Cat euthanization opinions wanted.

"EvelynVogtGamble(Divamanque)" wrote:

Since, in the U.S., it's generally impossible to get HUMAN doctors to
make "house calls", I'm not sure how successful that request would be -
although perhaps in rural areas, where vets are accustomed to visiting
their bovine and equine patients at home, it might be more likely.

Come to think of it, though, I do remember that when the first cat I had
in California was displaying a cat-bite abscess, the vet I phoned DID
come to the house to treat him. However, that was way back in 1954,
when things were different. Also, the vet I picked out of the phone
book turned out to be one who specialized in larger, more exotic animals
(including lions and tigers) used by the movie studios.

A friend of mine found a vet who makes house calls, for ordinary vet
visits, not just the final one. Only if the cats need a procedure done
that requires a hospital setting, such as surgery, would she bring them
in. This is in the San Francisco area.

I think they're not the norm, but they do exist. Of course, they
also charge more. My friend has limited mobility, so it's worth it to
her.

--
Joyce ^..^

To email me, remove the XXX from my user name.

"MaryL" -OUT-THE-LITTER wrote in message

"EvelynVogtGamble(Divamanque)" wrote in
message m...


CatEyes wrote:

I think it's probably not a good idea to bring it up now since
nothing will change what happened, but definitely next time I would
insist on being there. I would strongly urge anyone with a cat at
that point to look into having a vet come to your home. I did with
Bandit. I was surprised that it only cost $80 - I would gladly
have paid ten times that amount just to know that she would be on
her own bed, in her own house, and held and petted by me as she
breathed her last. It's a small enough favor to do for a being
that spends his or her whole life giving you unqualified love.

Hugs,

CatNipped

Since, in the U.S., it's generally impossible to get HUMAN doctors
to make "house calls", I'm not sure how successful that request
would be - although perhaps in rural areas, where vets are
accustomed to visiting their bovine and equine patients at home, it
might be more likely. Come to think of it, though, I do remember that
when the first cat I
had in California was displaying a cat-bite abscess, the vet I
phoned DID come to the house to treat him. However, that was way
back in 1954, when things were different. Also, the vet I picked
out of the phone book turned out to be one who specialized in
larger, more exotic animals (including lions and tigers) used by the
movie studios.

A number of people on this NG have had experience with vets coming to
their home, and I have a friend who also used that option. My vet
calls me personally to check on my cats if any issues have been
raised during exams, and he has told me that he does occasionally go
to people's homes. I do live in a fairly small town, and I suspect
that this option would be more limited in large cities. By contrast,
I think (as you said) that it would be impossible to get a human
doctor to come to a home. Of course, we are talking about euthanasia
here, and that would not be an issue with human patients. Doctors
claim that it is not useful to make housecalls because equipment
would not be available, but that avoids the issue of people who are
simply in such pain or disability that it is very difficult to go to
a doctor's office (such as when my mother was in a nursing home, and
every visit was somewhat traumatic for her--no need for "equipment").

I always thought it was totally nuts having to sit in a doctor's surgery for
up to 2 hours (maybe even longer) when feeling sick as a dog when the best
option for both me (in terms of rest and recovery) and others (in terms of
my infectiousness) is to be at home in bed, asleep.

Still, thats the way of it these days and if I want more than a day off work
for my trouble, thats what I have to do.

I particularly feel bad when I'm sneezing and coughing all over hte place
and young and seemingly healthy babies have to be near to me. The last thing
I want to do is give a newborn a stinking cold or worse, the flu, but in
doctor's waiting rooms, it can hardly be helped.

Yowie
--
If you're paddling upstream in a canoe and a wheel falls off, how many
pancakes can you fit in a doghouse? None, icecream doesn't have bones.

A number of people on this NG have had experience with vets coming to their
home, and I have a friend who also used that option. My vet calls me
personally to check on my cats if any issues have been raised during exams,
and he has told me that he does occasionally go to people's homes. I do
live in a fairly small town, and I suspect that this option would be more
limited in large cities. By contrast, I think (as you said) that it would
be impossible to get a human doctor to come to a home.

