Parapalegic pup brings smiles to patients

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Parapalegic pup brings smiles to patients

By BOB BATZ JR. Pittsburgh Post-Gazette November 27, 2002

- Heidi works Fridays at a hospital

It's easy to see why she likes it.

She's got great hours: 3 to 4 p.m. She gets a parking spot. And her colleagues couldn't be nicer. She can just be herself - a snuffling, slobbering St. Bernard.

This health-care gig, which Heidi has had for nearly a year, was an abrupt departure from her intended career path.

Her family, the Valkos, raised her to show and to breed. They're St. Bernard buffs, and Heidi had it pretty good; she had the run of the house and yard.

Heidi's "mom," Cindy Valko, recalls being at home with her March 15, 1999. Heidi, who was about 2, shuffled into the bedroom dragging her rear left leg. Cindy thought she had a pebble in her paw, but as soon as she put her arms around her and felt her heavy breathing and pounding heart ... well, besides being a dog person, Cindy is a nurse. She knew something was very wrong.

She and her husband, George, hurried Heidi to the vet. By the time they got there, both rear legs were paralyzed. By the next morning, vets had ruled out a spinal cord compression, but they still weren't sure what had happened. Perhaps a clot had cut off the blood to her spine.

The Valkos thought she would die. Or they'd have to put her down.

But after several days, Heidi regained control of her bladder and bowels and wasn't in any pain. She just couldn't move her rear legs. The Valkos decided to keep her.

They had a wheelchair specially built that supports her rear end while she stands on her front legs. She can propel herself in this when she's outside the house. Otherwise, by dragging herself and crawling, she gets around almost as well as the Valkos' two other St. Bernards, Beatrice and Lotto. As Cindy Valko puts it, "She can make it from the family room to the front door faster than I can."

Heidi even can bump down stairs by herself. Her favorite way to go upstairs is for her "brother" - the Valkos' nearly 21-year-old son who's also named George - to pick her up and carry her. She'll let him "wheelbarrow" her, too - hold up her rear while she walks with her front legs. She weighs about 120 pounds, but he weighs 240. George is her best buddy.

Hiring Heidi at Montefiore was the idea of Debbie Mangol, director of the rehabilitation unit there. She knew Cindy Valko, now endocrine nurse coordinator at UPMC's nearby Falk Clinic, because she used to work at Montefiore.

Mangol previously had used a therapy dog, but not one with a handicap (nor one so large). She thought that even though Heidi doesn't have a degree from therapy dog school, she'd be especially great dog therapy for rehab patients, because many of them are using wheelchairs, too.

She was right.

Every Friday now, the younger George Valko can tell Heidi is excited as he gets ready to drive her to work. As insurance against accidents, Heidi wears one of the medium adult diapers that George adapts by cutting out notches for her tail. He packs an extra one in her "Big Dog" tote bag, puts that and the wheelchair into his car or the family van, then wheelbarrows Heidi out and they're off.

At the parking garage, he sets up the wheelchair and harnesses in her hind end. The straps cause her to involuntarily wiggle in what looks like a whole-body wag. Before he follows her inside, he puts on her security tag, which has a drawing of a St. Bernard with a cask on its neck and reads, "Heidi Jo, UPMC Health System."

A recent Friday is typical, in that Heidi had people wondering and smiling and talking puppy talk before she even rolled onto the elevator. "Hi, puppy!" "Hi, sweetie!" "Awwwwwww!"

Up on the 11th floor, George turns Heidi over to recreation therapist Mike King, who spends a few minutes with her before saying, "You ready to go to work?"

Heidi always is.

It's not that hard. She and King just roll from room to room in the rehab unit, where up to 20 patients at a time begin recovering from everything from neurological disorders to broken bones to cancer surgery to transplants.

Mike first makes sure each patient wants to see Heidi. Then they go in for a few minutes. Heidi's role usually is to be stroked, both physically and verbally.

"There's my big girl!" Ervin "Dean" Johnson says from his bed. He's come to know Heidi because he's been in the unit for several weeks after suffering a stroke and other complications from kidney and heart surgery. You can't tell how tough it's been by how bright his face and voice are as he pets Heidi.

"Isn't she gorgeous, hon?" gushes Johnson's wife, Geraldine. "Hi, precious. Hi, darling."

Minutes later, as her husband snoozes, Geraldine Johnson quietly explains how much Heidi's visits mean, especially to a dog lover like Dean. He has six snapshots on his bulletin board of his and his son's springer spaniels, Pixie and Cody, back home in Batavia, N.Y.

The patient across the hall is a new guy, recovering from a transplant. He's sitting in a wheelchair when this big dog comes in in a wheelchair. The man's wife asks, "Is she here to help someone?" King tells them Heidi's tale.

When King explains to another curious patient how Heidi's paralysis probably was from a stroke, the man says, "Sounds like me," while patting her on the head, then jokes about her not wearing a keg. "You drank all the brandy!"

One woman wants to see Heidi so much that she walks down the hall to her, with the help of a walker and an aide. Her hand is more tentative as she reaches out to pet this big dog. Her smile isn't.

Heidi literally touches the dog lover in lots of people, said King. And her wheelchair prompts more than just questions and conversation.

"It's the idea that, 'If she can do it, I should be able to do it. Even if I can't do everything I could do before, I can still have a life.' "

If anything, Heidi is too anxious to keep moving, to visit the next patient, and to get back to George, who lets her slop water from her water bottle and rewards her with three pieces of "Pup-Peroni."

The young man was in UPMC Presbyterian Hospital himself in May, for open-heart surgery to fix a damaged heart valve.

Guess who came to see him?

-- Anonymous, December 01, 2002

Answers

I remember seeing a dachsund in a special wheelchair some years ago. I think I'd do that for my cats if any of them needed it and it wasn't a problem for them.

