Personal updates, H5N1 vaccine?, and what's the deal with bladder stones?

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Transcript

Dr. Cliff Redford (00:11)

Hey everyone. Welcome to another episode of vet life with Dr. Cliff. I'm Dr. Cliff. We're going to talk about the life of a vet. no guests today. So you guys get to listen to me chit chat, but I'm not just going to chit chat. We've got some stuff to go over. you know what? I've been kind of keeping to myself the, updates regarding my book regarding the documentary regarding the TV show project.

I was kind of being superstitious, saying I don't want to tell people because then if things fall apart, I look like a big schmuck. but the reality is, is, things are falling apart anyways. So I might as well share with everyone, updates and if things fall apart, then, you know, so be it. I don't think I'll be a schmuck if that happens. so I mean, regarding the book.

I'm done. wrote about a hundred thousand words. that's probably 330 pages, which is too many. edited down to about 95,000. I was talking with this, very nice publisher in the UK. and she had asked me, once I'm done, send it off to a bunch of friends of mine and have them, read it and critique it. So.

friends that are good enough friends that they'll read it and not so good friends that they won't give me the honest truth. And I found 10 or 11 of them. And after a month, I got back maybe seven sort of confirmations that they were finished. Everyone loved it. Everyone had some great constructive criticism, some points that needed to be removed, some questions, some things they liked, some things they didn't like, that sort of thing.

and I then got it down to about 92,000 words and I reached out to the publisher and said, Hey, I'm going to be done in a few days. I'll send you the next sort of editing. was going to drop it down to about 85,000 because there are actually like literally a few whole chapters that I could remove and really make the, the book more lean, a little more punchy. And she basically said, you know, I'm on vacation. I don't have anything to read.

I've been so excited about your book. Send it to me as is. I really, really, really want to read it." And so I did that. And then a day and a half later, she got back to me and said, hey, I'm almost done. She's fast. She says, I'm done like half, a little over half. I'm going to be done by tomorrow. I'd like to have a meeting with you, even though it was family day vacation for me. Might as well, right? So we set up a meeting, a little tricky figuring out the time because she was in France. So there's a six hour.

a time difference. But anyways, we met and she loved it. And she talked about, you know, obviously it needs some, polishing. But, you know, she's got, she's got books on her, in her sort of a library that they've published that are good books and others that are great books and are potentially award-winning. And she said, this is going to be a great book and potentially award-winning. And so grace.

Okay. Fantastic. And I mean, I really enjoy the book. I really do think it's quite good. she did say, look, it could take about six months for us to, I'm to go through each chapter and give you points and make you rewrite. And maybe I'll write 500 words for you and you got to put it your own words. And you know, there are going to be times where you hate me, et cetera, et cetera. But, when it comes out, it's going to be an amazing product. said, yeah, man, let's do it. Like I'm ready.

So she said, okay, I'm gonna be done vacation in a couple of days. I'll send you the documentation regarding an agreement, like a contract, and we're go from there. But, a big but, she did get back to me and then she said, basically I changed my mind. It was a little bit too much work to do. You need to rewrite it. I'll take another look at it if you wanna rewrite it, et cetera, et cetera.

And I, I, it's not that I'm not willing to rewrite it, but I'm not willing to rewrite it for a publisher. That is like a maybe, you know, like I want to find a publisher that says, Hey, I really like this. see potential. I'm going to help you rewrite it. I'm going to sort of mentor you. and, as we go along, I'm going to make sure that, that I like it. Cause in this situation I could rewrite it and you know,

months from now and she says, yeah, I'm still not interested. And I've kind of lost that time. So, we politely parted ways. I haven't burned the bridge. The door hasn't been shut completely, but I was bummed. I was really bummed. I was really bummed out. But, know, door shuts and other door opens, that sort of thing. I decided after wallowing in my own sorrows, like any good artist and author does maybe.

and I did it without booze. I, I did some research and, know, went on LinkedIn and just looked for, indie publishers, not, not to publish it independently. That's different. indie publishers are basically just not the big five. so you can get your foot in the door without a literary agent. And, and I've got some, I've got my foot in the door with some, some, with a few and, and, and they're looking to.

They're looking to read it. So, you know, back to kind of square one, but, you know, pretty happy with that. So got to do what I got to do.

Sorry, I had to disappear there for second and let my dogs out.

