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| President Dr. Mitsie Vargas in the news |
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WINTER HAVEN - Sabo, a K-9 who is now retired from the Winter Haven Police
Department, had a short career. Most K-9s work eight years, maybe more. Sabo
worked less than two, because he was injured on the job. He broke a bone
which didn't heal correctly. That opened the door to arthritis and bone spurs.
"In here it's bone on bone," Dr. Mitsie Vargas said as she looked at an x-ray of
Sabo's elbow. Vargas is a veterinarian who takes care of Winter Haven's police
dogs.
"Every time he flexes that elbow, it hurts" she explained.
Sabo's injuries, which are expected to get progressively worse, forced him to
stop working. This is just the beginning of his medical bills. Sabo's medications
run about $200 a month. Since there is no pension fund for K-9s, his former
partner, a police officer, will end up paying for the dog's care for the rest of his
life. Vargas thinks that is simply wrong.
"I feel that it is the least we can do to make sure in their golden years they are
taken care of," she told FOX 13.
Vargas just founded "K-9 for Life," the first known organization of its kind. It is
dedicated to raising money to care for retired K-9s. There are a lot of them.
Only the smallest law enforcement agencies don't have K-9 units.
Vargas hopes "K-9 for Life" motivates people across the country to start similar
groups to help take care of the dogs who have protected them.
To learn more, go to http://www.k-9forlife.com
Department, had a short career. Most K-9s work eight years, maybe more. Sabo
worked less than two, because he was injured on the job. He broke a bone
which didn't heal correctly. That opened the door to arthritis and bone spurs.
"In here it's bone on bone," Dr. Mitsie Vargas said as she looked at an x-ray of
Sabo's elbow. Vargas is a veterinarian who takes care of Winter Haven's police
dogs.
"Every time he flexes that elbow, it hurts" she explained.
Sabo's injuries, which are expected to get progressively worse, forced him to
stop working. This is just the beginning of his medical bills. Sabo's medications
run about $200 a month. Since there is no pension fund for K-9s, his former
partner, a police officer, will end up paying for the dog's care for the rest of his
life. Vargas thinks that is simply wrong.
"I feel that it is the least we can do to make sure in their golden years they are
taken care of," she told FOX 13.
Vargas just founded "K-9 for Life," the first known organization of its kind. It is
dedicated to raising money to care for retired K-9s. There are a lot of them.
Only the smallest law enforcement agencies don't have K-9 units.
Vargas hopes "K-9 for Life" motivates people across the country to start similar
groups to help take care of the dogs who have protected them.
To learn more, go to http://www.k-9forlife.com
| Dr. Donna Capps Featured in the Ledger |
The black cat arrived at the clinic in obvious distress. It was retching for no clear reason, and it
was up to Donna Capps to figure out why.
A clue came when the owners reported that one of their cat toys was missing - not a measly little
cloth mouse but the plastic "fishing pole" used to dangle a small toy on a string.
Capps, the lead veterinarian at Lakeland's Veterinary Emergency Care, anesthetized the cat and
peered inside its maw. Sure enough, she detected the tip of the plastic toy handle lodged deep
in the feline's throat, leaving the question of what had happened to the remainder of the wand.
Capps soon found out. She extracted the entire pole, about 10 inches long, from the gullet of
the cat, which was only about 4 inches longer. It was a feat to arouse envy in any human sword
swallower. Within hours, the cat was awake and acted if nothing unusual had happened.
That incident from last fall is one example of the odd emergencies Capps and other vets
sometimes encounter at the clinic, one of two in Polk County open throughout the night and on
weekends and holidays.
"The one predictable thing about here is it's unpredictable," Capps said.
DIFFICULT TO STOMACH
In many cases, the way to a pet owner's heartsickness is through the animal's stomach. Ingestion
mishaps are commonplace, clinic staffers say, and their effects can be deadly.
Dogs and cats swallow animal toys, human toys and dolls, doorstops, needles, thread, tinsel,
Christmas decorations, coins, ear plugs, nuts and bolts, fish hooks, human articles of clothing,
towels, clothes hangers, human medicine, illicit drugs, antifreeze, poisonous reptiles, poisonous
plants, rocks and sand, among other items.
