Whatever your profession, you’ll have work days that will stay with you forever. Yesterday was one such adventure...in misery.

I was feeling flu-ish and crappy (a rare occurrence for me) and had decided to take the afternoon off (an even rarer occurrence). Since I don’t like to take cold meds I was sniffling into Kleenex, coughing into my elbow and handwashing obsessively when my first...

I get it all the time. Vitriolic emails and anti-pet comments are inevitable every time I attempt a small splash in a big, not-so-pet-oriented pond.

“Take your sappy pet stories and animal welfare hand-wringing elsewhere,” they’ve said, along with, “Pets are dumb animals and you’re one too!” I’ve been called a “dumb blonde,” a “Valley Girl” (really) and a crappy writer (ouch!). Lots of other...

Whether you’re a veterinary surgeon or an human oncologist, you rarely have to handle the touchy topic of public health. General practitioners however––regardless of species––are constantly tasked with taking the long view when treating our patients: 

How might our patients’ conditions potentially affect the health of others? Which prevention techniques and tests are in the best interest of...

Some weeks my paycheck looks soooo paltry. We all have pay periods like that, don’t we? This one was especially financially trying, seeing as Labor Day intervened (and screwed everything up) and every afternoon brought buckets of rain (no one wants to come a-calling in stormy weather with their pets).

So it was that when yesterday morning’s phone call came in, I was willing to grant a...

Last week I extracted the sweetest little pair of Victoria’s Secret underwear from the innards of a beagle.

Though the pink had long since faded to gray, and I’m sorry to say the elastic had melted in the acids the teensy thong had marinated in for months, there it was: a sign of victory for me as it exited in two pieces (one directly out the stomach, another via a small incision in the...

CAUTION: Long rant in progress.

No this post is not a continuation of yesterday’s post on animal cruelty––nor was it intended as its corollary. Rather, today’s is a completely standalone rant on the subject of how some clients come to abuse of their veterinary care provider’s kindnesses.

I’ve posted here before on the subject of financial stress in recessionary times and how veterinarians...

Were you ever faced with the sad reality of multiple extractions for your pet’s less-than-perfect teeth? I deal in this kind of dental crisis on a weekly basis. And nine out of ten times the conversation goes the same way:

“But how is she going to eat?”

Newsflash: If she’s eating “just fine” now, it’s probably because she’s not using her teeth anyway. I mean, have you ever really looked in...

When veterinarians need to blow off some steam, they sometimes post comments to the Veterinary Information Network’s numerous veterinarian-only threads. In some cases, they even pen letters they wish they could have written...to their misbehaving clients.

Here’s one I’ve written to help elucidate the themes in evidence on a “Dear Client” thread on VIN:

Dear Client: Thank you for making the...

Don’t get me wrong. Here on Dolittler we’re near-fanatical about the use of pain control measures in veterinary medicine. We also spend a significant amount of time rehashing the side effects some of these alternatives offer along the way. But that’s not what this post is about.

Nope, this post is about how the use of pain relief in pets provides a reasonable escape hatch for those who would...

I’m getting the cold shoulder at work these days. Lots of could shoulders, actually. Verbal complaints, too. The moral outrage is so thick you could slice it mid-air. And it’s all to do with my take on TNR, which I’ve been working hard at lately.

Almost every day this week I’ve brought in a trapped feral. My neighbors and I have decided that the colony of [mostly sick] feral cats has got to...