And get my headphones back on. There we go. so that's that. So, you know, two steps back, one step forward. don't know. Two steps forward, two steps back, something like that. but, not giving up. It's going to happen. just gonna, it's hard, you know, as, as it should be, especially for a non author, you know, for a first time author. but I'm really excited when the time comes and, I hope all five or six of you guys who listen or will,

We'll buy it. might use some of the people who listen are the ones that read it already and I owe them a free copy, I think. But, either way, there you go. so stay tuned for that. Now regarding the documentary, we've been in, conversations when I say we, it's through our sales agent, of course, we've been in conversations with, several broadcasters, some, around the world, you know, like in Europe and Asia.

but also, one in Canada, one in the U S who was looking, they're looking to buy or we were negotiating for them to buy the film, to screen it on their television channel and, or, digital channel, like online, kind like a streaming service. And it looks like the, both the Canadian and the, American broadcaster have completed the deal.

So now we just got to find out when. So all I can tell you is it will be available soon for viewing for Canadian and American viewers, or I guess anyone worldwide that has one of those VPN things that hides what your IP address is, I think it's what it's called. But there's going to be options for it to be seen internationally as well. Middle East, North Africa has bought it, a broadcaster there.

Um, and then I believe, uh, one in Asia is about to, and a major channel in the UK as well. So, uh, and then maybe that broadcast or maybe that publisher, that first publisher will see it and they go, darn it. I should have, uh, I should have hired this guy. I should have signed this guy, which, know what, if she came back to me, I would, I would consider it. Um, as I said, no, no bridges burned.

and then, the television show. you know, the, the, the thought has been, especially from the Canadian broadcaster, which we've been talking to for about six months. They basically said, look, we're going to get the film on our channel and online. And if it does well, if people like it, if it gets views, if it gets some thumbs up or whatever their rating system is, then we would seriously consider a docu series.

which would be great, right? that's sort of the reason why we produced it. now since then we've had a major Canadian production company, interested in getting on board. They have been talking to a couple of specialty channels, like animal nature related type channels who are interested in a docu series, especially if this company, this production company gets

involved. there's been some conversations. So a lot of, let's say serious flirting going on. And the joke is, you know, between the sales agent and the broadcasters, which are going to want to have a development development and ownership say, and then this other production company, which same thing development and ownership say, and then us, surf dog productions. so Diego and my buddy Andrew and I.

between all those egos, is still very possible it's gonna fall apart. But I gotta say the three of us with SurfDog, we've been keeping our egos in check. We've been just letting the pros handle it and have their discussions regarding legalities. And we've just made sure that our interests are protected. And we're happy to work and to share ownership.

And creative control, of course, with some of these other companies. We just want to work with cool people, have a good time, tell some cool stories, that sort of thing. So, you never know, right? So we're kind of happy about that. The main thing is we're not doing nothing. not doing, we are doing something. We're moving forward. We're at least not just spinning our wheels for the sake of spinning our wheels, right? So we're actually making some forward momentum or at least trying to. So that helps.

now this week has been fun, at the clinic. a handful of stuff, some of it medical related, some of it sort of customer service related has happened. One of the things that happened was for the first time ever. I had to have a conversation with a client, that I don't want to say centered around, but there was a, there was a mention of chat GPT, as a second opinion.

you know, we joke about Dr. Google. People will Google symptoms and whatnot. And there's this great video on Instagram from, from an emergency hospital in the U S I think, and it's basically the person, the camera is asking technicians and, and receptionists and doctors. I think they ask them four times, you know, give me a disease that could cause vomiting and diarrhea and no, no, they'll say, what are, what are some of the symptoms of parvovirus vomiting and diarrhea?

What are some of the symptoms of pancreatitis, vomiting and diarrhea? What are the symptoms of a possible ingested foreign body, vomiting and diarrhea? What are the symptoms of Addison's disease in a dog, vomiting and diarrhea? And then, so then the receptionist goes to the camera and says, so when you call us and asking us and you ask us why your pet is vomiting and has diarrhea and we can't give you an answer, we're not being difficult. It's complicated.

We need to see your animal. We're not just doing it so that we can make some money. The reality is, is those are all very, very different diseases treated very differently. And some of them are very difficult to diagnose. So if your animal has vomiting and diarrhea, come on in. And this case was a two-year-old dog that did have history of a sensitive stomach, but had some diarrhea and had a lot of blood in it. And...

She didn't go to chat GPT, I think to avoid coming to us. She's a really good client and cares a lot about her pet. I think she just wanted to be informed, which makes sense. But she basically said to me, yeah, I Googled the symptoms or I went on to chat. I asked chat GPT about these symptoms and the list was so long and it was, some of them were really, really scary. And basically chat GPT said I need to seek veterinarian advice.

and intervention. So I was coming here anyways, but, so we agree, right? Chat GPT and I agree. Now there was a, there was a, some sort of study or survey, regarding chat GPT and diagnoses. And, the study came out, I should probably find it. I'll find it and talk about it another episode, but the study came out and basically said more often than not chat GPT is wrong. because things are so subtle.

