Hi!
I'm posting about two things.
One, there is an interesting article that just came out on reducing neonatal mortality:
www.ivis.org/advances/Concannon/davidson/chapter_frm.asp?LA=1
It is interesting timing, because in this article, Dr. Davidson mentions that she saw a reduction in puppy death from 9.5 percent to 2.5 percent in her repro practice (and she does repro for Guide Dogs for the Blind, so she sees a LOT of litters) when she started using the "WhelpWise" service. DogHobbyist.com is going to have WhelpWise founder Karen Copely RNC, BSN, as a special guest this coming Friday at 9 PM Eastern Time in the DogDen.
Karen is a high risk obstetrical nurse who co-owns two patents on methods to monitor uterine activity and fetal heart rates in non-human mammals, used by breeders in their homes. I've used her service and it's really quite amazing - you put the doppler on your bitch and then hook it up through your phone to their center, where they have 24/7 support. They read your bitch's uterine contractions and also ultrasounds of the puppies' heartbeats. You can get an idea if whelping is imminent, and if a puppy is in trouble. The last litter I was involved with where we used it, we did end up having to get an emergency C-section as one of the puppies was in trouble. I am sure we'd have lost that pup without using this service.
Anyway, she'll be at our chat to answer questions and talk about WhelpWise. I will also see if I can get Dr. Davidson to be a guest at a future event - she is local to me and I know her slightly.
If you would like a free email reminder of the chat, you can sign up on any of the transcript pages - here is last week's:
Understanding Genetics Transcript
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PHChristy
Director of Community Services
PetHobbyist.com
