Little female cat

Not all cases have a happy end for a vet. After 10 years of practice I ended one of the dozens of sterilizations in a female cat, not heavily pregnant as she happened to be. There was no issues during the spay and, after all day in the surgery, very awake, she is picked up to spend her first  sick night at home. At one in the morning I was called, she is bleeding a lot.

When she came back the bleeding had stopped some minutes before.

I stood with her that night. All seemed ok, no stitch had fallen, she has a good colour, but just in case I decided to have her with some saline solution in vein, some haemostatics, and some pressure in the wound. The next morning her owner came to see her and we decide I take her with me as it is weekend. Two days later she goes back home eating and happy. That night, before going to sleep, her owner takes off her bandage (a cotton net).

To everybody's surprise, the next morning, just after eating some tin food, all her guts are going out of her belly. As fast as possible she is brought to me. I'm more worried for the infection she has now than for the gone stitches. I had heard of the reaction in some animals, against the suture, and I was afraid that had been what had happened. Only one stitch was in her outer skin. Three layers of stitches were completely gone.

This time, instead of "safil" (a sinthetic, absorbible and multifilament suture) I used "monosin" (monofilament), less prone to provoke reaction. This time the stitches worked, but she struggled a week for her life, despite the antibiotherapy (peninciline-streptomicine, and metronidazol) due to the infection.

6 days later I had an appointment to spay some kin's female dog. That same day I had used the now mistrusted "safil" in a male dog with no problem. The female dog came back the next day, and I feared the worst. But this time there were no problem, her owner just came because she was very excited and was liking her wound, which was very dry and with all its stitches.

Luckily this would never happened to you, but once it occured you never forget. One of those moments in your career that you wonder if, after all you chose the right job...