Tom Papa, the comedian has this great set, this great little bit, awhile ago where he says, you know, I, I, I, I avoid going to the doctors. I don't like being around sick people. So I sometimes go online and I Google my symptoms. And at one point I had a sore, I had a bloody nose, and I was sneezing or something like that. And they said, yeah, you might have a sinus infection or it could be cancer.

And then another time I had a sore elbow and they said, it might be tendonitis or it might be cancer. And that maybe the website should be www.oritmightbecancer.com. And the reality is, is we put cancer down on the list of differentials for probably 90 % of the time when animals are sick, but it's often like way, way, at the back of the list unless something's obvious.

So these things are difficult and AI, thank goodness, I don't think it's going to be taking over my job anytime soon. And by the time it can, I will be retired most likely. I am 51 years old. I probably got another 15 years of this. Maybe I'll do some consulting afterwards. I don't know. Traveling and volunteering, who knows? Or maybe I'll be an award winning author and I'll have like my third book out and that'll be my job.

but no, there'll always be some direct caring of animals. I enjoy it too much. But yeah, that chat GPT thing was cool. I did another shift at Shades of Hope. Of course, it had been a couple of weeks. Had I taken a couple of weeks off? No, that was before that because of a callowat. So I'd been there two or three weeks in a row every Thursday. And you know, the usual cool cases and surgeries and a couple of little...

ends of the tail amputations on Virginia possums that aren't supposed to be here in Canada and can't handle the cold. So they get frostbite and the tip of their tail dies off that sort of thing. But we, we saw a owl that at first we thought was a saw wet owl, S W S A W H E T. but it just, it just looked a little different. And so we ended up doing some, some research and I think they.

took a photo or they scanned it with their phone and they have some sort of talk about AI that some sort of AI app that looked at it and confirmed it was actually a boreal owl, B-O-R-E-A-L. So a boreal owl. And these things are really, really rare. I didn't know anything about them. And I don't really have to know much about them to be able to fix their broken wing or deal with dehydration, that sort of thing. But either way, I decided to do a little Wikipedia search.

And let's see what we got here. it is, this article is about the owl species for the women's national football team of Finland. See boreal owls. That's pretty funny. so the boreal owl, golius, food, Nereus, or Teng mom's owl is a small owl in the true owl family. it's known as the boreal owl in North America. Borea.

Aurora borealis, Northern Lights, boreas is sort of the Greek root word for North. So boreal, so North America. then Tengmanzao is in Europe after the Swedish naturalist, Peter Gustaf Tengman, also known occasionally as the Richardson's owl. Anyways, very, very rare. One, they're just not frequent. There's not a large numbers of them, but also they're very shy, very evasive.

Nocturnal habits and they prefer sort of the type of inaccessible taiga forest habitat. I don't know what that means taiga That is rarely seen by humans Anyways, so it talks about subspecies Fossil history remains of the boreal owl dating back to the Pleistocene era were found in a cave in southern New Mexico Bones were found in a Pueblo

in north central New Mexico that has been inhabited from around AD 1250 to the present. It's a very small, large head, long wings. Females are a bit larger, which is common in the raptors. And the plumage is brown above with white fleckling, flecking on the shoulders and whitish underparts with rust colored streaks. Large head has yellow eyes and an olive brown crown with small white droplets.

and larger central spots. The dull white facial disc is framed with a dark border and white eyebrows, often described as giving the a surprised expression. I'm going to do a photo of this on my Instagram and boy, do they have this surprised expression. Anyway, so it does say that it's very, very similar genetically and in appearance to the Northern Saw-Whit Owl and it goes through different vocalizations.

Primary songs, a loud trill sung by males to attract females. Prolonged song, softer courtship melody sung by males from beginning of courtship to incubation to strengthen bonds. So the first one is like a loud trill song. Hey baby, come here. Hey baby, come here. And then I guess the females are attracted to that. Whereas the other one, they, once they get them attracted, then it's like, then it's like Barry White. It's like, yeah, baby.

welcome to, don't know. Welcome to my nest. but, you know, then, then he doesn't have to be so obnoxious and he can be more romantic. And then there's the delivery call soft call by mail to signal the signal, the transfer of prey to a female or young dinners here. Basically the screech is a loud contact call made while flying or from a perch. The peeping call soft vocalization by females throughout breeding.

to respond to males calls. So the men are going, baby, come here, come here. She's like, I'm coming, I'm coming. All right, relax. The weak call, single note repeated rapidly from females in the nest after hatching. That's because they're going crazy, because their babies are driving them nuts. So she's a single note repeated. No, no, no, I said no, no, no, no. I think that's what they're saying. The chook.

call, harsh response call by females on males territory, harsh response call by females on males territory. So they're checking out, they're hearing the men going, Hey baby, baby. And they come and then they finally go, okay, I'm here. Or, or they're complaining like this place is so messy. What the hell? and then the hiss call, defensive call by females when the nest is disturbed.

