Hugo’s life was saved at Davies Veterinary Specialists in Hertfordshire.
Hugo's All Go After Emergency Op At Davies
A Golden Retriever from Berkshire is back to his ‘happy, cheeky self’ after Hertfordshire vets saved his life, with an emergency operation to repair and rebuild his insides.
Poorly rescue dog Hugo was severely ill with a ruptured gall bladder which had, in effect, died, meaning he faced the real possibility of not surviving before veterinary surgeons from Linnaeus-owned Davies Veterinary Specialists bought him back from the brink.
Hugo’s medical plight started when his loving owners Emma and Michael Commissar from Thatcham noticed a marked change in his demeanour, including loss of appetite and drinking lots of water.
He was initially taken to two local vets, with the second visit concluding that Hugo, who is five years old, was suffering from sepsis and was seriously unwell, so immediately referred him to Davies, near Hitchin.
Emma said: “We were devastated about the seriousness and the unknown cause at that point. Hearing Hugo had a 50/50 chance of surviving was heartbreaking as he was still so young and we had only had him since 2019 when we rescued him.”
The internal medicine team at Davies quickly diagnosed the ruptured gall bladder but Hugo was also suffering from severe biliary peritonitis, which is when bile drains into the abdominal cavity.
Given the seriousness of Hugo’s condition, a truly multidisciplinary approach was needed from Davies, calling on the skills of the medicine, diagnostic imaging, anaesthesia, soft tissue surgery, rotating interns and nursing teams.
Emma said: “It was the longest week of our lives, waiting for the twice daily updates and being so far away from him made it really tough.”
Davies lead internal medicine clinician Anna Threlfall, together with lead surgeon Carolyn Burton, were among those who saved Hugo, including performing out-of-hours surgery.
Carolyn said: “It was a challenging surgery to remove the dead tissue and to reconstruct the remaining healthy common bile duct in a way which allowed continued bile flow from the liver into the intestine.
“It’s incredible how quickly Hugo bounced back after surgery, eating voluntarily the following day. Hugo hasn’t looked back and has had no ongoing issues.”
Emma added: “Hugo is back to living his best life. He’s super spoiled, enjoys two walks a day and even has his own sofa, as well as taking ownership of the spare bed upstairs. He’s back to being his happy, cheeky self, and his tail very rarely stops wagging.
“Seeing him so poorly makes his recovery all that more remarkable and we feel so lucky to have him back with us. We owe Davies for saving his life.”
For more information about Davies and the wide range of specialist-led services it offers, visit https://vetspecialists.co.uk/ or search for them on Facebook or LinkedIn.
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