Client expectations soared and clients were stressed and not in control, and we tried to follow government guidelines and those set out by our governing body the Royal College.

More people than ever got pets and we became busier than ever but not every client was kind and the job became more of a battle and morale and mental health was dropping.

For a long time Mochdre Vets has supported charities and been proactive in supporting organisations.  We have wanted to give back more and doing volunteer work has been something the team wanted to persue.

Veterinary practices are a place of healing, support, and second chances. Run by vets, nurses, and people who are passionate about animal welfare, they help ease the suffering of animals and give many a brighter future.

But, in some parts of the world, veterinary supplies are limited, expert training is lacking, and clinics are ill-equipped. Unable to provide animals with the treatment and care they so desperately need, many animals suffer unnecessarily.

Worldwide Veterinary Service provides free expert care to animals in need all over the world. We do this by sending vets where they are needed most, training them to increase the standard of care globally and by shipping urgent aid supplies worldwide, every week of the year.

Mission Rabies

Rabies kills at least one child every nine minutes. It’s an agonising death and there is no treatment once a person shows symptoms of the disease. If you get bitten by a rabid dog (the cause of 99% of all rabies in humans), the only chance you have is to get to a hospital and receive a course of post exposure vaccinations – which is fine as long as the hospital has them and if you can afford them. Tragically, in the places where rabies is most prevalent, access to treatment is difficult and prohibitively expensive.

The way to eliminate the disease is by vaccinating the dog populations that carry it. Protect the dogs, protect the people – and it is mainly children that get bitten as they are the ones who come into contact with roaming dogs most.

 Killing dogs doesn’t work – it just creates a vacuum for more dogs to move into an area – but vaccinating the ones there is the way to establish a herd immunity and this technique works! Mission Rabies vaccinated over 35,000 street dogs in Blantyre, Malawi last year (and the year before). Blantyre hospital annually reported the highest incidence of child rabies deaths from any single institution in the whole of Africa in 2012. This is why we targeted the city. This year it hasn’t recorded a single child rabies death.

So let’s do this properly – let’s eliminate rabies from one of the poorest countries of the world, let’s protect hundreds of thousands of dogs and people, let’s establish a blueprint for how this disease can be beaten in sub Saharan Africa on a national scale and let’s do it in the next five years. MSD Animal Health are donating the vaccines, Dogs Trust are supporting 3 states, Mission Rabies are totally fired to make this happen – we just need a bit of cash and a few thousand volunteers!!! and here we were!

Illovo Sugar Plantation

I think Mochdre vets is very well equipped and we offer a high level of care to our patients. In Malawi however we were given a gazebo and we just had to set up as a field station. We had none of the usual fancy gadgets and monitors we had to rely on ourselves to be vigilant and trust that the owners could hold their pets while we injected them. Most of the people bringing the pets were children. In the UK they wouldn’t be allowed to sign the consent form if they were under 18 but on occasions we had people that couldn’t read or write and we relied on just a finger print! We worked with some of the locals that had good English and they helped translate, Jo was responsible for registering them and weighing them.

Blantyre SPCA

As well as the out reach project we were involved with Malawian vet students and participated in helping them and sharing stuff we knew.They were all very interested in pain management and we had dogs at the clinic that we were able to perform acupuncture on and share our experiences. The staff at the Blantyre SPCA were so helpful and welcoming to us and they really seemed to want to ask questions and learn from us.

Our experience

Hannah

Hannah final year student nurse ….

From my adventure to Malawi there were two key memories which will stick out for me, one being Majete wildlife reserve and the other being the outreach project at the sugar cane plantation.

Majete started of with lavender hot towel and a fruity drink on arrival. We were then introduce to the lovely manager who promptly organised our bags to be taken to our rooms and a table set for lunch, it was a real luxury! We went on four game drives, two early rises and two sundowners.

