Jack and his story...
In 2003 Mina decided to cheer up a despondent family
friend, Sarah Miller, by presenting her with a small brown
puppy she called “Jack.” All was well until Jack
became lethargic, refused to eat and was vomiting frequently.
Soon blood appeared in his urine and he had severe diarrhea.Two
veterinarians in the Virginia area each diagnosed a urinary
tract infection and sent him home with antibiotics. Jack
showed no improvement. Mina paid the rising medical bills,
and Sarah suggested they become co-owners of Jack.
Finally, a third veterinarian, suspecting the puppy’s
condition was more serious, ran blood work. Enzyme levels
indicated that Jack had a liver shunt, a congenital problem
in which the liver is deprived of a blood supply and cannot
develop properly. Many puppies can live with the small functioning
portion of the liver for a short period but usually die
if the situation remains uncorrected.The doctor
recommended a procedure to surgically close the shunt, and
Mina readily agreed.
Then, at 10:00 on the night before the surgery, Jack’s
veterinarian called with some last-minute guidance.“He
asked me if I was willing to travel to Philadelphia,”
Mina remembers,“where there was a surgeon who was doing
a new procedure. Of course, I was willing!” In two
weeks’ time, Jack and Mina had an operation scheduled
at the Ryan Veterinary Hospital with Dr. Chick Weisse,V’98,
assistant professor of soft tissue surgery.
It Takes a team...
Rather than traditional veterinary
surgical procedures that require large incisions and can
be risky, Dr.Weisse and the surgery team used a minimally
invasive interventional radiology technique that, until
recently, had only been
performed on people. Metal coils were inserted into the
shunt to promote coagulation, eventually closing off the
unusually large hole in Jack’s liver.The operation
was a success, but about a month later, when the dog was
being
weaned off his medications and his low-protein diet, things
took a turn for the worse. He again became lethargic and
depressed, was
pale, and had a belly full of fluid. Once again, Mina brought
Jack to several
local veterinarians and a veterinary referral hospital;
at each place, doctors
recommended putting the young dog to sleep because of limited
treatment
options. Never giving up hope, Mina decided to come back
to Penn.
Dr. Allyson Berent,Waltham Lecturer in Minimally Invasive
Diagnostics
and Therapeutics and lecturer in small animal internal medicine,
remembers
her first encounter with the pair.“They came in through
the Emergency
Service and Jack was transferred to Internal Medicine the
next morning. I took
his case, and it just turned out that he had a bad gastric
ulcer. Because of the
ulcer, he was losing lots of blood and protein.We gave him
about 12 plasma
transfusions and five or six blood transfusions.We treated
him medically with
different antacids and gastrointestinal protectants, time
and support. It took a
lot of time and persistence.We needed to give the ulcer
time to heal.We also
put him back on the shunt medications.”
A recurrence of the ulcer in 2004 met with the same bleak,
previous
prognoses: three emergency veterinary clinics in Virginia
determined Jack
would not live very long and should be euthanized. It was
the Friday before
Memorial Day, and most people were beginning their long
holiday weekend.
Frantic and in tears, Mina telephoned Dr. Berent and caught
her on her way to
a family event in New York.
“Mina’s local vet said the dog had a perforated
intestine and was septic, so
would have to be put to sleep,” recalls Dr. Berent.
“I said,‘Mina, don’t put him
to sleep. Bring him here and let’s be sure of what
is going on.’ So Mina got
here late Friday night.”
Per Dr. Berent’s instructions, Jack was kept alive
via fluids and more blood
and plasma until Monday, when she returned. Even the Ryan
staff members,
however, were unsure if he would make it. First thing Monday
morning, Dr.
Berent examined Jack and decided to continue with steady
medical treatment,
as each day he was improving slowly. He went home nearly
one week later.
Over the following year, as Jack was slowly weaned from
the medication, his
protein levels came up and eventually all his liver functional
testing was normal.
Mina is still emotional when she remembers Dr. Berent’s
painstaking care. “I
was very thankful.You could really feel Allyson’s caring.
She was so supportive
and encouraging, saying,‘Don’t worry. Hang in
there. Give him time and we’ll
see. He’s going to be okay.’ Some nights she even
stayed at the hospital with
Jack.” And because of the experience they shared, Mina
and Allyson have since
become close friends.
“He was a little runt, and now he’s 92 pounds,”
Dr. Berent laughs.“Usually
dogs with shunts never grow to full size,and he just grew
and grew and did
great. He’s totally off his meds now and is completely
fine.” Because she is so grateful to staff at the Ryan
Veterinary Hospital for saving Jack’s life when so
many others had written him off, Mina will contribute a
portion of St. Germain Caterers’ profits to the Hospital.Through
this ongoing gift, Mina is excited to be
able to fund the Jack Miller-Ebrahimi Program for Interventional
Endoscopic and Radiologic Diagnostics and Therapeutics here.Truly,
the connections that
have brought Mina to the Hospital will benefit animals for
years to come.
