Caesar blinked guiltily at Doc Truli. His big fat yellow lab belly hung down from his hips like a condemnation of his gluttony. This time the 12-year-old yellow lab mix had really gone and done it. “We have these FloridaThey can get really big and brazen. put out the rat poison. Since we knew Caesar gets into everything, we were careful to put the bait behind our fence, between our fence and the neighbor’s. We caught Caesar ripping down a piece of fence so he could get at the rat blocks. he ate a whole box of it before we could stop him,” said Casear’s mom, a mid-50’s tanned Florida native with a smoker’s husk to herShe looked capable and practical. Or so he thought… Because Caesar had eaten the rat bait less than two hours before he was caught, we had a chance, if we could make him vomit it up, that he would not get tooHow do you get a dog to vomit? hospital, we use a medicine called apomorphine. the eyelid in the conjunctival sac, or intravenously.
morphine in it makes you puke like crazy. Caesar took 6 doses before he finally looked a littleThen we pulled out the hydrogen peroxide, householdThat put him over the top! puked his doggy heart out. “Be careful with anyIt is best to seek veterinary help in theseFor example, if your dog looks stuporous or out of it, he or she may breathe in the vomit or the hydrogen peroxide liquid. If they breath into the lungs, then a nasty aspiration pneumonia sets in that is as deadly and expensive to treat as poisoning,” says Doc Truli. we gave Caesar some medicine to settle his stomach because more doggy “torture” was on the way! Next, we fed Caesar activatedThis is charcoal medicinally treated and purified so that it adsorbs toxins from the intestinal tract. tastes like, well, charcoal. Getting a dog to eat activated charcoal is like getting a dog to eat paint. “I remember a pit bull terrier that ate some ratI figured, if he liked the rat bait, maybe he
would like the charcoal. I put a dollop of cat food on the top of a bowl of activated charcoal. He ate the whole bowl right down!” says Doc Vomiting alone will not get all of the charcoal out of his system. The activated charcoal sticks to the poison (adsorbs, different physical process than absorbing) and the stuck-together particles get pooped out of the system in dueThe rat poisons readily available today stop Vitamin K from working in your liver. (Or a rat’s, mouse’s, or dog or cat’s liver…) Vitamin K is a necessary cofactor on the synthesis of blood clotting factors. essential for the “Vitamin K dependent” clottingThe shortest-lived clotting factor isThe supply in the bloodstream will start to run out 5-7 days after the vitamin K stops. This means the symptoms of Rat poison will show up 5-7 days after the poison is ingested. Looking at a dog’s lip that had a bleeding cat scratch hole for 7 days,”Did she get
into any rat bait?” “Sure, said the dog’s dad.” asked Doc. “About a week ago,” said the dad. Why didn’t you come in for treatment?” asked“She was fine the last time she ate it,” said theHmmm…hard to argue with that Sometimes I forget they don’t really teach us much about ourAll day long, your blood vessels get little micro-tears, damage, holes, what-nots. Your body makes little bandages called platelets, which resemble little pieces of red blood cell wall membranes to patch bigger holes. molecules in the family called Clotting Factors in order to orchestrate and organize blood clots and repair functions. If you bleed, after a short time, you see a little firm bleb of blood that solidifies into a gelatinous little thing that stops the bleeding. If you run out of clotting factors, that never happens and the cut or hole, or whatever rent you have in your blood vessel, keeps bleedingYou bleed to death.
The rats and dogs and cats that eat this stuff bleed to death. they do not understand what is happening to them. really doesn’t like rat poison, can you tell?) never know if we got all the rat bait out, we assume we did not. Instead of waiting 5-7 days to see if there’s bleeding, usually, the veterinarian will prescribe start with injections and then pills until we can get some blood test results and see how the clotting factor levels actually are doing. Depending on the brand of rat bait, and whether or not it is an old-fashioned formula or a new-fangled one, Vitamin K1 needs to be given for 2 weeks to 2 IMHA Immune Mediated Hemolytic Anemia Rickettsial Diseases (like Ehrlichia, these are diseases spread by tick bites) Thrombocytopenia (fancy word for platelets) Cancer (especially older pets) Plus many more your vet can test for or rule Caesar took his Vitamin K for aDoc recently saw him for, you
guessed it, upset stomach. That guy really needs to get his Anyone who is present, near the dog, when the poison is vomited up, can become very sick from The vomit can release this toxic gas and hurt your dog orOnly let dogs vomit in well-ventilated areas and do not breathe in the gas. The CDC’s Epidemic Intelligence Service is collecting data regarding among veterinary workers who clean up the vomit from rat bait containing zinc phosphide. working on guidelines as to how to safely work with the vomit after this type of poisoning. Rate this:Share this:Like this:Any poison that can kill rodents also can kill dogs. And unfortunately any bait that is attractive to rodents will also be attractive to dogs. So-called rodenticide toxicity is therefore among the most common forms of poisoning in dogs. Mouse and rat baits come in three varieties. One relatively uncommon variety contains products similar to vitamin D. These products can cause kidney failure in dogs.