The game drives were truly magical where we got to see: impala, waterbucks, baboons, vultures, giraffes, zebra, lions and not to forget the elephants! The elephants frequently visited the watering hole which was only 5 meters away from the lunch table.

The outreach project was people who did not have the means to pay for sterilisation and rabies vaccinations. Setting up for surgery out in the middle of a sugarcane plantation was interesting to say the least, but we made it work. After the first couple of surgeries the team really pulled together to make a flowing system. During this outreach, I have learnt how to be a nurse using the bare minimum supplies and staff. Putting IV catheters in without any assistance from another nurses to raise the vein and restrain became easy. And monitoring multiple animals under anaesthetic all at once became the normal. At the end of the outreach project, all 88 animals seen for surgery went home neuter, preventing unwanted pregnancies and stopping the spread of TVT (transmittable venereal tumour) which are spread through sexual interactions of dogs.

The adventure to malawi was truly life changing and has hopefully made me grow into a more confident nurse. Seeing what difference we can make to people who need our help has really gives me confidence to want to pursue more volunteering campaigns in the future.

Amy

Jo

Head receptionist Joanne said;- When I heard about our trip to Malawi I had mixed emotions .A mixture of excitement and also doing something out of my comfort zone. When we arrived my nerves subsidied and I felt instantly relaxed.The Malawians were so friendly and I soon realised why Malawi is known as the heart of Africa. The team at the BSPCA was so welcoming and the animals under their care so well looked after.

One of the highlights of my trip was getting involved with the outreach project at the sugar plantation. The project was neutering the village dogs which was a huge success.All in all this trip has made me realise how lucky we are with what we have.Some of the children and families have very little but it doesn’t stop them from being happy, smiling and welcoming.

Louise

To try and write a full story of our time would take pages and pages . This is a short paragraph , a taste of what we all encountered. Long may we hold onto the joy of what we achieved with Mochdre Vets.

Louise also talked about Mission Rabies

Many adults and children are still dying from rabies In Malawi and the surrounding villages .

Mission Rabies is a charity initiative set up worldwide to try to eliminate dog bite transmitted rabies.

They need a minimum of 70% of cats and dogs to be vaccinated to help stop rabies as a killer.

I was fortunate enough to be asked to do two days outreach with the mission rabies team alongside other volunteers and it will stay with me for the rest of my life.

We set off early in the morning armed with a bag full of vaccinations and big red “ bingo style dobber” for marking the newly vaccinated animals.

A very loud megaphone to alert all the villages to bring out their animals to us and off we went.

We traveled many miles through terrain that I was amazed we actually got through!

Once the cars couldn’t go any further, we set out on foot over land. The obstacles for me anyway were entertaining to say the least, at one point going over small bridges and water ways over big obstacles for a long way and sometimes just for one animal.
All adding to the numbers needed.
My memory of the children is what made me a little emotional at times, as waving at a few children made dozens and dozens more appear and then would all chase the cars, running alongside waving cheering and the smiles were huge.

We managed 84 vaccinations one day a big total given how far apart each animal was.

The cats came out in bags which at first was alarming but then quickly realised how easier and less stressful for all . Cats didn’t seem to mind either!  The tree method was also a winner, hold the cat against a tree, it will naturally hang on, vaccinate it and go to the next one 🤩🤩

The feeling of accomplishment was always present and has stayed with me since. Even with no medical skills you can make a difference, common sense and enthusiasm can get you far.
I met so many people, all humble and grateful just for us being there to help.
The education is always present on handling, caring and the facts on rabies.

Everyone’s documented and certificates were proudly given .

The fact that I had the opportunity to even join the group from Mochdre Vets still amazes me but I’m proud to have been able to do a very small part .

Melody

Thursday came around and Nicola and I had a very bumpy (literally) ride around Blantyre to treat the TVT dogs with chemo injections.

Friday we were off to Majete, where we had 3 amazing game drives and even saw elephants about 30 meters away at our campsite watering hole.