I think that's true for a lot of different species. Certainly it is true in my house if I let our nest get messy. What the hell? What are you doing? Who left this here? That's what that is. And then they talk about the bill clapping. It's used as protective sound by both adults and juveniles and is also frequently associated with a vocal hiss. Adults reply with a bill clap when humans handle them or enter the nest cavity.

I hear that a lot. It's like this, it's incredibly loud. This, this it's like a snapping of the fingers, but it's the bills, the upper bill and the lower bill sort of upper beak and lower beak clapping together. anyways, so, that's not a whole lot of useful information, but still I found it interesting. they talk about distribution and habitat and behavior, breeding and whatnot, but, basically it's very, very rare. They think they see it, the Boreal owl in, at shades of hope.

only once like every five years. So I've been there maybe seven. So I guess I was, I was due. I think my dogs want to be led inside. Thali is staring at me from the window. Who are you talking to? So I will be back in a minute.

talk about dirtying up the nest. They end up tearing in here, tracking snow and whatnot. Anyways, so let's go, what else? So we did the boreal owl, we're dealing with this swan that's got like this gurgly noise. It's probably got asper, aspergillosis in its upper airway, so we got to treat it. So that was sort of something I had to do some research on.

What else is going on? So Canada has bought a half a million 500,000. So 500,000 H5N1 vaccines that they're shipping throughout the different provinces. And for some reason, Alberta is not too keen on getting their share. So H5N1, the avian flu has been sort of more noted these last handful of years.

They've had to kill large flocks of birds. Apparently, that's why eggs are so expensive in the US, not because of some political reason, not because Biden's government screwed up the economy or Trump's government can't fix the economy when it comes to and maybe they can, maybe they did, maybe they can't. I don't know, but it has nothing to do with the price of eggs. The price of eggs are so high because so many like

Millions and millions of layer chickens were culled, were sort of mass euthanized because of the threat of, or they were carrying, or maybe H5N1 got into that hatchery. it's supply and demand, right? And it's going to take a while for a newly hatched, I almost said newly born, a newly hatched chick to turn into a big enough

a chicken to be a layer hen. so it's going to take some time, but H5N1, avian flu, there have been the occasional human cases, causing respiratory problems, pneumonia, flu like symptoms, that sort of thing. And they believe, or I think they've confirmed that the few people who have caught it actually caught it from cattle. there was like a mutation and the cattle, caught it.

I'm screwing this up a little bit. Of course I should know this, but there's only so much I can retain or think of and do research on. And so these vaccines here in Canada are going to be for people that are at risk. know, there's only 500,000 of them. I don't know if I need a booster or if someone needs a booster when they get one and do they get the other one a month later. I don't really know, but we've got 35 million people, 37 million people here in Canada.

Um, so obviously 500,000 is not gonna, not gonna handle all of them, but the vast majority of people don't need this. So I think they're think they're, they're considering it for like farmers, uh, bird farmers, like chicken, chicken farmers, and maybe cattle farmers. Um, and then people who work at high risk professions, which would include veterinarians, uh, who deal with wildlife. So I have to decide if I'm going to take this vaccine and.

I gotta say, would have 10 years ago, I would have been like, all right, if my doctor recommends I take it, I take it. this pains me to even consider this, but I am not an anti-vaxxer. I am not a vaccine, I guess I'm hesitant, I guess everyone should be hesitant about anything, about any sort of medicine. If your doctor's prescribing chemotherapy, you should be hesitant in the sense of you should ask questions.

I'm not a conspiracy theorist. I am not a anti-vaxxer. I got a crap ton of vaccines when I went to India the first time. I have received my rabies vaccine. I've been lucky that I've been doing the titers for 27, 29, 30. I'm trying to think, oh, more than that. 32 years now, because I got my vaccines back in 93 when I got into vet school, and I haven't had to have a booster since. But I do the blood work to make sure that I'm

protected. So there's things like that, right? And I've come in contact with animals that were rabid and almost were bit by them. So it'd be nice to know that I'm protected, although I'd still go and get the antitoxin. So it's kind of a weird situation. But I'm kind of hesitant because of this whole COVID thing. And you know, I know people in my family are going to be thinking I'm being an idiot. like, you know, I got my vaccines when during coronavirus during the pandemic, I got my

and then a year later I got my one and even when I got my one I was starting to think is this really necessary? You know the studies the studies are showing that the vaccine hasn't helped significantly in reducing numbers and maybe if it has people are going to be again, you know, please send me send me the info dr.redford.vet905.com or find me on instagram at drcliffworldwidevet.

or I think there's a way through some of the different podcast apps to message me. But either way, if you really, really want to send me information, you can find out how to do it if it's important to you. And I'd be happy to read it, but it makes me wonder, like, do I need this? And so I did some research and I went on the Veterinary Information Network. So I did some research regarding the disease in animals.