My friend Harriet had the vet some to her house to put her last cat
to sleep - it's not that unusual. That was in Edinburgh city centre.

I've only asked for one house call from a doctor since I've been in
the UK - that was when I was having a gallstone attack (they got my
gallbladder out the next week). This is in a commuter village a few
miles outside Edinburgh. Doctors allocate a couple of hours a day
to them. I guess it happens less in rural areas because it takes so
much longer to do the visit.

It was quite routine for doctors to do house calls when I was a kid
in New Zealand - mine came nearly every day when I was in bed with
hepatitis. That was in a fair-sized city.

==== j a c k at c a m p i n . m e . u k === http://www.campin.me.uk ====
Jack Campin, 11 Third St, Newtongrange EH22 4PU, Scotland == mob 07800 739 557
CD-ROMs and free stuff: Scottish music, food intolerance, and Mac logic fonts
****** I killfile Google posts - email me if you want to be whitelisted ******

Yowie wrote:

I always thought it was totally nuts having to sit in a doctor's surgery for
up to 2 hours (maybe even longer) when feeling sick as a dog when the best
option for both me (in terms of rest and recovery) and others (in terms of
my infectiousness) is to be at home in bed, asleep.

Still, thats the way of it these days and if I want more than a day off work
for my trouble, thats what I have to do.

I particularly feel bad when I'm sneezing and coughing all over hte place
and young and seemingly healthy babies have to be near to me. The last thing
I want to do is give a newborn a stinking cold or worse, the flu, but in
doctor's waiting rooms, it can hardly be helped.

A few months ago when I was in the ER with a high fever and cough, I
was worried about *catching* stuff from other people in the waiting
room. My cough wasn't that bad, and I pretty much always remember to
cover my mouth anyway. But I got one of those masks to wear just in
case. I've since read that face masks aren't very useful for protecting
the wearer from contagion - they're mostly good for protecting others
from one's own coughing and sneezing. And it turned out I had something
that wasn't even contagious - bacterial pneumonia. So I would have been
in trouble if I'd gotten someone else's flu on top of that! Hospitals
can be dangerous places.

--
Joyce ^..^

To email me, remove the XXX from my user name.

"Jack Campin - bogus address" wrote in message

A number of people on this NG have had experience with vets coming
to their home, and I have a friend who also used that option. My
vet calls me personally to check on my cats if any issues have been
raised during exams, and he has told me that he does occasionally go
to people's homes. I do live in a fairly small town, and I suspect
that this option would be more limited in large cities. By
contrast, I think (as you said) that it would be impossible to get a
human doctor to come to a home.

My friend Harriet had the vet some to her house to put her last cat
to sleep - it's not that unusual. That was in Edinburgh city centre.

I've only asked for one house call from a doctor since I've been in
the UK - that was when I was having a gallstone attack (they got my
gallbladder out the next week). This is in a commuter village a few
miles outside Edinburgh. Doctors allocate a couple of hours a day
to them. I guess it happens less in rural areas because it takes so
much longer to do the visit.

It was quite routine for doctors to do house calls when I was a kid
in New Zealand - mine came nearly every day when I was in bed with
hepatitis. That was in a fair-sized city.

Dunno how old you are, Jack, but I'm 40 this year and I remember our family
GP coming around to see my sister & as kids when we had 'chumps' (we got
chicken pox and mumps at the same time) and for whatever other ailment us
kids got. No such thing any more, heck, I feel lucky that we still have a
family GP - most folks have to go to the polyclinic where you get to see the
next doctor who is available. No adequte history no doctor-patient
relationship can form int hat situation and I think the service is poorer
for it. Mind you, it sometimes takes up to 3 days to see our family GP if
its a non-emergency, so I also go to the polyclinic if I know what I've got
an all I want is a doctor's certificate and/or repeat prescription. If I
want genuine *care*, then its the family GP (he's often running late because
he *does* give the care and attention that folks want & need)

Yowie


==== j a c k at c a m p i n . m e . u k ===
http://www.campin.me.uk ==== Jack Campin, 11 Third St, Newtongrange
EH22 4PU, Scotland == mob 07800 739 557 CD-ROMs and free stuff:
Scottish music, food intolerance, and Mac logic fonts ****** I
killfile Google posts - email me if you want to be whitelisted ******

--
If you're paddling upstream in a canoe and a wheel falls off, how many
pancakes can you fit in a doghouse? None, icecream doesn't have bones.

