We had 4 litters of puppies between our two bitches Macey and Mia in the last couple years but never came across a Cleft Palate puppy or know anything about them before Grace came along.

When Mia’s litter arrived in Jan 2008 we just thought she had a runt in the litter. When Grace was born she was not only a runt, she was full of fluid in her airway, which took us a while to get her clear. After the birth when we all settled, I noticed it didn’t matter how often I held her on to her mum to suck she never got a round belly. All her littermate were clearly putting on weight and able to suck by themselves within 6-7hrs from birth.

It was not until the next evening we decided to milk her mum and feed her by a syringe every 2 hr. While we were doing this we got on the phone to our local Vet the first thing he suggested was “Cleft Palate”. Once we open her mouth it was very clear she had a large gap on the top starting just behind the gun line. At the time we don’t know how far it extended to the soft palate.

We immediately booked an early appointment with the vet the next morning, and searched any information we can find on the internet.

Most websites recommended euthanasia and deterred you from raising them, because they are prone to infection and the cost for repairs in the future etc…. The only site we found that said they are worth saving is Hennwood website. We printed the 14 page instructions. And read them again and again. We had prepared ourselves what to expect from our vet but were also very sure to let him know our decision.

As we expected our vet was not optimistic, I will never forget the way he looked at Grace then us, however we made it clear that we are here to save her. And we want her to have the correct antibiotic injection as suggested from Hennwood. He told us the injection will cover her for two weeks and to come back after that.

During the second week (12days after the injection) Grace started signs of Pneumonia, we have to take her to the emergency at midnight, it was two days before she was due for her second antibiotic injection, but later I learned from the owner of the same practice, the injection Grace received will only effectively cover her for 10days, therefore she was not covered the last 2days when the pneumonia set in. I was very angry to know that as Grace is a cleft pup prone to infection and pneumonia. The vet should have taken more care.

At the emergency service we seemed to have the most grumpy vet from Cheshire, she keep telling us if she doesn’t improve over the next 24hr it will be best to put her to sleep and how often these pup don’t make it though, if she was born at the vet she would have been put down etc……. at the end all she makes us feel is we shouldn’t have woken her up in the middle of the night for a not worth saving puppy.

We went home with bag of medicine, Grace received a new course of antibiotic injection; oral antibiotic twice a day; oral drop for her lung every night plus we have to inject her every eight hrs to open her lung so she can breath easier, on top of all that she still require feeding every 2 hr around the clock. It was difficult to get her to have all the medicine due to her cleft, we had to mix them with her milk and feed her slowly.

Within 48hr her breathing had slowed down and sounded a lot more normal. The next few days were the same medicine; injection; feeding, and keep her warm the whole time.

Week three came and she started to recover and getting stronger, drinking more milk and each feed can take up to a hr with sucking a finger after every couple of times when she finished drinking. We never tube fed her, she was bought up by a syringe with a teet at the end, but each feed was a worry as you never know any milk has gone down the wrong way. Because her breathing was always very noisy.

Beginning week four we bought her to see a special vet who has more knowledge about Cleft Palates in animals, he was very nice and helpful. And agreed they don’t come across many of these cleft pups as most of them will be put to sleep as suggested by vet. He was also very impressed how well Grace is doing, but he did discover that she had a very wide and long cleft palate, start from the hard palate as medium width but once it got to the soft palate it completely spreads open, he did not think it can be repaired . We never like the idea about repair anway, we believe they will learn how to cope once they get older. But he does think the gap at the back was so big it may help her to eat as there is no tissue to hold any food up.

To Be Continue......