The following week I enjoyed a few rewarding (but very tiring) days of mission rabies. Where a total of 91 dogs and cats (in bags) were vaccinated against rabies.

Finishing off our last night with a wonderful sounds of Malawi concert where we had 3 different artists and lots of dancing. Malawi had both ups and downs of the water and electricity shutting off randomly, but also the pleasure of working with a terrified puppy who went from hiding in a corner, to climbing into my lap.

Overall an unforgettable experience. Thank you to BSPCA and especially Sarah for making my dreams come true.

Nicola

The people were lovely and so grateful to us for helping the village dogs. It was rewarding as we weren’t only just preventing Rabies in cats and dogs but also humans as well. We also visited the villages treating dogs with TVT (transmissible venereal tumours), neutering and giving vincristine injections weekly. It was amazing and so rewarding to see the tumours shrink from the size of melons to barely visible at all. I learnt some new things such as how to give and monitor injectable anaesthesia rather than the usual gas anaesthetic which was quite daunting. I learnt about Rabies and how to deal with cases (I didn’t realise Rabies had a 100% fatality rate). I also learnt about the treatment of wild animals such as darting lions, tracking wild dogs and pangolins (although unfortunately it was only cats and dogs I got hands on with!)

Chloe

Hello,

First of all I would like to say thank you very much for giving us the amazing opportunity to be able to volunteer with the BSPCA in Malawi. It was a once in a lifetime opportunity that I will be forever grateful for and that has helped me gain a different perspective of the veterinary world outside of the UK and helped me further my veterinary knowledge which I shall use throughout my veterinary career. I thoroughly enjoyed working alongside the staff and clients of the BSPCA they contributed greatly to my great experience in Malawi.

I loved the amazing experience of the safari in Majete and being able to see many wild animals in their natural habitat.

I cannot say thank you enough for the amazing experience I had in Malawi, I still can’t believe I was able to take part in such a great opportunity.

Chloe x

Ella

The next day we decided to head over to Majete. It ended up creeping up to 36 degrees which was crazy to us as we’re so used to the wet welsh weather!! On our first game drive we spotted a beautiful male elephant which got us quite emotional. He was very tranquil which our tour guide informed us can be quite unusual. We saw a range of other stunning animals such as all the different types of antelopes like the Nyala. Our tour guide was teaching us the difference between them all by their markings + the quantities of their packs and he quizzed us regularly 🙂

We then cooled ourselves off by the pool with some lunch for a few hours before heading on our second drive for the sunset. We again saw some elephants but this time we saw a family with their calf. The male became quite protective of the calf therefore we had to move on quite quickly before they became unsettled or upset. Our guide was telling us the story of Majete’s reserve and how he hopes it will persevere and that they will get to include more animals in the near future.

On our way back as the sky got darker we were alerted of some Lions near by , and our guide was driving very quickly in the dark to try and find them for us, it was a lot of fun but we did come home with a fair few bruises!
We stayed the night in Majete in the lodges , but we did not get much sleep as we later learned the Lions decided to come to us after we failed to find them!

The next day was our introduction day at the clinic. We got to meet all the volunteers and their inpatients. We were also given a presentation by Dagmar about Rabies and the BSPCA’s future goals in treating it. I learnt that Rabies is 100% fatal and despite having vaccinations we would still need post exposure vaccinations if bitten.

That afternoon the orphaned puppies became our responsibility for the rest of our time there. At first they were fed every 2 1/2 hours, but they eventually began to be fed every 4-5 hours. It was a great experience on how to hand rear puppies and we quickly got a routine down between us. We took turns during the night where two of us would do one night then the other two the next, we were very tired but seeing the puppies grow + improve made it very worth while.