I went on a, on a website that I trust called worms and germs. is a infectious disease and zoonotic disease website, by a friend of mine, Dr. Scott Weiss, he's probably one of the smartest guys in Canada. And I went on the Canadian government, website, Canada.ca slash E N slash public dash health slash services slash diseases slash avian dash influenza dash.

h5n1 slash prevention dash risks dot html. Alright, titles here risks of getting avian influenza. The risk of infection is low for the general public who have limited contact with infected animals. Those with close contact to infected animals are at increased risk and should take appropriate precautions. And we have seen h5n1 at shades of hope. I mean, it happens. So

But it does say that it is rare, human infection is rare. 1997, this is what I'm getting off the website. Since 1997, there have been over 900 human cases of avian influenza reported worldwide. Mostly occurring in Africa and Asia. Okay, so 1997, close to 20 years. 900 human cases, we're going to say 50 cases a year.

Most of them are Africa and Asia. So what maybe 30, are we gonna say 30 out of those 50? That would be a pretty conservative number. It could be a lot higher, but certainly more than 25, because it says mostly occurring in, let's say 30. So let's say 20 are outside of Africa and Asia. That's Europe and North America.

So let's say just for argument sake, 15 out of those 20 are North America. And I'm being pretty, pretty generous. There's also South America, but let's say 15, which would make you think that there's gotta be 12, 13 in the U S and two in Canada, just from the population. so very, and that's yeah. So that's two a year. That's pretty small. And I don't think.

I don't know if any have been diagnosed here in Canada, but anyways, this, this decrease may be attributed to, so says the number of human cases has decreased substantially since 2015 may be attributed to the use of poultry vaccinations, prevention and control initiatives, and potentially changes in the virus.

It talks about how the virus spreads from birds to other animals, including humans and also how severe illness is. that the virus is continually changing. bum bum bum talking about people traveling. In 2022, the virus became widespread across Canada through the migration of wild birds and has affected many poultry farms and many different species of wild birds and other wildlife. Most recently, H5N1 has also been detected in livestock.

such as dairy, cattle, and goats. All right. Few human cases associated with the 2021 to 2024 avian influenza, a H5N1 outbreak have been detected. The number of human cases reported worldwide is tracked and reported on this link. Ah, here we go. November 13th, 2024, the Public Health Agency of Canada confirmed a human case of H5N1.

In Canada, this is the first instance of a human case that came from transmission within Canada. Now I do travel, but lately it's just been to Canada. It's been to the Arctic North, North avian and influenza is not known to be a food safety concern. There's no evidence that eating fully cooked commercial poultry eggs and meat could transmit avian influenza to humans. There are those cats that I've talked about before, and there have been more and more recalls on raw food.

that had poultry in them where the cats were getting very, very sick. One of them died in a household. The second cat got quite sick and recovered. And the third cat just watched as everybody got sick and was fine. Though they do think that cat, those cats actually, so sorry, it wasn't due to raw food. That case, the, one of the owners worked at a meat farm, at a, at a cattle farm at a beef farm. and they're pretty sure that he or she brought it, brought it home with them.

so who is most at risk working with infected animals or livestock hunting, de-feathering, field dressing and butchering infected wild birds working. Okay. So, I mean, clearly I'm at this most, I'm at a higher risk. what do do if you've been exposed? There's treatment if deemed necessary. So that's interesting. Yeah. early recognition of exposure to an animal infected with avian influenza and initiation of treatment if deemed necessary.

are important steps to provide protection against infection. Antiviral medications might reduce symptoms. Speak to your healthcare provider, recommendations for travelers. We're gonna skip that. Wash your hands, ba-ba-ba-bum. And then another study or another couple of websites and some of the other ones that I've already mentioned had talked about how most people who become infected

are not sick. or if they're sick, they're not sick enough to go to the doctor, or at least go to the hospital and they just fight a flu and then they're fine. and I, I don't remember the exact number. It was actually a week ago that I was reading it. but, a very few, very, very rare that you become really sick. And I think, like fatalities, you gotta have some.

wickedly horrible comorbidities, which I don't have. So I'm on the fence. I don't know. I'm on the fence. mean, yes, I'm in that at risk, but no, no drug, although they have plenty of benefits, plenty, plenty, plenty of benefits, save many, many millions of lives. No drug is without side effects and vaccines and especially

They are needed. They're beneficial. you know, polio and again, for my case, rabies and situations like that. you know, you get infected with rabies and you don't get treated almost immediately. You're dead. You know, it's not like a, you might be able to fight it if you don't have core morbidities. No, you got a core mortality. It's called rabies. going to kill you. So, yeah. So anyways, I'm on the fence and I'd love to hear people's opinions.

