(This is a long post so I put a TLDR at the bottom! It's not exactly a rant, but I think it fits this thread best.)
Last night, I started a pet sitting job for four older easy-going dogs. When the owner was giving me instructions, she included "Our one dog has epilepsy, but she hasn't had a seizure in months." Just two hours after she left, I heard a thud upstairs and ran up to find the dog (a lab/pit mix) in the start of a seizure.
The owner was actually on a trip with a vet I previously worked for (the vet referenced her friend to me for pet sitting) so I called them and they said sometimes she comes out of it on her own after a couple minutes, sometimes she doesn't. In case she doesn't, grab the diazepam in the cabinet downstairs. Five minutes of cluster seizures later, the vet said the diazepam was initially dispensed for the owner to administer rectally but it didn't work last time they tried it. She asked if there was any way I could give it IV. I said I could definitely try and hung up.
Miraculously, I hit the vein and gave 2 ml. I've drawn blood a good amount of times but I don't think I've ever given an IV injection, let alone on an actively seizing dog with no one to help restrain or hold off. She stopped seizing, vomited, then sat up and did alright for about ten minutes. I carried her downstairs to be closer to the med cabinet and the doorway. Just as I thought we might be in the clear, she started shaking, then fell back into cluster seizures. The vet said to give her another 2 ml of the diazepam. There was only 1.5 ml left. When I went to stick, she was with it enough to sit up and try to bite me, and when I stopped her, she screamed for a good minute interrupted by more attempts to bite me. Grabbed a blanket to put over her head, held her down with my leg, and tried again - gave 1 ml before she got too fractious. Gave the remaining 0.5 rectally.
Vomited again but seizing did not stop. Out of diazepam, the vet recommended I dissolve 3 tabs of clorazepate in water and give orally, then head over to ER. She said she would send over a neighbor to help me carry her to the car - no need, my 115lb self already carried her down the stairs, I could do it out to the car too.
The owners met me in the ER parking lot and sat with her while we waited for a vet in the pouring rain. Half an hour later, a vet and tech came out. The ER vet asked if she was on any long term meds - no - and started lecturing them about the importance of long term meds as the dog was still seizing in the car. Os got pissed off and insisted they take the dog in now and talk about that later. The ER vet changed subjects to how tonight will work - bring her in, put in a catheter - and the husband cut her off and started yelling about "you won't do anything to her until you give her the shot and make it stop." The ER vet tried explaining but the husband was too heated and wasn't understanding what a catheter was for. I interrupted to tell him, in a way he would understand, that putting in a catheter to give the diazepam is what I was doing at home except with one stick instead of many. He understood and backed down.
ER vet said protocol is to stop the seizures then monitor for 24 hours. Again, a sensitive topic to the husband. He started yelling "you might be a vet but you don't know MY dog, your job is to make her stop, and that's IT. Once you've done your job, we will bring her home." Cue more arguing about protocol vs owners' expectations. At that point, the dog had stopped seizing but was in a postictal state. I interrupted them to tell the ER vet what happened and what I had given. They finally started taking the dog inside and the owners tried following and arguing more - I interjected, talked to them about what happened earlier as a distraction, and calmed them down so that the vet and tech could take the dog in.
End result: the dog didn't seize anymore once inside, didn't get any more drugs, and was monitored for an hour before being sent home. I went home at 3am. I went back to their house today to pick up the stuff I left behind last night and was greeted by a dog overjoyed to see me. It made my heart happy.
TLDR: Epileptic dog went into cluster seizures two hours into pet sitting. Alone, I simultaneously restrained, held off, and injected IV diazepam into an actively seizing/otherwise fractious dog. Seizing started again, ran out of diazepam, and my 115lb self carried a lab/pit mix down the stairs, through the house, and out to the car to bring to the ER. Then acted as mediator between the angry owners and frustrated vet in the pouring rain at 2am. Dog ended up okay. I feel like a bada**.