We also gifted Verson and Aaron with their stethoscopes which they were beyond happy with. They couldn’t believe it was theirs and that they were also personalised. It was emotional and made us so happy how something small can mean so much to them, after all their hard work they deserved it 🙂

On Wednesday I volunteered myself to go on the TVT rounds with Courtnie, Aaron and George. I had no knowledge of TVT therefore it was a very interesting day! I was primarily in charge of documenting all the information onto their app, such as if their tumours had improved + dates of the treatments etc. I did also get to assist in restraining the dogs and even preparing some of the medication in between. I feel like this experience has given me more confidence in handling / restraining dogs as most of them were a bit wild and would not easily sit as we’re used to !

As a bonus I got to experience more of Blantyre as every patient was quite a distance from each other, all the people were so kind and welcoming and the views were breathtaking.

Thursday morning we were up bright and early to do the morning round at the clinic. We assisted in giving the animals their medication, change their bedding and giving them fresh food. We also were socialising many nervous dogs and encouraging two amputee dogs to try and get mobile again post surgery.

After the round was done Auguste and I did two surgeries together, a dog castrate and a bitch spey. I am fairly confident with monitoring under anesthetic therefore I was very keen to help. I was very surprised to learn how they manage their anaesthetics with an injectible ‘top up’. I had to be extremely observant and at any sign of the dog being light I had to administer 0.5-1ml of the ‘top up’. It was stressful at first but I did find it very fascinating as well. It was not only great to further my experience with anaesthetics but it was incredible to watch my colleagues gain confidence with surgeries and monitoring as well.

Lydia also taught me how to place IV catheters. After a few attempts I was successful and felt very proud of myself! I did try with the next surgery as well but unfortunately blew the leg!! Practice makes perfect 🙂 Courtnie, Mark and Lydia invited us out for dinner which was nice as we got to know them better and to learn more about the BSPCA – we also had a laugh eating in the dark due to the power going out.

Thursday afternoon we went over to Game Haven to experience another drive but this time focusing on Prey animals. I had never seen a Zebra so close before and I was taken back by how beautiful they were . We also managed to find their only Giraffe ‘Mrs G’ which was amazing as they stated she can be difficult to find.

Unfortunately we did seem to bring a part of home with us and it rained the entire time ! But we still had an amazing afternoon. We then made our way back to the puppies before packing our bags to sadly head home. On Friday morning we made our mark on the volunteers wall and took plenty of pictures to look back on with the other volunteers. We were extremely grateful for the incredible experience and they were grateful for our help and newly found friendships.

This trip was truly a dream come true for me. Experiencing the culture, people and animals was magical, and getting to further my skills in a variety of conditions really has helped my confidence and I believe they will be beneficial to my nursing in future. After this experience I am sure to volunteer again in the near future.

Claire

Firstly, I will never be able to thank Sarah enough for this amazing opportunity!

Malawi was beautiful, the staff and animals at the BSPCA were lovely to work alongside.  In our country, we are used to gold standard veterinary care, experiencing veterinary care in a different country was definitely an eye opener for me, having to deal with patients with diseases such as rabies and commonly parvovirus was different to what I’m used to.

The work that the BSPCA do is wonderful, the mission rabies was a highlight for me, going to different villages and vaccinating the dogs against rabies was very rewarding.

Going to Majete and seeing all of the wildlife in their natural habitat made me quite emotional, especially the elephants, we were so close to a male elephant who had left his herd to go and find a mate, he was breathtaking!

We also visited Game Haven where we saw some beautiful Zebras – again, so beautiful and so close to us.  Malawi was an amazing experience that I will never forget and will forever be grateful for. Thank you Sarah.

One Saturday a few months ago, a kind member of the public (Helen J) brought an injured hedgehog to the practice. He was a juvenile male, found wandering out in the daytime up at Pen y Bryn with a severe wound to the back of his head and neck area. The wound was quite extensive, he almost looked as if he had been scalped by something. It was also quite a dirty wound so vet Laura admitted the hedgehog to hospital for treatment.