Other products I’ll write more about later in this post contain an active ingredient called bromethalin that is a nerve poison. Finally, some products contain toxins that make it impossible for blood to clot. The last group, known as anticoagulant rodenticides, historically have been the most widely used in the United States. They cause death by hemorrhage, and they are toxic to all mammals. There are different types, or generations, of rodenticides. The later generations are phenomenally deadly to dogs. Dogs that have consumed anticoagulant rodenticides show no symptoms for several days. However, once the symptoms start, the situation becomes an urgent veterinary emergency. Dogs may bleed into their lungs or into their chest. They may cough up blood or become short of breath. Bruising of the skin or gums may occur. Blood may be noted in the mouth, urine, or stool. Weakness, poor appetite, or lethargy may be seen. Death occurs as a result of blood loss or from compromise of vital structures secondary to internal hemorrhage.
There is plenty of bad news about anticoagulant rodenticides, and dogs that show symptoms after consuming them are nearly certain to die without treatment. However, there is one bit of good news. Anticoagulant rodenticide poisoning is treatable. There is an antidote for the poisons: vitamin K1. In dogs that have consumed the poisons within the previous three days, administration of vitamin K1 alone is generally sufficient to prevent symptoms and complications. In dogs with symptoms, a transfusion of a blood product called plasma, combined with vitamin K1 administration, usually reverses the toxicity and saves the dog’s life. Identifying the toxicity is usually simple, even in cases when the owners don’t know the poison has been consumed. Simple blood tests can identify the problem in a matter of minutes in most cases. I’ve never been a fan of anticoagulant rodenticides, but at least they are not difficult to diagnose and treat. It turns out that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency also is not a fan of anticoagulant rodenticides.
The agency issued severe restrictions on the products in 2011. And in July the Journal of the American Veterinary Medical Association reported that the last company to fight the regulations (the manufacturer of d-Con) has agreed to comply. The EPA instituted the restrictions over concerns about exposure of children, pets, and wildlife. The agency reports that exposure of children (which I imagine is the agency’s greatest concern) has decreased by 50 percent since the regulations went into effect. The agency also released some rather alarming statistics about wildlife exposure to support the restrictions. From the JAVMA article: Agency documents filed in mid-2008 indicate a study in New York found residues from second-generation anticoagulants in 48 percent of diurnal raptors and owls analyzed. In California, residues were found in more than 70 percent of bobcats, mountain lions, and San Joaquin kit foxes analyzed. The JAVMA article goes on to discuss the epidemiology of rodenticide toxicity in pets.
Predictably, since the institution of the regulations, pet exposure to anticoagulant rodenticides has decreased. However, total rodenticide exposures have remained stable. That means exposure to one of the other poisons has gone up. That other poison is bromethalin. Bromethalin is a neurotoxin. It causes the brain to swell. Symptoms of bromethalin ingestion may be delayed by several days after exposure. The symptoms may include tremors, behavior changes, weakness or staggering (especially in the hind end), and hyper-responsiveness to stimulation. Severely intoxicated individuals may suffer seizures, coma, and death. The symptoms of bromethalin ingestion are very nonspecific — just about any neurological condition, including other toxins, head trauma, brain tumors, and meningitis, can look identical. There is no point-of-care diagnostic test for bromethalin. There is no antidote. That is the bad news. Fortunately, there also is good news. Bromethalin generally is much less toxic than the anticoagulant rodenticides.
When dogs break into anticoagulant rat baits, they nearly always consume a fatal dose. When they eat products that contain bromethalin, they most often do not. The treatment for bromethalin toxicity is symptomatic care with IV fluids, antiseizure medications as needed, and nursing support. The article in JAVMA reports that “dogs that receive early, appropriate treatment for bromethalin poisoning tend to recover well.” That statement is compatible with my personal experience; I have treated a large number of dogs for bromethalin ingestion, and I have yet to lose one. Nonetheless, remember that bromethalin is potentially deadly to dogs. And remember that there are ethical issues with rodenticide use as well. Mice and rats may be pests, but they are mammals with a capacity for suffering that is similar to that of dogs. Death by rodenticide is not pleasant. Whether you have a dog or not, I do not recommend use of rodenticides. Traps are more humane, and pet-friendly traps pose less risk to your — or your neighbor’s — beloved furry friend.