"EvelynVogtGamble(Divamanque)" wrote in message
m...


CatEyes wrote:

I think it's probably not a good idea to bring it up now since nothing
will change what happened, but definitely next time I would insist on
being there. I would strongly urge anyone with a cat at that point to
look into having a vet come to your home. I did with Bandit. I was
surprised that it only cost $80 - I would gladly have paid ten times that
amount just to know that she would be on her own bed, in her own house,
and held and petted by me as she breathed her last. It's a small enough
favor to do for a being that spends his or her whole life giving you
unqualified love.

Hugs,

CatNipped

Since, in the U.S., it's generally impossible to get HUMAN doctors to make
"house calls", I'm not sure how successful that request would be -
although perhaps in rural areas, where vets are accustomed to visiting
their bovine and equine patients at home, it might be more likely.

Come to think of it, though, I do remember that when the first cat I had
in California was displaying a cat-bite abscess, the vet I phoned DID come
to the house to treat him. However, that was way back in 1954, when
things were different. Also, the vet I picked out of the phone book
turned out to be one who specialized in larger, more exotic animals
(including lions and tigers) used by the movie studios.

I didn't have any problems at all. We live just north of Houston in Spring
Texas and I got my vet to come out when it was time for Bandit to go to the
Bridge (gawds, almost two years ago now).

Hugs,

CatNipped

wrote in message
...
On May 15, 10:51 am, "MaryL" -OUT-THE-LITTER
wrote:
My reaction is, I
can't see how anyone would take the risk that their cat's final moments
would be filled with fear or lonliness. I wanted to be there for them.

I confess to being a bit of a coward when we had to have Fugazi PTS-
it was my first time and she got ill so suddenly (the morning before
she was fine) the vet was worried that my upset would affect her so
what we did was I held her while the vet gave her a sedative and she
fell asleep in my arms while I told her what a good cat she was and
how we would miss her so she did the final injection and I handed her
to the vet still asleep and left the room- she wasn't conscious by the
second injection and the last thing she would have heard was me
telling her how lovely she was and the last thing she would have felt
was me stroking her and to this day I wonder if I did the right
thingeven now 10 years later I am wiping away the tears when I think
of it

Lesley

Slave of the Fabulous Furballs

=========================

Yours were the last words she heard and the last touch she felt - you did
well by her and gave her the last, best gift you could. It's always hard,
so don't add to the hurt by blaming yourself for what you could not do - you
did all that she needed you to.

Hugs,

CatNipped

Yowie wrote:

I always thought it was totally nuts having to sit in a doctor's surgery for
up to 2 hours (maybe even longer) when feeling sick as a dog when the best
option for both me (in terms of rest and recovery) and others (in terms of
my infectiousness) is to be at home in bed, asleep.

Still, thats the way of it these days and if I want more than a day off work
for my trouble, thats what I have to do.

I particularly feel bad when I'm sneezing and coughing all over hte place
and young and seemingly healthy babies have to be near to me. The last thing
I want to do is give a newborn a stinking cold or worse, the flu, but in
doctor's waiting rooms, it can hardly be helped.

I think my doctor's office has a sign up saying to tell the receptionist
if you have a rash or something - I assumed anything possibly really
contagious. I've never needed to do that, so I don't know what the
receptionist does - put you into isolation???

I have never known a GP who does house calls, although I have heard that
one or two who specialize in geriatric care do. Many, probably most, of
the elderly seem to stay with the same GP who has cared for them for
years rather than see a specialist in geriatrics, though.

I really like and trust my GP. Many people do go to one of those big
group clinics where you get the next doctor up, but I had enough of that
when I lived in a more rural area, and had to take whoever happened to
be on contract at the moment. Doctors tended to head off for greener
pastures as soon as their contracts were up, and I didn't get sick
often, so I don't think I saw the same doctor twice the whole time I
lived in that area until near the end, when I found a GP in a nearby
larger town.