-- Anonymous, December 01, 2002

It says something about people when they go to that much trouble so their pet can live. And then to share her with strangers, well, it makes ya misty-eyed.

-- Anonymous, December 01, 2002

I've seen two dogs who had been hit by cars and had been fitted with a wheeled harness contraption that enabled them to get around really well.

We'd do the same thing for any one of ours if it would allow them a halfway normal life.

Dunno if I can describe what "halfway normal" means for here, though. :-)

-- Anonymous, December 01, 2002


A few years ago we took our two dogs in for a check up and shots. The vet said that our yorkie had heart worms real bad and that a treatment costing 500 bucks would be needed and that the odds were 50/50.

We did not have the 500 at the time. Come to think of it, this was before I started at the post office, so it was before 1998.

Anyway, we decided to just let him live out what time he had left. a hard decision, but the alternatives [500 nonexistent bucks or immediate death] were not acceptable. The vet continued to send us bills for services that we opted not to do based on the diagnosis of the vet. They finally stopped after we told them we would hire a lawyer if they didn't fix their damn computer.

We kept him, and he is still with us. I just took the dog to a new vet, one we found last year after the yorkie had been mauled. The new vet tested him, and gave him all his shots. All his shots. Including a heartworm preventative.

Can heartworms miraculously clear up? Remember, this dog was not on any treatment plan for years. I mean, we expected him to die within six months. That was what the first vet said.

So, we have a dog who is supposed to be dead these many years, eating and barking and messing around, and he is now 13 years old and going strong, even though he has lost some teeth. you wouldn't know it to look at him eat, though.

I wonder if he is part cat...

-- Anonymous, December 01, 2002


Wow, Barefoot - what a neat story! I'm glad he is still here!

I don't know if heartworms can go away on their own, but I'd rather think not. Kinda makes ya' wonder, doesn't it??

Sure wouldn't be the first time I've heard about a vet who invents diseases. Jerks!

I had a Yorkie I loved named Winston, and he was a wonderful little companion. I'd like to have another, but new additions to the Hilltop Dog Pack tend to be "pound puppies" and dogs that can see our invisible-to-humans-yet-NEON-BRIGHT-to-canines tattoo that says "SUCKER FOR ANIMALS".

It's our animal magnetism, dontcha know? :-)

-- Anonymous, December 01, 2002



We have wondered if the vet meant the other dog, the one we lost in April to a tumor in his snout that was inoperable and causing him pain and us distress. No other vet after that one before 1998 has ever said that either had heartworms and they never had any treatment since that particular visit.

About that tatoo...I know what you mean. I recently had cause to go to our dog catcher website. I needed the number so i could call them about a couple dogs who kept going into our trash on pick up days. When I accessed the site I found they had put pictures of the dogs they had on hand, with the date they were admitted. I did not need that as I immediately wanted to take them all home. I resisted the urge, fortunately for us, and programmed my phone so I wouldn't have cause to go back there.

[damn! i had to go back cuz I wasn't sure about the meaning of the dates shown. I thought it was their sentences, but the page says they will hold them as long as they are healthy.]

-- Anonymous, December 01, 2002


I don't think heartworms can go away, just like that. They stay where they are, nice and cozy and, as y'all probably know, the cure is arsenic. You can't cure heartworms in cats because the cure will kill them first. Apparently, there isn't much distress for the animal, they just drop dead suddenly.

We believe there are a number of vets who are in it for the money. Didja know the reason Hill's can say--what is it?--7 out of 10 vets give their pets Hill's is because Hill's GIVES them the food free if they push it in their practice. My lovely vet, Adriano, has quit PetsMart because of their predilection for pushing expensive stuff. He's going to be a "mobile vet" and do house calls!

By the way, the American Vets Assoc (whatever it's called) is now recommending shots every three years, not every year. Bet your vet hasn't mentioned it! Also, try to get your vet to give shots in your pet's LEG. Some shots can cause tumors at the injection site and it's easier to take off a leg than the back of the neck. . . Of course, you have to get rabies every year or choose the 3-year shot because of health laws. But in some states you can get an exception made for an ill animal.

-- Anonymous, December 01, 2002


*sniff* Great story Brooke. My last beloved Saint Bernard passed four weeks ago today, from bone cancer, peacefully, after her dinner. No drastic intervention (which was total limb amputation of a hind leg). I still hold her and love her in my heart. She was 6.

I learned my lesson about vets from another Saint, some years back, who had lymphoma. I loved Gus so dearly, and the vetinarian oncologist knew that, and in retrospect, saw that as a money maker. She kept hanging that carrot in front of my nose, saying "this drug has an 85% (80%, 75%, it changed with the drug) chance of cure. To make a long story short, 28 painful days, and $5000 later, my beloved Gus died, stuck in a stainless steel cage, on IV's with no one to hug him as he passed. I miss his sweet soul still.

-- Anonymous, December 01, 2002


Damn, Aunt Bee, I'm SO sorry. I shall be hard-pressed to find another vet like mine. I hope he knows someone in Charleston.

-- Anonymous, December 01, 2002

I've been there too, Aunt Bee. My male golden passed away, alone, in my parents house after a too late surgury to remove a colon blockage that I knew was there but the vet wouldn't do till too late.

I was 15 minutes late in picking him up after work. my parents left for church and they said he watched them leave, and 15 minutes later I showed up and he was gone. i had to carry him to the vet office alone because my SO was stuck in our house while the police handled a standoff with the neighbor's son, who was holding his mother hostage with a gun of some sort in her house next door.

It was an experience I would rather not repeat, but my love for dogs will doom me to repeats of some sort or other till it's my turn comes.

-- Anonymous, December 01, 2002



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