I was wondering(because I haven’t seen anything about it in any of the Straight Dope posts) . what the dopers thought about the Dog who was taken to the vet,euthanasaised, then the owner took it’s body home ,and laid it in a utility room intending to bury it the next day, but when he awoke in the morning, the Dog was waiting at it’s food dish to be fed! The Vets couldn’t explain it, as all of it’s vital signs indicated it was dead!
Link to the story, please?
This story was in the news a couple weeks ago. See, for example, http://www.wxyz.com/dpp/news/family-dog-put-to-sleep…-wakes-up-hours-later
Well, they could have explained it, but didn’t want to, because that would have required them to admit they were wrong. They didn’t administer the drugs correctly, and they didn’t diagnose death correctly.
The vets were “witholding comments until it could be verified that the dog survived the shots”. What the hell? Obviously the dog survived. Unless it’s a zombie dog!
Yup. Possibly they gave too small of a dose - or that’s one hell of a strong dog - and the dog only appeared dead. Euthanasia drugs are basically an overdose of anesthesia so the heart stops beating and so on, so they apparently merely really put the dog to sleep this time.
He was only *mostly *dead. Nothing that a good visit from Miracle Max couldn’t cure.
Thank you!
Yes, that’s pretty bizarre and the “what ifs” are clearly difficult on the dog’s human family, as one would imagine.
As far as the vets comments, what they said was they wanted to verify that it was the same dog. They are hoping, I’m sure, that somehow the owner “switched” dogs and is coming out with this big story about the vet. Not sure what the owner’s motivation would be-- get out of paying the bill maybe? Seems unlikely, but who knows.
aaaG-A-A-I-I-N-E-S
It makes me think of that Louis CK bit about his dog surviving being euthanized, then crawling back to his house and visiting all of them.
“Yay! The dog is alive!!!”
“Oh, shit, we have to kill him again!”
OK. That was good. Seasonal, too.
Um… no. The current euthanasia solutions used in most clinics, the ones that are TAUGHT to veterinary students how to properly dispense, are NOT anesthesia drugs. When an animal is euthanized, the final solution is NOT an overdose of anesthesia.
Pre-anesthetics and anesthetics CAN and ARE used to sedate the animals before euthanasia. This is usually done when the animal is still too strong, won’t hold still, and/or dangerous (raptors, for example, and other wildlife), or when the owners want to be present during the final moments. It can also be done as standard protocol for the veterinary hospital.
But I do agree with the first part, it could have been too little a dose. Weird, I seem to get the ones where they actually overdosed the animal (causes artifacts at necropsy).
Adding on: They do use a barbiturate, sodium pentobarbital, which can be a sedative. But this is not the same barbiturate used generally in veterinary anesthesia (thiopental), or the one commonly used for seizures (phenobarbital). It is a drug whose only purpose in the clinic is to put down animals.
Or is was a switch, as they are suspecting.
A (very much older) colleague of mine started out in the 60s, when pentobarbital was the drug of choice for dog anaesthesia. He doesn’t exactly remember it fondly; in his first week as a practising vet, every single one of his surgical patients died. While the anaesthesia itself was adequate, recovery took around eight hours, and he suspected most of the deaths were due to post-op hypothermia.
Very interesting comments, yet there are people who claim to return from the dead, and it made me wonder if the same mistakes were made in their cases.
I don’t believe the dog was dead ,and nor do I know the Vet’s credentials or if it was a hoax, just found it interesting.
Thanks bibliophage for saving me the trouble.
KarlGrenze - my apologies for the inaccurate information. A vet explained it to me over a decade ago and either she was simplifying to spare a grieving owner needless detail, or my memory did not retain everything that was said. The latter is highly likely.
Good call!