Under general anaesthetic, his wound was flushed out and debrided, removing all unhealthy or infected tissue so that clean skin edges could be sutured back together for faster wound healing. His surgery went well and he was up and about and eating well by the next day. He was also started on antibiotics to help clear any remaining infection. “Juan Julien” (as the nurses named him) stayed with us for 10 days whilst his surgical wound healed. Because he weighed only 460g on admission, he was not able to be released for the winter straight away, as hedgehogs need to weigh 650g minimum to hibernate over the winter and survive.

Back in recovery after wound repair

“Jules” was sent to Hedgehog Help Prestatyn, a charity which takes in ill, injured or underweight hedgehogs and rehabilitates them for return to the wild. He stayed with Tracy at Hedgehog Help for a month, until he had gained a whopping 420g to reach a release weight of 860g. He was released onto a smallholding in the local area which already had a small number of resident hedgehogs.

On release day, weighing 860g!

Hedgehog Help is a small charity run by Tracy Pierce.  She rehabilitates up to 30 hedgehogs at any one time and is dedicated to helping nurse them back to health so that they can be returned safely to the wild. As our native hedgehog population has declined over the last few years, it is even more important to have places like this to look after them and to offer help and advice to people who have found an ill or injured hedgehog.

If you would like more information on what to do if you find an ill, injured or daytime roaming hedgehog, please check out Hedgehog Help Prestatyn on Facebook:

https://www.facebook.com/Naturegarden4hogs/

or ring Tracy on 01745 856181 or 07591576765 (Not in the night please)

Donations of cat food (tinned or pouches, ideally not fish flavoured), cat biscuits or tinned dog food are always gratefully received at Hedgehog Help as this is what the hedgehogs are fed whilst recovering.  You are welcome to drop donations at the practice, just let us know who it’s for and we will make sure they get to Tracy!

As we have said before we don’t have a proper anniversary as we were seeing clients before we officially opened, so we count August the 12th as our anniversary as that is when we had our first open day.  12 months on and with lots to celebrate this year we help our ‘Open Day 2018 – A day in the life of ……’    which gave clients new and old a chance to see behind the scenes and see what our staff might do in a day because lets be honest in our job there is nothing like a typical day!

We really have a great bunch of clients and the support and enthusiasm we get from them is second to none and this was shown on our open day with lots of presents, cards and well wishes. We had clients volunteering to help us on the day to generously donating prizes for the raffle.

We had live demonstrations throughout the day from Abbie and Gwenan from the rehab team supported Cerys our super 16 year old swimmer and young guns Oscar and Lucy.

In the gazebo were Claire and the nursing team Nat, Jodi and Jess ably supervised by Clive who pottered a bit but was mainly happy lazing on a chair waiting to be fussed. Clients got the opportunity to set up a drip, practice stitching up and bandaging!

Clive

The star prize was a dog swimming pool cake made by Pippa at Cariad Cakes – even starring Clive, Pedro, Bert and Drum!

The raffle did fantastically and managed to raise £600 which will be split between our three chosen charities Hectors Greyhound Rescue, North Clwyd Animal Rescue and St Davids Hospice.

The morning started with the day officially being opened by Gaynor from the Milverton Hotel in Llandudno who has been a great friend and supporter to the practice although as predicted people were chomping at the bit to come in so a few limboed under the ribbon before it was officially cut!

We think we have had an amazing year with lots of real success stories but a most of you know we also eat a lot of cake and to reflect this we had a gorgeous chocolate cake from the Goodheads, some fabulous cupcakes and chocolate cake from Sue, Patsy and Holly and a superb dog cake by Tina at Tina’s cakes which came complete with edible grass!  Long standing friends of the practice the Charnocks came just before the end loaded up with more cakes in case we ran out!

At the end of the night we all headed to Wildwood in Llandudno for a slap up meal and the nurses who are all like stick insects managed to find room for Dessert!

