Anyone who knows me and Shannon know how much our dogs mean to us.

On the evening of March 2nd, Dolly, our beautiful Doberman, experienced some bleeding which wasn’t related to her season. She was taken to the vets first thing in the morning and as she was doing so well, they thought it could be a phantom pregnancy, but we asked them to be safe and do a scan and they found out it was Pyometra.

Pyometra is a serious and potentially life-threatening infection of the uterus that causes it to fill with bacteria and pus. Most dogs have a good prognosis if diagnosed and treated promptly, but it can be deadly if left untreated.

She had an emergency spay with 1kg of infection tissue also removed. She did have a small bleed during the surgery, but she was recovering really well. On Friday 6th she experience some leakage from her stitches and she ended up back in the emergency vets on Saturday 7th. They weren’t too worried as she was so bright in herself and said it may just be a bad reaction to her stitches, so she was given antibiotics and sent on her way. The antibiotics did stop the leaking and she was healing really well. The vet did mention an “infected stump”, but they said because it is so rare and that she would be so unwell if it was that, they weren’t concerned. On Monday 9th she had another visit, but they were really happy with her recovery.

On Friday 13th, Shannon came home on his lunch break to Dolly’s entire crate and bedding soaked in blood. She had to go to the vets immediately, still losing a lot of blood. Our local vets told us she needed to go to Newcastle immediately for a blood transfusion. They had to open her back up and found she had an abscess and infection on her uterus stump from her first surgery.

A uterus stump infection, or stump pyometra, is a rare but serious infection developing in the remnant uterine tissue of a spayed dog, usually caused by hormonal influence from leftover ovarian tissue. It only happens in around 2% of spays/pyo surgeries.

Dolly had to have a blood transfusion, plasma transfusion, stump removal surgery, a stitch in her bowel as the infection was effecting her bowel and intestines, an IV, a catheter, a fecal catheter, and packing (a tampon) to try and clot her bleeding.

She was in the ICU for 3 days and she’s now back home recovering.

Our insurance will only cover £2000 of the costs. We now have a bill of £6501.85. We know it is a HUGE amount to try and raise and don’t expect at all to hit that goal, but we appreciate any help we can get at all towards this whilst we figure out the rest.

We really hope Dolly is now on the mend, but with her doing so well after her first surgery and then taking a turn so quickly, we feel on the edge of our seat everyday until she’s in the clear. It’s been the scariest few days.

Dolly turned 4 on the day of her first bleed. She is the sweetest, most gentle and loving Doberman. She lives with her German Shepherd brother Marty, and they are both our world. We appreciate all the support and love for Dolly so much. Thank you. ❤️