NEWS AND COMMENT: There is always a time to praise something really good in the cat world. Over the years I have criticised veterinarians but also praised them. My criticism for American veterinarians is nearly always over declawing and is therefore entirely justified 🤔.
But in this instance, Dr. Nicole Martin of the Caldwell Mill Animal Clinic in Birmingham, Alabama, USA, deserves a lot of praise for her actions. In fact, I took the time to write a review on Google Maps. I gave the clinic a five-star rating even though I have never visited it as I live in England! 😎
There are actually two aspects about this clinic I know about which deserve praise and the first one is that Dr. Nicole Martin was called upon to trudge through 3 miles of icy snow conditions to treat Blueberry a five-year-old cat brought to the clinic feeling unwell.
Diagnostic tests couldn’t reveal the illness initially and Blueberry stayed at the clinic over the weekend. In short, she had stayed at the clinic for quite a little while and there must have been concern about her prognosis.
Last Tuesday morning Blueberry took a turn for the worse. Her condition was deteriorating and I suspect urgent care was demanded. The clinic rose to the occasion despite the very tough weather conditions at that time.
The news media report doesn’t tell us explicitly but it appears that there might have been a skeleton crew at the clinic while the vet techs and veterinarians were temporarily at home dealing with matters remotely as occurred often during the Covid-19 pandemic. That’s my assessment although it is not reported.
But it would explain why it was decided – bearing in mind that she was the nearest to the clinic – that Dr Nicole Martin should walk through the snow and difficult weather over a distance of 3 miles to the clinic to treat Blueberry. It was clearly too dangerous to drive.
“There was no other option other than to walk,” Martin said.
The other veterinarians were further away than Dr. Martin. Two vet techs had carried out X-rays and sent them to Dr. Martin remotely and this information informed her that there was something stuck inside her digestive tract.
Dr. Martin said the following:
“Two of our most wonderful technicians got here through the snow and were able to look at her and called me and said something’s not right with Blueberry. They took X-rays which clearly showed there was something stuck in there.”
She added:
“We’ve been with her for days at this point, realizing how much we loved her and, once we saw the X-rays of what was making her sick, it was just in time we all got together to help save her life,” Martin said.”
We all love a dedicated veterinarian, don’t we? There are some great veterinarians out there who really care and Dr. Martin is one of them.
Check out the picture
And I would add that this appears to be a very well organised and thoughtful veterinary clinic because if you notice in the photograph on this page that there are two doors, one for dogs one for cats. Clearly, they are following best practice in separating the dogs from the cats in order to keep the peace within the clinic and to ensure that the cats are not frightened.
It all helps to provide a pleasant visit which is very important as for both cats and dogs a visit to the veterinarian is stressful. I might add that it is also stressful for their caregivers.