On re-reading this - my doctor, like most here, is part of a group, but
in those group practices you tend to see your own doctor, although of
course, if you really needed a doctor, and yours was on holiday or
something, you'd probably be offered an appointment with one of the
others in the group. But there's a big family practice that works on the
group basis - you get whoever's on - and a lot of people seem to like
it, possibly because they can get appointments quickly. I've never had a
problem getting an appointment with my own doctor within a day or so,
although I always ask for the first appointment, even if I have to wait
a few days, because she often runs late. I think that's because she
never makes you feel hurried and explains everything carefully, so I
don't complain about waiting - I just try to get an appointment early
rather than late in a day.

The alternative to a family doctor is the ER, which is strongly NOT
recommended unless you are actually bleeding or in the process of having
a heart attack! Some people, either because they don't know any better,
or because they haven't found a GP, seem to use the ER for routine care.
Having located a GP here for a relative who just moved here less than a
year ago, I KNOW the reason these people haven't got a GP isn't because
there isn't one available!

I've used the ER once or twice for things that didn't turn out as
seriously as I had thought - an ankle I thought might be broken but
which turned out to be sprained for example - and the wait was painful.
And you can't really complain that no one will look at your ankle, when
the EMTs are bringing in people from car accidents and so on!

Cheryl

On Sun, 17 May 2009 07:38:29 -0230, Cheryl P. wrote:

The alternative to a family doctor is the ER, which is strongly NOT
recommended unless you are actually bleeding or in the process of having
a heart attack! Some people, either because they don't know any better,
or because they haven't found a GP, seem to use the ER for routine care.
Having located a GP here for a relative who just moved here less than a
year ago, I KNOW the reason these people haven't got a GP isn't because
there isn't one available!

I've used the ER once or twice for things that didn't turn out as
seriously as I had thought - an ankle I thought might be broken but
which turned out to be sprained for example - and the wait was painful.
And you can't really complain that no one will look at your ankle, when
the EMTs are bringing in people from car accidents and so on!

I had to visit the Emergency Room this week due to a nosebleed that
wouldn't stop. After the nose had been bleeding for 1 1/2 hours without
stopping, I called my doctor and was told to go to the ER. At the ER,
they tried various methods of applying pressure, which didn't stop the
bleeding. Finally, after I had been bleeding continuously for four
hours, they "blocked" the nose, meaning that they inserted a sponge
similar to a tampon tip. A couple of days later, I had to visit an ear-
nose-throat specialist, who removed the sponge and used silver nitrate to
cauterize the blood vessel in my nose. A vein in my nose had
spontaneously ripped open; the scar tissue from the acid burn should keep
the vein closed from this point onward.

--
John F. Eldredge --
PGP key available from http://pgp.mit.edu
"Reserve your right to think, for even to think wrongly is better
than not to think at all." -- Hypatia of Alexandria

John F. Eldredge wrote:

I had to visit the Emergency Room this week due to a nosebleed that
wouldn't stop. After the nose had been bleeding for 1 1/2 hours without
stopping, I called my doctor and was told to go to the ER. At the ER,
they tried various methods of applying pressure, which didn't stop the
bleeding. Finally, after I had been bleeding continuously for four
hours, they "blocked" the nose, meaning that they inserted a sponge
similar to a tampon tip. A couple of days later, I had to visit an ear-
nose-throat specialist, who removed the sponge and used silver nitrate to
cauterize the blood vessel in my nose. A vein in my nose had
spontaneously ripped open; the scar tissue from the acid burn should keep
the vein closed from this point onward.

That sounds horrible! I know how much nosebleeds can bleed, as I used
to have them regularly as a kid. I hope you didn't lose too much blood!
Do you feel OK?

I wonder if you had an aneurysm in the vein in your nose? I guess, of
all places to have one, that's better than most!

Purrs for a quick healing.

--
Joyce ^..^

To email me, remove the XXX from my user name.