 3 (42:02.894) I'm sure you'll you will be fine. I'm I'm not worried about your dogs any more than you are. So I think I think it's okay. Sure. Speaker 3 (42:15.788) Yeah. I've been worried about bloat. I just try to ignore bloat. I know it can happen. Mm-hmm. And I do know the signs. And I've actually always let my dogs eat whatever they wanted until very recently. Mm-hmm. and I prefer to do that just because it I always felt like I was limiting my risk of bloat by letting them eat when they were hungry all the time. Unfortunately I now have one thin male and one female. so Just sneaking some extra meals in, huh? I don't think she was sneaking. I think she was doing it right in front of me. yeah. Speaker 2 (43:04.782) We love Grace. Grace is just the best character. She's my favorite, I think, of all of your dogs. She almost has a waistline again, but I mean she's still fat, but she's no longer a porker. She's on a diet plan. She's been on a diet for a year. I think it's I I we talk about Grace a lot. I love her, but I remember when I was looking into poodles, Karen, and I came and met you and like we were kind of like talking about it. You told me like, poodles don't get fat. Like that's not a thing. And you stop And you she Brittany, she sent me a picture of her not long ago and I was like, That's Grace. But this was this was why this was a while back. But she's she definitely has slimmed slimmed down since. Speaker 1 (43:51.832) Yeah. It made me laugh 'cause I was like, I didn't we have this conversation like three years ago and it wasn't a thing. But we're working on it. probably heard that and it's like, hmm, I'll show you. That s sounds about it's like, challenge accepted. Sign me up. I also got fixed and I didn't really realize that, you know, some people have the genes for menopause and some people don't. Speaker 2 (44:20.238) Yeah. That's the truth. Just me too, Grace. I understand. Yeah. Yep. my gosh. Well, thank you so much, Brittany, for giving us your time. We really appreciate you coming on and you've had a lot of really, really interesting information. Yeah. and we will look at putting together maybe like a nutrition episode. Kept eating. Speaker 3 (44:29.826) I feel it. Speaker 2 (44:48.352) Sometime in the future. So if you're listening and that sounds like it's up your alley, just you wait. This will be summoned at some point. Before we That's Before we sign off, Brittany, can you tell our listeners how to contact you if they have questions or if they live in the area and want to hire you for your services? Yeah, absolutely. Probably the easiest way to go about it would be to go to my website, which is J B as in Boy McGill, as in Mary, A G I L L Vet Tech. So V-E-T-E-C-H dot com. So J B Miggill vettech dot com. And then all of my other contact information is on there. And I also have a contact sh form that you can submit online. Speaker 3 (45:45.282) Fantastic. Awesome. Well, thank you, Brittany. Absolutely. Really appreciate it. Yes. Glad I could come on. Thanks for having me. You're welcome. We'll talk to you again soon. Bye. Speaker 1 (45:57.826) Bye. Bye. Bye.