This week’s case is a one off for me, and the diagnosis was, unusually, aided by my husband’s garden wall-building activities (more of that later).

The lovely Irish Terrier, Tiggy originally came in and saw vet Carmen as she had been vomiting and had some diarrhoea with a little bit of fresh blood. This is quite a common case that we see day to day. After examining her, Carmen prescribed the appropriate medication for her signs.

Four days later she came back in on a Sunday afternoon and saw vet Sarah as she had become more poorly. Although still quite bright and keen to eat she had vomited a considerable amount of pure blood and was passing tarry black diarrhoea as well. This is a sign of bleeding in the stomach or upper small intestine as the blood is then semi-digested and comes out with a characteristic black appearance.

I was worried about the amount of blood that she may have lost as her gums and tongue were quite pale rather than a nice healthy pink colour. We talked about any possible toxins that she may have eaten, and the owner couldn’t think of any, but did remark that they had recently moved into an old cottage and were having quite a lot of renovations done. They had lime plaster on the walls and Tiggy was licking at this and the lime dust that was coming off the walls.

Here’s where the gardening comes in. I had recently become aware of just how caustic lime products can be as my husband is using lime mortar to build a wall in our garden and only the day before had shown me how it had burned through the skin on his hand where there was a small hole in his glove. I was suspicious that this could be the cause of the irritation and bleeding in Tiggy’s gut.

We admitted her and started her on intravenous fluids and several medications to try and help her gut to heal. The next day was an anxious time as Josh performed an ultrasound on her to make sure that there was no sign of a tumour that could also have been responsible for the bleeding, particularly as Tiggy is 11 years old. Fortunately, nothing abnormal was seen.

We had been monitoring Tiggy’s red cell count closely as that gave a good idea as to whether she was continuing to bleed, and that continued over the next few days with Tiggy coming in for daily visits. For a couple of worrying days, it hovered just above the level where we would need to consider a blood transfusion, but then she gradually began to turn a corner. Her appetite improved, she stopped vomiting and was passing normal poos.

We finally signed her off nearly 2 weeks after her 1st visit as she was back to normal and had a very healthy red cell count. The only problem now is making sure she stays away from the renovations!