We are delighted to be sponsoring this years Woofs & Wellies sponsored walk in aid of St David’s Hospice.  Every dog attending the walk will receive a complimentary session in our hydrotherapy facility – a canine spa for tired paws!

To register for this worthwhile event you can contact Agnes at St David’s Hospice on 01492 873674 or email her agnes.jones@stdavidshospice.org.uk or if you prefer contact the surgery.

We look forward to seeing you there!

Wow what a day!

I consider myself very lucky as the support we recieved was over whelming. When I first set up Mochdre Vets I met the Griggs’s and their lovely puppies and despite coming and seeing the building transform, they probably know every exit, entrance and thing behind the scenes – they still came to just show support!  And that was the bench mark for many clients who generously supported Mochdre Vets on the open day!

So the day started with me carefully loading my salted caramel and my Baileys cheesecake into the car. Those of you who know I drive will understand what an achievement it was to get them to the surgery in one piece. Especially as I seem to have clients that should be on Bake off! – yes Mrs Good head, Mrs West  and Miss Stanford  you certainly are women of many talents!

When I got to the practice the staff were there armed with their own creations some made lovingly by their own homes and some still in boxes with a price tag on! Morale was really high and work had begun the day before setting everything up to welcome people!

Each staff member had their own job. Pippa and Jo were in charge of greeting people as they arrived. Having the most important jobs of the day our lovely clients Corinne, Lizzie and Ray kept everyone entertained providing cake, tea and refreshments.

Claire and Cookie were in x ray with various games and parasite facts. There was a jar full of jelly worms and jelly worm eggs that will be won for guessing the right number of contents (winner to be announced Monday), there was also guess the object magnified by our microscope, guess the x ray and play with a parasite.

From here the tour took them up the corridor here there was ten pup bowling with Joanne. The aim was to call your dog in the perfect position to score a strike!

We had so many dogs attend and they were all so well behaved. There was no barking no puddles or accidents so no call for Joannes behavioural advice.

Then it was onto me in consult 1 where you had the chance to operate on Luca the pukaa very poorly pet that had swallowed a coin, dress up as a vet and do operations for money!  Think we lots of budding vets in the making!

Next door in cons 2 was Gwenan demonstrating the physiotherapy agility course and my my didn’t we have some professionals!

Next door in the cat consulting room was Natalie or Catalie as she will now be known playing pin the tail on the cat, mouse hunt and dazzling us with cat facts!  Who knew Sir Issac Newton invented the cat flap?

Further along the corridor was Ceri in charge of the raffle and again thanks to our generous clients swelled in prizes as the day progressed!  Don’t worry the draw is being done on Monday and winners will be notified!

Next it was in to Hydro where you could hook a duck in the treadmill or try and net the inflatable basketball with Abbie! The good thing about here was everyone was guaranteed a prize!  Sadly my only regret of the day is that after all the anticipation I didn’t hook a duck, the day just passed in a blur!

On the way out was Rhian to make sure everyone got their goodie bag which was full of gifts for adults/children cats or dogs depening on your preference!

For those that you come to the practice regularly you will know who long suffering Lee is and he was on hand taking photos and luckily he is more interested in models with four legs!  It also gave us the opportunity to get a staff photo with everyone in it! However when we all went to the Pen Y bryn afterwards everyone was too tired to get glammed up so just a few jokey ones!

The day was a massive success in terms of seeing lots of old and new clients but we also managed to raise a massive £600 for St Davids Hospice so thank you to everyone! There was lots of cake left over which is going to North Clwyd Animal Rescue for them to sell in their cafe with proceeds going to the animals or just give to their helpful volunteers!

Alfie’s mum sent us this picture of him after the open day and thats how we felt! My dear friend Liz is a shopaholic and has regularly tried to get me to come to the January sales with her, however as someone described yesterday like the next sale ‘millions of people all in their element and all in the way’ I think I will give it a miss!

THANK YOU TO EVERYONE!