My dad's going to tell me to get the vaccine or he's going to tell me to ask my doctor. but we will, we'll see. I'm going to, I'm to think about it. anyway, so that was, that was that situation. how are we doing on time here? Let me check. Who's still with me. 35 minutes. Look at that. there's still a lot of stuff I could talk about, but the last thing I want to talk about is bladder stones. And I want to talk about that because in the last eight weeks.

including the 10 days we were in a callowat. I think I've done eight, seven or eight surgeries to remove bladder stones in cats and dogs. Now the two in a callowat were pretty interesting because the dog X-ray, the X-ray system's not very good there and the dog X-ray, you could kind of see the stones and the stone's really big on a small dog. So, you know, was a pretty good guess, but the cat, you can even tell it was a cat on the X-ray. It was, it was, it's getting fixed.

and I should say thank you to everyone who's donated to the go fund me page, with that and the charity ride we did at my wife's, spin studio cycle bar and Markham. Everyone will check it out. we raised, close to five grand, maybe a little bit over five grand. So a little bit over our goal plus another $3,500 went to the shelter portion of the Calloway animal hospital for the seven puppies. was a $500 donation fee for each of them.

so they, everyone did well. Thank you very much. and we're to do it again next year. So stay tuned to keep supporting. But, where was I? So, yeah, so, so I did this, this cat, this cat surgery. I kind of said, I'm pretty sure your cat has stones. Like it just kept coming back with blood in the urine, blood in the urine every three months or so. And the vet would be coming up to volunteer and they would treat with antibiotics and it would go away and then it would come right back. I said, look, I think your cat's got stones and.

we need to go in and if I don't find stones, I can biopsy the wall of the bladder to confirm something like a deep tissue infection or a condition called interstitial cystitis. Dr. Anne Silvest, my surgery professor who's going to be coming on the podcast soon. She constantly said and still says when you go in to do an exploratory surgery, and we're typically talking about the abdomen for vomiting and stuff like that. And if you don't find anything,

don't leave empty handed, take biopsies, because you're going to regret it if you don't. And that can be biopsies of the intestines, of the lymph nodes, maybe of the liver, et cetera, if you feel comfortable doing that. And in this case, I would have biopsied the bladder, but the cat did have stones. But we've had a lot of these cases. And the most recent one was a new patient coming to us for a second opinion. This dog had had two years of urination.

abnormalities, peeing in the house, constant frequent small urinations, blood in the urine occasionally, et cetera, et cetera. Their vet two years ago had diagnosed it with an infection. I don't think they did a urine test. They didn't do x-rays. So, but they diagnosed it with an infection. treated with antibiotics. They did not check the urine afterwards. They put it on a special diet. The dog continued to have problems.

This is a, eight or nine year old Pomeranian. And, we came and we saw the dog and, and I did a urine test and yes, there was blood and the pH was a little elevated. Normally it's around a six, six and a half, meaning a bit acidic. Seven is neutral above seven is alkaline or basic non acidic. And then anything below seven is acidic. and for those chemistry.

Academics, let's say are nerds. I'm a chemistry nerd. The chemistry nerds out there, they're going to be thinking in their heads right now that if it goes from a seven neutral down to a six acidic, it is 10 times more acidic. And then six to five, five is 10 times more acidic again. So it should normally be a little bit acidic because of the uric acid. And this one had a seven pH, so it was neutral. And a lot of gunk, a lot of protein, a lot of white blood cells.

And just with the history, said, look, and the breed, what's called the signalment. So, female spayed breed age, that sort of thing. That's what signalment means. So let us do an X ray. Well, holy geez, rock and roll. This dog has hundreds of stones in its bladder. or it used to have hundreds, hundreds of stones and now they've all stuck.

together into one giant rock. I kid you not the bladder is full of stones. The bladder can only expand about 10 % and then it can't expand anymore. She peas a little bit and then it can't collapse because it's got this stone or hundreds of stones in it. It is bigger than the kidney. The stone or these groups of stones are bigger than the kidneys like enormous. So we're gonna be doing surgery in a few days and the dog's gonna do fantastic.

And you know, I wish dogs don't need surgery. I wish they're healthy, but boy, this is going to be a, a rewarding surgery and, and, and interesting surgery. like it's, it's, it's, it's fun. It's, know, the animal is going to do great and they're going to feel so much better. And it's just going to be really interesting pulling these stones or this one giant stone out. if it is one giant stone, I might actually have to break it up to get it out of the bladder. Cause there's only so much of an incision you can make without,

really sort of causing some damage. Now the kidneys were fine, no stones in the kidneys, blood work was good. So let's talk a little bit about bladder stones. There is a genetic predisposition with certain breeds, little small fluffy dogs, Lassas, Shih Tzus, Poodles, they're really susceptible. Schnauzers are really susceptible. And then for the bigger dogs, Dalmatians are susceptible, but they've sort of been bred out of the Dalmatians. We don't see a lot of Dalmatians anyways.

