On a Wednesday in August, Dr. Sarah Matthews scrubbed into her first ever bladder surgery, took a deep breath, and picked up her scalpel. The Maddie’s® Shelter Medicine Intern had read and re-read the procedure, and was feeling nervous but excited. Standing on the other side of the table, her supervisor, Cornell Maddie’s® Shelter Medicine Program (MSMP) Clinical Instructor Dr. Aly Cohen, gave the go-ahead. The patient was Snickers, a 7-year-old mixed-breed dog, transported that morning from the Cortland County SPCA for a new chance on life.
The MSMP at Cornell University works hard to increase access to veterinary care for shelters and pets. This is done by training interns and students to confidently perform spay-neuter, dentistry, medical and preventive care; by helping with vaccine and spay-neuter clinics; and for shelter-owned animals like Snickers– thanks to a generous grant from the John T. and Jane A. Wiederhold Foundation-– by providing general practice-level surgical care to dogs, cats and rabbits when they need it most.
Snickers is an energetic friendly girl, described as a “social butterfly, outgoing, affectionate and smart.” In late June, her family was forced to give her up because they could not afford to take her to the veterinarian. With her pitty build and border-collie coloring, her sense of humor quickly stole the hearts of everyone at Cortland County SPCA. But the reason for her surrender also quickly became apparent: she leaked bloody urine everywhere.
CCSPCA has a protocol in place for urinary tract infections in dogs and treated her for two weeks with antibiotics. When that didn’t help, they arranged a consultation with their volunteer veterinarian, Dr. Baines. Dr. Baines performed a thorough physical exam, and quickly palpated several bladder stones in her belly. The stones were large and were preventing Snickers from being able to hold her urine, causing bladder inflammation, secondary infections and frequent urges to go.
The director of the Cortland Community SPCA, Emily Roberts, reached out to all three local town veterinarians. While they were willing to do the surgery, the earliest available surgical appointment was in late October, four months away. The shelter arranged for a foster home so Snickers didn’t have to stay in the shelter facility, and her foster family began managing her with frequent bathroom breaks, pee pads and diapers. But Roberts was not willing to wait four months and worried about the expense of such a surgery. She contacted the Maddie’s® Shelter Medicine Program at Cornell University.
A few weeks later, Snickers arrived at the MSMP’s surgical suite at the Tompkins County SPCA, enrolled in MSMP’s Wiederhold Foundation funded “Creating Accomplished Veterinarians and Access to Veterinary Care” (CAVS) program.
“Dr Cohen guided me through incising the bladder, removing the stones, closing the bladder, testing for leakage, closing the body wall, subcutis, and dermis.” Dr. Matthews said. “I learned how to perform a cystotomy, which is a procedure I had never observed or assisted with previously but anticipate needing to know for my future career in shelter medicine.”
Cortland Community SPCA Director Emily Roberts said: “Snickers’ constant squatting and dribbling made her a hard-to-place animal, despite her affectionate personality and her love for children and other pets. Thanks to this grant, Snickers was able to have four golf-ball sized bladder stones removed and begin a new, pain-free life. We are so happy to announce she has been adopted and has a family of her own thanks to the MSMP and the John T. and Jane A. Wiederhold Foundation.”
