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 MEET
SOME OF OUR PATIENTS: “Willow"
Willow is one of life's "natural mothers". An extremely pretty
blue point Birman with the characteristic placid temperament
of the breed, she was an ideal choice to breed from. Her owner
picked the potential father carefully; a blue point stud was
selected as Willow's owner quite fancied keeping another blue
point kitten. Both cats underwent the necessary blood tests
prior to mating to ensure that neither were carrying any of
the fatal viruses that can be transmitted during sex and, when
the time was right, Willow was dispatched to the stud cat. She
returned several days later looking extremely pleased with herself
and 9 weeks later safely delivered 5 baby Birmans.
Unfortunately one was a stillbirth but the remaining 3 girls
and 1 boy were healthy and thriving. Willow was a perfect mum,
feeding cleaning and playing with her kittens but even she had
had enough by the time the kittens went to their new homes at
12 weeks of age. A year passed and the mating was repeated;
this time things were more even with 2 girls and 2 boys being
delivered safely and successfully reared. Willow is nothing
if not consistent and her next experience of motherhood produced
yet another 2 boys and 2 girls! One of the female kittens turned
out as beautiful as her mum so her owner decided to keep her.
 It
was decided to give Willow one last litter as she was 5 years
old by now and although she thoroughly enjoyed rearing her babies,
her owner felt that she had done her bit in keeping the breed
going! Nine weeks of pregnancy passed uneventfully, and at the
appointed time, Willow settled down in labour to produce her
babies. This time things didn't go according to plan. Three
kittens were produced quite normally and with her usual lack
of fuss but then things went horribly wrong. Although Willow
strained and pushed, no more kittens were forthcoming and her
owner was extremely distressed to see something, obviously not
a kitten, protruding from Willow's vulva. She was rushed to
our out of hours emergency service (why do these things always
happen at night or at weekends?) where a quick examination revealed
that there were 2 kittens still inside Willow. However, what
had appeared at the back end was part of her intestine. Willow
had torn part of her womb and part of her intestine had slipped
through and appeared out of her vulva. Things were looking extremely
serious at this point; the gut would have to be pushed back
in place and the tear repaired immediately. Even with urgent
surgery, there was a very high risk of infection through contamination,
to say nothing of saving the 2 kittens still inside.
The priority at this stage is the same as it is with humans;
mum comes first so Willow was rapidly prepared for theatre.
The first part of the surgery was to get the kittens out and
so a cesarean section was performed. Amazingly both kittens
were still alive and responded well to resuscitation and were
placed in an incubator whilst efforts were made to repair the
internal damage to Willow. The only possible option was to perform
an hysterectomy as the uterus was too badly damaged to repair.
The bowel was liberally cleaned with a sterile saline solution
and replaced back to its normal position in the abdomen. Unfortunately
the tear was very extensive and extended down through the pelvis
meaning it was extremely difficult to access to repair properly.
The wound was sutured up as well as possible but the owner was
given a strong warning that there could be further complications
due to scar tissue developing around the bowel.
Whilst all this was going on Willow was given intravenous fluids
and large doses of antibiotics to counteract the inevitable
risk of shock and infection that could well follow such a traumatic
event. This also meant that there were now 5 very hungry newborn
Birman kittens (4 boys and 1 girl) and so the owner was dispatched
home complete with hot water bottles, feeding bottles, colostrum
and cat milk substitute to rear them. Willow was placed in a
recovery kennel still attached to her drip and monitored throughout
the night.
The next morning she was remarkably bright. She had lost a
lot of blood during the operation but her colour was pink and
she was looking for her babies. Her very relieved owner was
allowed to collect her the same day, and true to form Willow
almost immediately starting nursing her babies. Three days after
the surgery, both mum and babies were checked and were all found
to be doing very well considering the bad start. Ten days post
operatively, Willow's sutures were removed and everything had
healed very well.
 At
the time of writing, the kittens are 9 weeks old and just had
their first vaccinations. Willow is looking forward to a very
pampered life as a much loved pet; the breeding mantle will
hopefully be passed onto her daughter, who is carving out a
rather successful career in the show world.
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