Capps recalled performing emergency surgery on a dog with a hard lump in its belly and seeing
a hand suddenly emerge - a small, plastic hand, that is. It belonged to a Dora the Explorer doll,
which was stuck inside the intestine. Another time, she discovered a Rolex watch, still ticking,
inside a dog's digestive tract.
A mixture of predatory instincts and curiosity leads dogs and cats to consume just about
anything that might possibly be construed as food, and that tendency can lead to trouble.
Puppies seem especially prone to drinking vehicle antifreeze (known in Florida as coolant),
apparently lured by the aroma. Antifreeze causes kidney failure, and Capps said a mere
teaspoon is enough to kill a dog.
Capps said dogs are particularly apt to consume anything that carries the odor of a human,
especially that of their owners.
"Our (family) dog used to eat a sock once a month," said Capps, whose family now owns one dog
and three cats, as well as five goats, three chickens, one horse, one rabbit, and two turtles and
some ducks. "Thankfully this generation doesn't wear panty hose. Because it's so fibrous, that
doesn't pass."
Capps said cats seem to have a weakness for consuming sewing needles, perhaps attracted by
the metallic tinkle of a needle bouncing on a table or hard floor. When a cat swallows a needle
with thread attached, the thread can loop around the base of its tongue or wrap around the
intestines. If the thread slices through the intestines, the cat will die, which is why Capps does
surgery whenever a sewing needle shows up on an X-ray.
Dorsey Hightower, a long-time veterinarian at Lakeland's Santa Fe Animal Hospital and one of
the founders of the emergency clinic, recalled a cat whose X-rays revealed a thin object lodged
in the esophagus. When Hightower pulled on the object, the cat's eye moved. It turned out the
cat had swallowed a coat hanger and the wire had curved behind the eye muscles. Hightower
extracted the hanger, and the cat lost the vision in the eye but was otherwise fine.
DRUGS AND PETS DON'T MIX
Troubles sometimes arise when well-intentioned owners try to play veterinarian, giving their pets
human medications that their bodies can't process. Hightower said acetaminophen, an
ingredient in Tylenol and other painkillers, damages a cat's red blood cells, and a single pill
can cause suffocation.
"People will say, 'Oh, Buster's been out fighting again, let's give him Tylenol and take him (to
the vet) in the morning,' " Hightower said. "Well, you'll take him in in a box."
If legal drugs can yield problems for pets, illicit drugs also fuel trips to the emergency clinic.
Capps said dogs sometimes sniff out an owner's stash of marijuana and gobble down the
aromatic herbs. In other cases, owners decide it might be funny to feed a bit to the canine and
see how it reacts.
Capps said a dog that consumes marijuana typically gets dilated pupils, becomes disoriented
and leans to one side and becomes light-sensitive and jumpy. It might sound amusing, but the
effect can be deadly. Capps treats pot poisoning with a sugary slurry containing activated
charcoal that absorbs the toxins, and it's not difficult to administer because she said the dogs do
indeed display evidence of "the munchies."
The vet said she has also seen pets that ingested methamphetamines and crack cocaine. The
typical treatment is to sedate the animals until the risk of seizures passes.
While cats are drawn to small, swat-worthy objects that might trigger predatory instincts, dogs
sometimes challenge mechanical items that might somehow evoke canine rivals. Hightower
said he has seen several dogs that lost legs after they attacked lawn mowers and one that had a
leg nearly sheared off during an encounter with an edger.
Both cats and dogs seem unable to resist the temptation of scrapping with serpents. Capps
recently treated a pair of puppies, both of which had been bitten in the eye by a water
moccasin. She also says dogs and cats often sustain bites from pygmy rattlesnakes and
occasionally from coral snakes. The clinic stocks antivenin for moccasins and rattlesnakes.
When an owner is unsure what kind of snake did the biting, he or she sometimes brings along the
snake for the vet to examine. Capps recalled receiving a supposedly dead snake in a bag from a
girl whose dog had been bitten, only to find a still-living coral snake in the bag.
