Dr. Lera Clone rescues a pet pig from an owner with Alzheimer's who can no longer care for it. The pig weighs nearly 200 pounds, double the initial estimate, complicating sedation and transport. She's wrapped in a blanket and driven 35 to 40 minutes to a family farm in northern Florida.
May 26, 2020.
80 to 120 pounds.
Approximately 200 pounds (almost 200 lb).
About 35 to 40 minutes.
Alzheimer’s disease.
Hey, guys. Dr. Lara here. So normally we focus on dogs and cats. This video is gonna be a little different, a wee bit different, and there's a little play on words there. So I had a client go ahead and reach out to me who she is suffering from Alzheimer's, and she was looking for a home for her pig because she had to sell her home and move into a condo, and she was not able to take her pet pig with her. And so what ended up happening was it's something that puts me in a situation where, since I don't normally deal with pigs, I reached out to a couple of different people who deal with pigs. And it was also something that, being vegan, which, by the way, most veterinarians are not vegan. I wasn't vegan when I became a veterinarian, and it made me really wanted to help out this pig that much more, just because I was concerned about what might happen if we weren't able to find the pig a home. And so when we figured out what we needed to do, the drugs that we needed to use or drug, we were given a certain weight range. We were thinking about 80 to 120 pounds max. And that makes a big difference for us as doctors when we're trying to provide sedation, because we calculate our drugs to the pound. And so when Abraham and I arrived to the house, that wee little pig looked a wee bit bigger than 120 pounds. The pig probably looks closer to almost 200 pounds, if not more than that. And so when we arrived, we wanted to give little girls her name, little girl, a little bit of time to kind of get used to us and get her into an area where she would be able to be handled safely for us as humans as well as for herself. And so one of the things that the owners had mentioned was that she had been acting kind of odd anyways. But after we were able to give the injection. And so the way that it works, typically with swine or pigs, is you'll get the needle, you'll put it into the skin first, and then they might move around a little bit. So that way you don't have the syring kind of waggling back and forth. Once they calm down, you can go ahead and connect the syringe to the needle, inject the drugs in, as you guys will see. And. And then it usually takes about 10 to 15 minutes for the drugs to kick in. The issue was that I brought a certain amount of drugs with me to go ahead and sedate her, assuming the maximum dose of Our maximum weight of 120 pounds. That meant that the dose that I had given her ended up being half that dose because she was double the weight. And so after about 25 minutes of giving the medication and her starting to act a little weirder than normal, she ended up, you know, we ended up kind of nudging her and just kind of getting her to go into the direction of the truck, where we were able to wrap a blanket around her and then be able to pick her up and put her in the bed of the truck so that way she could be transported to where she needs to go. She is now going to be at a farm up in the northern end of Florida, where she's going to be part of the family there. And one of the things that, you know, was interesting for me and definitely for Abraham as well, was the noises that she made when we were picking her up. You know, at the end of the day, we really just wanted to do this for her so that way we could get her somewhere safe, sound, and in a good home where she would be treated like a family member. We were happy to go ahead and get her in there. They were able to transport her. They covered her with some plastic and then drove her for about 35 to 40 minutes, where they were then going to have a bigger truck to be able to transfer her. But mom told me that they were super, super grateful, and we were just really happy to be able to help and get into that truck. And I don't know where I got the strength to lift that pig, but we lifted it and we got it in there, and we got her taken care of. So hope you found this video helpful. If you know anyone who needs to watch it, please share it with them. If you found it entertaining, because it was definitely entertaining on my end. Please subscribe. Otherwise, be safe and thanks for watching.
