Injured K9 EMS treatment?

[pullnshoot25]

Bagging a dog is damn difficult without an airway adjunct. They have a Mallampati score of somewhere around 15.

Huh...

Don't know anything about the difficulty of BVM w/o an adjunct but I do know that this particular BVM fit around the snout and forced air into the nose.

Would suck if the little bugger needed to pant. I think that there are cooling jackets for dogs for that purpose, among others.

On a completely unrelated sidenote, can you imagine being the poor peon doing manual ventilation on an equine? I only bring it up because I remember reading about this one doc that wanted to prove the effectiveness of Dendrobate/Phyllobate (think Poison Arrow Frog) poison for medical purposes and I think he either did a tracheotomy or intubated the bugger for 3-4 days.

 

[usafmedic45]

Huh...

Here.... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mallampati_score It's a way to tell how difficult someone will be to intubate based on how much of the back of the throat you can see.

Don't know anything about the difficulty of BVM w/o an adjunct but I do know that this particular BVM fit around the snout and forced air into the nose.

Yeah, it's a standard veterinary anesthesia mask fitted to a BVM. Nothing new or fancy. They've been around for years.

The problem being that with a large floppy tongue, bagging without either an ETT or something to hold the tongue out of the way would likely be difficult.

Would suck if the little bugger needed to pant.

If you're bagging them, chances are they are not going to be panting.

On a completely unrelated sidenote, can you imagine being the poor peon doing manual ventilation on an equine? I only bring it up because I remember reading about this one doc that wanted to prove the effectiveness of Dendrobate/Phyllobate (think Poison Arrow Frog) poison for medical purposes and I think he either did a tracheotomy or intubated the bugger for 3-4 days

For that, they would use a ventilator. And, by the way, I've bagged a foal before.

 

[pullnshoot25]

Here.... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mallampati_score It's a way to tell how difficult someone will be to intubate based on how much of the back of the throat you can see.

Took a look at it earlier. So many scoring systems, so many things to learn!

Yeah, it's a standard veterinary anesthesia mask fitted to a BVM. Nothing new or fancy. They've been around for years.

Gotcha.

The problem being that with a large floppy tongue, bagging without either an ETT or something to hold the tongue out of the way would likely be difficult.

If you're bagging them, chances are they are not going to be panting.

I figured that. I as thinking more along the lines of how bagging would eliminate their primary method of thermoregulation and how other measures would be needed to help them.

------------
It appears I remembered the story incorrectly. The poison used was curare (a concoction where dendrobate/phyllobate/etc poisons can be mixed in if not used exclusively) and the ventilation time needed was only 4 hours, not 3-4 days. Mea culpa on that part. Method of ventilation was a bellows.

This experiment was actually performed a few years earlier, just apparently not as well-known.

Excerpts from "The Griffith Legacy"

 

[usafmedic45]

It appears I remembered the story incorrectly. The poison used was curare (a concoction where dendrobate/phyllobate/etc poisons can be mixed in if not used exclusively) and the ventilation time needed was only 4 hours, not 3-4 days. Mea culpa on that part. Method of ventilation was a bellows.

Eh....that wouldn't be too bad, but then again I once bagged a patient from Pensacola, FL most of the way to Ft. Smith, AR after the ventilator on our aircraft decided to go on the fritz. Nothing like bagging someone for the better part of two hours to give your forearms a workout.

 

[HotelCo]

What does your state ambulance authority/local medical control say about tying up a unit/provider to treat an injured K9? Will you be dispatched to calls for this? Will you transport?

Some things to think about...

 

[usafmedic45]

What does your state ambulance authority/local medical control say about tying up a unit/provider to treat an injured K9?

Seeing as in most states, a K9 officer is considered a LEO in the eyes of the law, I would imagine they wouldn't say much. My bigger concern would be the state veterinary licensing board if you did anything invasive.

Our medical director had a policy that we were to render "all due assistance" to injured or ill animals particularly K9 officers. He went so far as having a local veterinarian work with him to give us some basic guidelines (which were basically the human protocols with the appropriate drug dosages plugged in) and someone to point to if the state veterinary board starting getting upset. Under those orders, I treated seriously ill or injured:
-Dogs and cats (after fires mostly, but one choking dog and one dog that had been shot),
-A turkey that had been struck by a truck (which is how I earned my 'Fellow, American Academy of Emerge-turkey Medicine (FAAEtM) "board certification")
-A goat with smoke inhalation
-A half-starved horse

If I had kept a copy of the protocols I would post them but unfortunately I lost my copy when my computer crashed a few years back.