That leads to another oddity for emergency vets, the delivery of non-domesticated animals.
Capps laughs at the memory of a woman who arrived one day clutching a plastic bag with a
butterfly inside. The woman announced the butterfly had been hit by a car and promptly
departed, leaving Capps to release the insect outside and watch it fly away.
WIMPY AND BRAVE
Longtime veterinarians learn that animals' reactions to physical pain and distress range across a
wide spectrum.
"They're all individuals and they all respond individually to trauma," Hightower said. "We've got
sissy dogs, sissy big dogs, and wimpy cats and brave cats, just like you do (with) people."
As an example of bravery, Hightower cited a Sheltie that arrived with one leg attached only by
some skin after it was hit by a train. He said the male dog never cried and only seemed
concerned with sniffing the office in hopes of finding a female.
Capps said many animals project stoicism, allow her to do anything to them, even if it causes
discomfort. Others are aggressive and must be anesthetized before she can work on them. In
general, she said, animals tolerate pain better than people do, though she also sees her share of
what she calls "drama queens."
"The pampered ones tend to be more dramatic in their pain; they milk it as much as they can,"
she said. "We see dogs that will limp on a leg that's been well for months because they continue
to get attention. They are very, very smart. They know if they're injured and have a sore leg,
they'll get a lot of attention."
was up to Donna Capps to figure out why.
A clue came when the owners reported that one of their cat toys was missing - not a measly little
cloth mouse but the plastic "fishing pole" used to dangle a small toy on a string.
Capps, the lead veterinarian at Lakeland's Veterinary Emergency Care, anesthetized the cat and
peered inside its maw. Sure enough, she detected the tip of the plastic toy handle lodged deep
in the feline's throat, leaving the question of what had happened to the remainder of the wand.
Capps soon found out. She extracted the entire pole, about 10 inches long, from the gullet of
the cat, which was only about 4 inches longer. It was a feat to arouse envy in any human sword
swallower. Within hours, the cat was awake and acted if nothing unusual had happened.
That incident from last fall is one example of the odd emergencies Capps and other vets
sometimes encounter at the clinic, one of two in Polk County open throughout the night and on
weekends and holidays.
"The one predictable thing about here is it's unpredictable," Capps said.
DIFFICULT TO STOMACH
In many cases, the way to a pet owner's heartsickness is through the animal's stomach. Ingestion
mishaps are commonplace, clinic staffers say, and their effects can be deadly.
Dogs and cats swallow animal toys, human toys and dolls, doorstops, needles, thread, tinsel,
Christmas decorations, coins, ear plugs, nuts and bolts, fish hooks, human articles of clothing,
towels, clothes hangers, human medicine, illicit drugs, antifreeze, poisonous reptiles, poisonous
plants, rocks and sand, among other items.
Capps recalled performing emergency surgery on a dog with a hard lump in its belly and seeing
a hand suddenly emerge - a small, plastic hand, that is. It belonged to a Dora the Explorer doll,
which was stuck inside the intestine. Another time, she discovered a Rolex watch, still ticking,
inside a dog's digestive tract.
A mixture of predatory instincts and curiosity leads dogs and cats to consume just about
anything that might possibly be construed as food, and that tendency can lead to trouble.
Puppies seem especially prone to drinking vehicle antifreeze (known in Florida as coolant),
apparently lured by the aroma. Antifreeze causes kidney failure, and Capps said a mere
teaspoon is enough to kill a dog.
Capps said dogs are particularly apt to consume anything that carries the odor of a human,
especially that of their owners.
"Our (family) dog used to eat a sock once a month," said Capps, whose family now owns one dog
and three cats, as well as five goats, three chickens, one horse, one rabbit, and two turtles and
some ducks. "Thankfully this generation doesn't wear panty hose. Because it's so fibrous, that
doesn't pass."
Capps said cats seem to have a weakness for consuming sewing needles, perhaps attracted by
the metallic tinkle of a needle bouncing on a table or hard floor. When a cat swallows a needle
with thread attached, the thread can loop around the base of its tongue or wrap around the
intestines. If the thread slices through the intestines, the cat will die, which is why Capps does
surgery whenever a sewing needle shows up on an X-ray.
