My First Disaster

I remember reading a James Herriot book when I was a kid. James, as a new graduate had just done something that lead to the death of a cow. He was distraught when he went to his boss and told him what had happened. His boss sat himself down and said something to the effect of "you've only killed one cow. You can't call yourself a vet until you've killed a whole fields worth of cattle."

It's a sad fact of the job that sooner or later, every vet will have an animal die because they did something wrong. I am no exception.

When I was working in Esperance, I had a call out to a cow that was down and couldn't get up. She was extremely aggressive, so the physical exam was a bit limited but I was happy with my diagnosis of low blood magnesium. This is often characterised by increased aggression and being unable to stand,so the cow fitted the description perfectly.

The treatment for this condition is intravenous magnesium, which must be given slowly or it can stop the heart. Because this cow was so aggressive, I had to jump in, give it a bit then jump back to avoid injury. I did this 3 times without her getting up. On the fourth attempt I gave her a bit more and she immediately gasped, then died. I had given her too much magnesium too fast and I had stopped her heart. The farmer and I both knew I had killed her.

I felt sick the entire drive back. As soon as I walked into the clinic, I asked the boss for a chat. He knew from the look on my face that something bad had happened. At this point I realised what a good boss I had. He told me he was glad I had told him the truth, and he straight away phoned the farmer and paid him the value of the cow as compensation.

Of course, farmers never let you forget when you are wrong, even when you save a cow. On another callout to this farm, I had to do a caesarian on a cow. She had developed an infection prior to giving birth, and I thought she was beyond saving. I told the farmer this, but he told me "you've driven this far to see her, you might as well try to save her".

Because the cow was so weak, she couldn't walk to the yards so we had to do a caesarian in the middle of the paddock, with dust blowing into the wound and no running water. After I had closed her up I gave her a shot of antibiotics and pain killers and gave the farmer another injection of antibiotics to give in two days if she was still alive.

Two days later the farmer rang me to ask if she really needed the second injection. "She's looking so good I can't catch the bloody thing!'

Every time I visited the farm after that until I left Esperance, the farmer would make sure he'd point out that cow and remind me "that's the one you said was going to die."