Sick Puppy

Toby was a sick puppy yesterday.  A week ago, he got out of the fence and was there to meet my truck when I drove up.  I put him back in the fence and later found an empty box of rat poison in the yard.  I suspected that he had eaten at least some of it but I wasn't sure.  I watched him for a few days and he showed no ill effects.  I figured that everything was OK.  Yesterday when I got home from work, he was obviously sick and couldn't get up.  I carried him to the vet and he got a half liter of blood and some vitamin K.  His body temperature was very low (it seems that 101-102 is normal for a dog, his was 97) and he was struggling to breathe.  After the blood transfusion I took him over to the E-vet for him to spend the night.  They were giving him a 50/50 chance of making it through the night.  I didn't get any calls during the night and when I picked him up this morning he was standing up but moving very slowly.  I took him back to the regular vet where is has stayed today getting more vitamin K treatments to counter the poison that is in his blood.  Apparently it isn't uncommon for rat poison to take up to a week to work.  I didn't know it before but it works by inhibiting the vitamin K in the blood and keeping it from clotting.  He was bleeding internally and it was in his lungs and intestines.  If he wasn't so big (~90 lbs) and strong he wouldn't have made it.  Hopefully he will be able to get well and be back to normal in a few weeks.

The moral of the story is don't let a dog eat rat poison.  If you suspect that they have eaten it you can get them to throw it up by giving them a little hydrogen-peroxide but call the vet.  I think that if it has had time to absorb into the blood they can give them vitamin K to counteract its effects.

My dad tells me that this is not unlike a human's reaction to overdosing on coumadin or warfarin.