Pet emergencies can happen at any time, but the holidays can provide additional challenges with all the travel and festivities that accompany them. By recognizing an emergency and having a plan in place, you have very good chance of keeping your animals safe and perhaps saving their life.
Keep Pets Away from Snacks
The holiday season is filled with delicious food, beautiful decorations and visits by friends and family. As wonderful as these are, any of these can cause stress and even danger for your pet.
Food dangers include chocolate, macadamia nuts, alcohol and other food items can cause something as mild as a little stomach upset to something much more serious or even fatal. Decking out the house for the holidays gets us all in the holiday spirit, but one emergency trip to the veterinarian can ruin holiday fun. Pets can find the smells and textures of holiday decorations very interesting and many of these can be extremely dangerous. Both cats and dogs can pull over Christmas trees and candelabras, ingested pine needles, tinsel, toxic plants and flowers and even tree lights.
Know When to Call the Vet
How do know if you have a real emergency on your hands? Supervise your pet closely and watch for signs they would indicate a trip to the veterinarian is in order. These include:
- Trauma, bleeding, broken bones
- Lethargy
- Breathing difficulties
- Bloody stool
- Diarrhea
- Vomiting
- Decreased or no water intake
- Ingesting a poisonous food, toxic substance or foreign object
- Collapse, unconsciousness, disorientation or seizure
- Abdomen is hard and/or swollen
Check with your veterinarian now to confirm their holiday hours of operation. They should also be able to provide a number for the closest emergency or 24 hour veterinary hospital for when they are unavailable.
Save These Important Numbers
Make a list of these numbers and post them near the phone or add them to your mobile phone address book along with the number for Animal Poison Control Center (888) 426-4435. Call about any animal poison-related emergency, 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.
If you think your pet may have ingested a potentially poisonous substance, make the call that can make all the difference. Have a debit or credit card ready, there is a charge to use the service, but it is worth it to save your pets life.
Have a Travel Emergency Plan
The holidays often bring lots of visitors to your home or your own travel to visit friends and family. Pets can find these situations overwhelming and become anxious or frightened and try to escape and accidentally get loose.
Be prepared by having your pet’s id tag up to date with your contact information. To keep pets safe at home place them in closed bedroom or a crate avoids the possibility of them slipping out as guests arrive. When traveling:
- Pets should be in a crate or in the back with safety/car harnesses or behind pet safety gates.
- Get an additional ID tag listing your temporary location and cell phone number for the pet’s collar.
- Have the numbers for local animal control or police in the area you are traveling through and for your final destination.
- Keep current pictures of your pet available on a laptop, tablet or cell phone just in case your pet becomes lost. Both a full body view and a close up.
Being prepared for your pet emergency can make all the difference in having a Happy Holiday.