Now there are different types of stones. Quite a few different types and not all of them show up on x-ray. As I've learned the hard way when I'm x-raying animals. But the vast vast majority, I'm to say 95 % at least of stones are one of two types. So we're going to focus on those. It's either Strubite stones, also known as phosphorus stones because that's the chemical composition or calcium stones made with calcium.

and they're kind of yings and yangs. Let's start with calcium. Calcium stones develop not always, but sometimes when the animal has high levels of calcium in their blood, so what's called hypercalcemia, and that needs to be dealt with, and there can be hormonal conditions that can cause that, but is primarily genetic. And I'm gonna talk a bit about food, but food doesn't cause these problems. Food just makes it more likely if it's already gonna occur,

It makes it occur quicker or more severely, let's say. So we'll talk about that in a bit, but calcium stones occur when the urine is not dilute enough. So it's concentrated. So you get a lot of precipitate out. That makes sense. But also when the urine is acidic, whereas streuvite stones, streuvite stones occur more often phosphorus, more often in alkaline urine.

And 85 % of struvite stones are secondary to chronic infections of the bladder. that those infections change the environment. Some infections, some bacteria produce an enzyme called urease. Ase is sort of the ending of an enzyme. Lactase for lactose and amylase and lipase for fats.

So this is a urease. It is an enzyme that the bacteria produce that destroys uric acid. So if it's going to destroy the acid, makes the urine more alkaline, less acidic, right? So above the seven or above the six and a half, let's say the normal six and a half. so 85 % of them have are due to infections, which means if you get a urine that is not acidic,

and they have an infection and you diagnose stones, might be able to dissolve them just through treating the infection aggressively. It may take six to eight weeks of antibiotics and a couple of recheck x-rays to make sure things are going in the right direction. However, that's better than surgery. Now, if you've been paying attention, if I were to guess and if you were to guess the stones that this little Pomeranian has are probably struvite stones because the urine was

not acidic, was neutral or edging towards alkaline. But there's just too many of them. So surgery is absolutely necessary in this case. But we're gonna send the stones off and find out and then you get to make sort of a treatment plan to avoid them from returning. Now let's talk about why these things happen. So this, if it's not infection, like the struvite stones, those 85%, so if it's 15 % of those, or if it's calcium stones or some of the others,

It is primarily a genetic disorder. So these animals, these patients, their kidneys produce urine and they process improperly normal nutrients and electrolytes and whatnot, such that the urine is not dilute enough. The urine is not acidic enough or it's too acidic and the minerals precipitate out and form crystals. And then the crystals like snowflakes

formed together into stones like a snowball. And sometimes hundreds of stones and maybe those hundreds of stones form into one stone that so it's this process and you can have your animal on a great food, a veterinary recommended diet. had my last app. So snuggles on a veterinarian approved diet to help with his teeth and he still develops stones because I didn't know he had that genetic predisposition.

Now, once he developed the stones, we had to take them off and we put them on a special diet that was there to make him thirsty. So he would drink a lot to make the urine dilute and also to alkalinize the urine. So again, if you're paying attention, you would have figured out he had calcium stones. Calcium stones are more likely to come back. So that's something we always have to warn owners, but generally.

If as a pet owner, you listen to your veterinarian and your veterinarian gives you the right recommendations regarding monitoring. So they're not doing it just to make money. They're not doing it to make money period. They're doing it. mean, they're not doing it for free, but they're doing it to avoid surgery. Surgery is way more profitable than, you know, the occasional urine tests and x-rays. So if we were doing it just for money, we would just let you go back to feeding whatever you want. like a raw food diet or homemade diet.

and then we'll see you back every year for stone removal or every 18 months. But if you feed the right food and get urine assessed, initially every three months and then every six months, maybe once a year, it depends on the case, and then occasionally do recheck x-rays. Recheck x-rays are usually recommended for the calcium stones, but not for the struvite stones, the phosphorous stones. But the struvite phosphorous stones, we recommend a urine culture.

