Paper Training Adult Dog Whippet

TOA PAYOH VETS
toapayohvets.com
Date: 23 November, 2009

Focus: Small animals - dogs, cats, hamsters, guinea pig & rabbits.

Toa Payoh Vets Clinical Research
Making veterinary surgery alive
to a veterinary student studying in Australia
using real case studies and pictures

How To Revive A Distressed Pup
Dr Sing Kong Yuen, BVMS (Glasgow), MRCVS
First written: Nov 22, 2009.

TIPS FOR HOME-BREEDERS

The exhausted dam will not bother with distressed pup. Home breeder must learn what to do. Reading books may not be as useful as seeing how to revive a non-crying pup. Contact your vet for demonstration or read numerous dog breeding books.

I had presumed that the experienced pet shop operator and groomer would know what to do after tearing the amniotic membrane which had wrapped around the pup.

But the couple just left the distressed and "dead" pup with the exhausted dam. "Don't you know what to do when the pup is not crying?" I asked.

1. Grasp the pup firmly with both hands after wiping away the slippery amniotic fluid and clearing the nose with tissue paper. Hold pup above head and swing in an arc downwards for around 5 times forcefully.
Reports I read indicated that there is no need to worry about any ill effects on the pup's brain in using this vigorous swinging method. Swinging expels the fluid in the pup's lungs so that it can breathe.
2. Clear nose of mucus in between swings.
3. Massage neck of skin with your fore-finger to stimulate breathing reflexes. Grip neck skin with thumb and fore-fingers and pinch it back and forth.
4. Blow air into nose to inflate the lungs (if necessary).
5. In successful cases, the pup will cry within 5 swings.
6. Put it with the mother and see that it suckles.

I had to intervene fast and swung the pup for them. Oxygen-deprived pups will not live.

This experience would teach them what to do next time. Experience is gained over time and so I don't blame the pet shop operator. There are so many aspects of breeding and one can't know everything. Read lots of breeding books? But no amount of reading may prepare you every challenge that occur in home-breeding or life encounters. One happy part of veterinary medicine is that the vet saves a life and gets to see a distressed pup grown into a healthy 6.5 weeks old. Unfortunately, the pet shop operator could not identify which pup was the distressed one!

Some problems from inexperienced pup handlers:
1. Loose hand grip. Pup gets swung off the hands and drops on the floor.
2. Too confined a space. Pup hits the wall. Do the swinging outdoors as shown in these pictures.

Picture (left) showed all Maltese healthy and of even-sized. It was great to see them again after 6.5 weeks!

Toa Payoh Vets
Clinical Research