Gave an 8 year old dog a vaccine he's had yearly for his whole life with no issues. Went to go make an estimate for this dog for a surgery and not 5 minutes later the owner poked his head into treatment to say the dog had just vomited 3 times.
I go in and stare at the dog a moment: no facial swelling, no dyspnea, no lethargy. I clean up the vomit, then check his mucous membrane color: nice and pink with a good capillary refill time. I exit the room to finish the estimate and to inform doc when she finishes with her next exam.
A minute later: he's vomited 2 more times. I go back in, still no dyspnea but he's now lethargic. Lift up a lip and now his MMs are pale and muddy colored, with a CRT greater than 2 seconds. I go interrupt doc in the other exam to come look at the dog.
We give diphenhydramine IM. I go over the surgery estimate and linger in the room to monitor. Breathing is still good 10 minutes later but he's getting more lethargic. No improvement in MMs or CRT. Doc does a reasses, not a fan of heart rate/pulses. We give a steroid injection IM and some SQ fluids. I keep watching. 5 minutes later he's perking up, MMs are getting pinker. I kept him there another 15 minutes and by that time he was back to normal.
In my 26 years as a tech i can say that this is honestly the first time I've seen an older adult dog have an anaphylactic reaction to a vaccine it's gotten numerous times before. It's also maybe the 5th time I've seen an anaphylactic reaction *at all*. And you can imagine how many tens of thousands of animals I've either given vaccines to or have been working the day they got them after 26 years, including nearly a decade in a high volume shelter.
So anyways, that was my extremely anxiety inducing afternoon.
Me to the dog the whole time:
