Yesterday I worked off one of the spay/neuter days at the Bangor Humane Society. There I ran into Karen Littlefield, who volunteers her time to help the homeless pets at the shelter.

She does something very special for the dogs that are at the shelter and calls her service Dog's Day Out. 

Karen selects dogs to bring home and give a time away from the stress of the shelter. There she can also observe more closely the dog's personality and unique gifts. She then blogs about them and whatever is on her mind. This week, she observed us spaying and neutering bunnies, cats and dogs.

Click Here for her Blog 

There is almost always someone new when Valerie, Erica and I spay/neuter each month. One of the stories that I get requests to tell is about a surgery that I had shortly after graduating from vet school. There are some gestures that go along with this story...you at home will have to close your eyes and imagine me telling it...

So, I was admittedly a nervous new graduate. My first job was at a 10 veterinarian practice in Annapolis, Maryland.  It was June of 1989, and I was the new kid on the block.

One of the people that taught me the most was the surgery tech. Judy had been working exclusively in surgery for about 6 years before I got there. She tolerated my requests to check on my patients very frequently after surgery. I wanted to make sure that there was no bleeding, that they were comfortable, that nothing could go wrong.

Judy had assisted for 10 different vets in probably hundreds of surgeries. Each time I would request that she check on the patient, she would look at me and say

"It'll be fiiinnne."

The slight whine to her voice let me know that she was humoring me....but God Bless her, after a short while working together she would always go back to check on my patients when I was scrubbing my hands for the next surgery.

One of my patients was a hamster with a lipoma. A lipoma is a big fatty tumor, and although it is not cancerous, in this case it prevented the hamster from walking well. A 10 year old girl had brought the hamster in with her mom and looked up at me with her big brown eyes and asked if I could make "Squeaks"  walk ok again.

Yeah, like I was going to say no.

I planned the surgery and conferred with Judy beforehand to make sure we had a mask small enough for Squeaks. I asked her if she was comfortable monitoring hamster anesthesia.

"It'll be fiiinnne" was her only response.

Now you have to know that when we induce anesthesia, if the surgical site is on the belly ( ventral abdomen) that we tie pets down with soft nylon ropes to hold their unconscious body safely on the surgical table. The ties go on the feet and are held in cleats on the side of the table.

The ropes were too large for the hamster, so Judy fashioned restraining devices out of thin strips of white bandaging tape.

With the hamster anesthetized and held firmly in place with Judy's tape stirrups, I turned to scrub.

Just as in any surgery I had on a hat, a mask, and a gown. The scrub takes several minutes whether I do surgery on a St Bernard or a pocket pet.

Just as I turned around with my gloves on I saw that Judy had made a pile of hair that she had shaved off at the side of the hamster and was preparing to scrub. First though, she reached for the central vaccum hose to suck up the hair. As she turned on the powerful vacuum I thought that maybe I had scrubbed too fast because it would be a few minutes before she was ready.

Between the high pitched sound of the vacuum I heard it.

WHOOSH, SLURP

WHUMP WHUMP WHUMP!!!!!

I looked at the surgical table and in a moment of horror realized there was no hamster.

THERE WAS NO FRIGGIN HAMSTER!!!!

"OMIGOD Judy!! Where does that hose go???!!"

My hands were still gloved and pointing up as they had taught us in vet school.

"The Central Vac is in that rooooomm"

Her voice didn't have the panic in it that I expected...but that was ok, my adrenaline was enough for the both of us.

I flung open the door and opened the large central vacuum unit. On the front of the unit was a metal door. I opened it, imagining the worst.

In a large nest of hair, on a screen before the blades that generated the vacuum, I saw a thin white strip of tape. I pulled the tape and Viola....the hamster was resting peacefully, unaware of its close call.

I brushed the hair off of the hamster and brought it back into the OR. Judy sheepishly scrubbed it and I removed the lipoma. The surgery went without a hitch.

But I have to say that my phone call to the client that day was nothing if not honest.... 

"Hello, this is Dr. Hanks. So I have some good news and some bad news. The good news is that the surgery went great and Squeaks is waking up as we speak. "

The bad news, well, the bad news is that there was an incident....."

I'll have you know that when it was time to design Kindred Spirits my wife said..."you should really get a central vacuum" I guess I hadn't told her the story of Squeaks.

I got a hand held itty bitty vacuum instead. 

So...I'm leaving you all in Jim and a mystery vet's hands this Friday the 14th as I go to a week long veterinary conference.  Because of a non-compete agreement, I am not allowed to broadcast the name of the vet, but I can tell you that she will be working at our clinic once a week when I am in surgery on Thursday seeing appointments that would usually have to wait. I think you will love her as much as we all do. She, like Jim is a perfect fit. 

You will not see her name in print on our website or in the paper or on the sign. 

....but if you asked me who she was, I would tell you.

I'm thinking maybe I should have her see any hamsters that might come in too.