Usually every six months for a year and then once a year after that, because again, the infections can cause those things to recur. So if you follow those steps, recurrence is very unlikely, never zero, but very unlikely. so that's sort of bladder stones. I just touched on it, but, there's some information regarding it. And basically if your animal is having unusual urination habits, cat or dog. So peeing more frequently.

discomfort when urinating. Maybe you think it's constipated, especially cats. People say my cat's constipated. It keeps going in the litter and pushing and no poop's coming out. It actually might have a urinary tract infection or it's blocked and that's even more serious. So basically don't go messaging chat GPT. Call your veterinarian. There's a nice little circle, circle of story there. So any sort of urination abnormalities,

urine behavior abnormalities, blood in the urine, unusual sort of stronger smell to the urine. Get it checked out, talk to your veterinarian, tell them what the problem is because they're probably going to say don't let your dog pee for a couple hours or take your cat's litter box away for a couple hours so we can get a sample. In my opinion, a veterinarian who just says that's probably an infection, here's an antibiotic.

that's not ideal, they really should check the urine. Because first of all, what if it's not an infection? Second of all, like if it's calcium crystals, that's not generally infection based. There may be an infection, but that's not what causes the crystals to form. So as the crystals cause the infection. So if you don't know, if you don't run a urine and you don't see the calcium crystals, you're not going to know that this animal might have stones. And if it doesn't, diet will dissolve those crystals and save

Surgery from happening down the road. So anyways, so run the tests. It really is valuable And now they're like there are times where we can't get a urine from an animal. They're dry their bladders not palpable. It's too small You know, it's a Saturday. We don't want to wait till Monday, etc, etc So in those cases, I'll often treat them with an antibiotic and an anti-inflammatory And there are those who rightfully so we're gonna say well, you shouldn't treat them with an antibiotic

just do an anti-inflammatory, because maybe it's something else. Yeah, yeah, you'd be right in saying that. It depends on the case. But the main thing is I have them come back. I say, look, even if your animal feels better, and it probably will start to feel better, regardless of what it is, it's going to start to feel better if it's some sort of inflammation of the bladder, or of the kidneys, or of the urethra, or all of them, et cetera, et cetera.

Please come back, come back. We usually do a 10 day recheck and we absolutely will want a urine because we want to make sure the inflammation and infection are gone. And in those cases, if the infection, the inflammation are gone and blood remains, then we really start leaning towards a stone. In cats, it could be this interstitial cystitis condition, but that's generally a diagnosis of exclusion.

So we rule out stones, we rule out infection, we rule out crystals and IC, interstitial cystitis, it's a tongue twister. IC is sort of the leftover. Could be bladder cancer, as I said, but that's very rare. But bladder cancer is always on the list for senior animals with blood in their urine. So that was sort of an interesting case. And I thought, you know what, I haven't talked about diseases much very much in a while on this podcast.

So here we go, there's my very, long spiel about bladder stones. So message me, Instagram, email, carrier pigeon, I don't know. How would you find me? I'm not going to give you my address. Message me with your bladder stone questions or your bladder stone stories or pictures of bladder stones, what have you. And I'm happy to answer them and maybe read them out on the podcast.

I still have to, I'm to ask people, post a review on whichever way you're listening to this podcast, post a review, whether it's Spotify or Apple, that's probably 90 % of them. I got to check, I got to find a way to read my reviews because I'm really interested in reading the one star reviews that I have. I don't know anyone who's going to listen to a podcast that they hate enough to do a one star review. Like why listen?

After two minutes, I'll listen to a new podcast and after a couple of minutes, I know if I like it or not. And then I just turn it off if I don't like it. Certainly if I'm giving it a one star or if I think it's one out of five, I just don't listen. And I don't go out of my way to do reviews, but anyways, I'm gonna read them if I can figure it out, cause I think they're hilarious. And I've got enough love in my life with my family and my friends and my clients, my coworkers and all these different people that and myself.

that, it's not going to bother me if people say this guy's a total jerkwad. they're, probably not a hundred percent incorrect. I am a bit of a S disturber, as, as my father says, you guys can all figure out what the S stands for. Anyways, that's about it. I'm sure I had some other stuff to talk about, but I have blah, blah, blah, enough for long enough. So everyone be kind to animals and yourself and

those in your life, the people in your life as well. Give me a five star review, please. Message me and pass this on. Share it with your friends. If you found this one interesting, stay tuned. I'll give you an update on that case or follow me on Instagram. There'll definitely be some, photos and videos of that giant bladder stone and or a hundred little stones, hundreds of little stones in this dog's bladder case. And then I'll keep you guys up to date regarding the film.

regarding the docuseries, regarding the book. and then last but not least, last week, a couple of days ago, Canada beat the U.S. in the Four Nations Tournament in hockey. So for those American friends of mine that listen to this and follow hockey, suck it. We won. You can't take our country and you can't take our game, as our Prime Minister said.

one of the few things recently that I've been agreeing with my prime minister about to get too political, but, he's on his way out anyways, but, we will never be a 51st state, which everyone knows. mean, Trump's just blowing air. We're never going to be a 51st state. especially if you can't beat us at hockey when we've got a 10th of the population. anyways, go Canada, go. And I love you all guys for, for listening, especially if you stayed this long and, have a great day. Cheers.