 

[rwik123]

I would imagine that dogs or any other animal if injured would become very aggressive and combative to treatment. Do any of those guidelines cover chemical restraint in human terms?..sedation of the animal while you can tend to it?

 

[bigbaldguy]

Seeing as in most states, a K9 officer is considered a LEO in the eyes of the law, I would imagine they wouldn't say much. My bigger concern would be the state veterinary licensing board if you did anything invasive.

Our medical director had a policy that we were to render "all due assistance" to injured or ill animals particularly K9 officers. He went so far as having a local veterinarian work with him to give us some basic guidelines (which were basically the human protocols with the appropriate drug dosages plugged in) and someone to point to if the state veterinary board starting getting upset. Under those orders, I treated seriously ill or injured:
-Dogs and cats (after fires mostly, but one choking dog and one dog that had been shot),
-A turkey that had been struck by a truck (which is how I earned my 'Fellow,
American Academy of Emerge-turkey Medicine (FAAEtM) "board certification")
-A goat with smoke inhalation
-A half-starved horse

If I had kept a copy of the protocols I would post them but unfortunately I lost my copy when my computer crashed a few years back.

So would a turkey suffering from smoke inhalation be a "smoked turkey" ......get it? Smoked turkey! No? Nothing? Never mind sounded funnier in my head

 

[usafmedic45]

I would imagine that dogs or any other animal if injured would become very aggressive and combative to treatment. Do any of those guidelines cover chemical restraint in human terms?..sedation of the animal while you can tend to it?

You'd be surprised how often animals are not aggressive when injured. I'd guess the rate is much lower than the rate of people who become total ****s when injured.

 

[mycrofft]

Need a nasopharyngeal airway for a dog.

In different sizes...pug, chihuahua, up to Saluki and Great Dane.

 

[usafmedic45]

In different sizes...pug, chihuahua, up to Saluki and Great Dane.

You'd probably not get it past the turbinates. LOL

 

[cfrench]

Probably a stupid reply but I did do mouth to snout on a full size dog many years ago and had no problem with an open airway. No resistance noted at all. Having tried it on a human and a dog, I would do it to a dog anytime over a human. Very easy skill actually. Now back to your regularly scheduled rambling....

 

[pullnshoot25]

Probably a stupid reply but I did do mouth to snout on a full size dog many years ago and had no problem with an open airway. No resistance noted at all. Having tried it on a human and a dog, I would do it to a dog anytime over a human. Very easy skill actually. Now back to your regularly scheduled rambling....

Do go on...

JK

 

[cfrench]

Nothing big, just attempted to resuscitate a dog at a fire scene.

 

[bigbaldguy]

Any luck? Almost as importantly did someone get a photo for your face book page? We carry canine/feline masks that were donated to us by a local animal group. I don't think they have ever been used so far.

 

[cfrench]

Any luck? Almost as importantly did someone get a photo for your face book page? We carry canine/feline masks that were donated to us by a local animal group. I don't think they have ever been used so far.

No, no luck. The dog belonged to neighbors of mine at the time. Funny you should ask about FB pics;

https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=59751910627&set=a.59750365627.85868.516855627&type=1&theater

It is actually my favorite picture from my career. Not sure if that link will work.

 

[usafmedic45]

Nice. We had a successful canine code after a house fire a few years back. It actually made the local news and several of us were interviewed for it. Must have been a slow news day or something....

 

[Bon-Tech]

This course looks interesting:

http://www.k9medic.us/index.php

 

[mike1390]

There is a teacher in so cal named Sterling Johnson who teaches K9 first aid/ALS all around the world. Sterling is a retired LE K9 handler who is the only person to win the K9 world championship back to back. He also teaches EMT and paramedic classes at UCLA.

 

[Martyn]

I would imagine that dogs or any other animal if injured would become very aggressive and combative to treatment. Do any of those guidelines cover chemical restraint in human terms?..sedation of the animal while you can tend to it?

Duct tape 'em!!!