Dorsey Hightower, a long-time veterinarian at Lakeland's Santa Fe Animal Hospital and one of
the founders of the emergency clinic, recalled a cat whose X-rays revealed a thin object lodged
in the esophagus. When Hightower pulled on the object, the cat's eye moved. It turned out the
cat had swallowed a coat hanger and the wire had curved behind the eye muscles. Hightower
extracted the hanger, and the cat lost the vision in the eye but was otherwise fine.
DRUGS AND PETS DON'T MIX
Troubles sometimes arise when well-intentioned owners try to play veterinarian, giving their pets
human medications that their bodies can't process. Hightower said acetaminophen, an
ingredient in Tylenol and other painkillers, damages a cat's red blood cells, and a single pill
can cause suffocation.
"People will say, 'Oh, Buster's been out fighting again, let's give him Tylenol and take him (to
the vet) in the morning,' " Hightower said. "Well, you'll take him in in a box."
If legal drugs can yield problems for pets, illicit drugs also fuel trips to the emergency clinic.
Capps said dogs sometimes sniff out an owner's stash of marijuana and gobble down the
aromatic herbs. In other cases, owners decide it might be funny to feed a bit to the canine and
see how it reacts.
Capps said a dog that consumes marijuana typically gets dilated pupils, becomes disoriented
and leans to one side and becomes light-sensitive and jumpy. It might sound amusing, but the
effect can be deadly. Capps treats pot poisoning with a sugary slurry containing activated
charcoal that absorbs the toxins, and it's not difficult to administer because she said the dogs do
indeed display evidence of "the munchies."
The vet said she has also seen pets that ingested methamphetamines and crack cocaine. The
typical treatment is to sedate the animals until the risk of seizures passes.
While cats are drawn to small, swat-worthy objects that might trigger predatory instincts, dogs
sometimes challenge mechanical items that might somehow evoke canine rivals. Hightower
said he has seen several dogs that lost legs after they attacked lawn mowers and one that had a
leg nearly sheared off during an encounter with an edger.
Both cats and dogs seem unable to resist the temptation of scrapping with serpents. Capps
recently treated a pair of puppies, both of which had been bitten in the eye by a water
moccasin. She also says dogs and cats often sustain bites from pygmy rattlesnakes and
occasionally from coral snakes. The clinic stocks antivenin for moccasins and rattlesnakes.
When an owner is unsure what kind of snake did the biting, he or she sometimes brings along the
snake for the vet to examine. Capps recalled receiving a supposedly dead snake in a bag from a
girl whose dog had been bitten, only to find a still-living coral snake in the bag.
That leads to another oddity for emergency vets, the delivery of non-domesticated animals.
Capps laughs at the memory of a woman who arrived one day clutching a plastic bag with a
butterfly inside. The woman announced the butterfly had been hit by a car and promptly
departed, leaving Capps to release the insect outside and watch it fly away.
WIMPY AND BRAVE
Longtime veterinarians learn that animals' reactions to physical pain and distress range across a
wide spectrum.
"They're all individuals and they all respond individually to trauma," Hightower said. "We've got
sissy dogs, sissy big dogs, and wimpy cats and brave cats, just like you do (with) people."
As an example of bravery, Hightower cited a Sheltie that arrived with one leg attached only by
some skin after it was hit by a train. He said the male dog never cried and only seemed
concerned with sniffing the office in hopes of finding a female.
Capps said many animals project stoicism, allow her to do anything to them, even if it causes
discomfort. Others are aggressive and must be anesthetized before she can work on them. In
general, she said, animals tolerate pain better than people do, though she also sees her share of
what she calls "drama queens."
"The pampered ones tend to be more dramatic in their pain; they milk it as much as they can,"
she said. "We see dogs that will limp on a leg that's been well for months because they continue
to get attention. They are very, very smart. They know if they're injured and have a sore leg,
they'll get a lot of attention."
Veterinarians Can Tell You Some Shocking Pet Stories