How your puppy can live longer.


"Learn stitching from your wife!" the groomer advised the vet.

The 3 mini-Maltese puppies were incredibly beautiful if you appreciate the Maltese with clear "tearless" eyes. These puppies had no tear staining in their eyes unlike so many seen.

Their mother did not have this problem although the sire had tear staining.  The pet shop owner had reminded me that these puppies were delivered via Caesarean section by me when I vaccinated them.

"Why didn't you retain them for breeding?" I asked the pet shop owner who has a dog breeding farm about his strategic plan for 2004.  "These are the Maltese all buyers will like and they are not easy to find. Therefore, you have a product people desire and command a premium price."  I was trying to upgrade his breeding operations so that he would be more successful in this economic downtown period.   


The mother of the three lovely non tear-staining Maltese pups. The father had epiphora.

"I had to pay bills, including your veterinary fees" the pet shop owner was frank.  Pet shops seem to bloom all over Singapore and price undercutting had attracted a large number of customers away from established enterprises such as his.

This pet shop owner had over two decades of experience and would have exposure to the skills of veterinary surgeon he had referred cases to. Now, it was his time to advise me.  

"Your stitching needed to be tight so that the skin edges pull close together," the pet shop owner said as he bench marked me against the skills of the other vet who had performed Caesareans for him previously.  

I remembered he was unhappy with the stitching on his favourite Maltese bitch's skin 2 days after the Caesarean section. He had shown me the reddish yellow flesh between the 2 edges of the skin.  It was about 3 mm in width and looked gross.

"Your stitches were not tight," he said. "That's why the fat from under the skin had oozed out between the wound."   I had not commented then because this was the first time I had encountered this situation from several Caesarean stitching of other bitches.

It looked like "proud flesh" or granulation tissue seen in wounds which had been licked continuously.

However, the pet shop groomer had not forgotten my lack of sewing skills. This was the third bitch I had performed a Caesarean for him. There was no complaint about the first. The second died before Caesarean was performed.

It was good to get feedback on my veterinary surgery. Could things be done in another way and be better? 

The skin stitches for this bitch were horizontal mattress sutures and were placed such that the two edges of the skin meet upwards to heal. The knots were at the side of the edges unlike simple interrupted stitching where the knots were on top of the skin.   

So, what was the skin situation now I wondered? Would the bitch have an ugly scar?  This was his favourite bitch and excellent healing of his bitch were very important to this bachelor.

What about this bitch now, six weeks after Caesarean?

Would I dare to ask the pet shop owner to see the bitch?  I better faced the reality of being an incompetent canine tailor.

The pet shop owner lovingly took the well groomed Maltese out from the cage, turned her upside down so that I could see the belly. 

I expected "proud flesh", the ugly swweating lick wound spreading out and protruding above the skin surface seen in dogs that cannot stop licking their wounds.

Would you believe it? I could not believe my eyes. There was not even a line or scar showing that the bitch had a Caesarean.

As to the cause of the "oozing fat", it was the reaction of the wound to the bitch's licking and probably the use of the pet shop owner's special disinfection liquid which had irritated the wound and caused the bitch to lick more. 

It was best not to comment again. Unlike clothes, stitching skin edges should be quite "loose" so that the skin edges can close properly.


The skin edges swell after stitching and if the stitches were too tight, the healing would be irritating to the dog.

The pet shop owner did not say a word and I presumed his unhappiness had evaporated and he would not bring up the matter of poor tailoring again.



The breeder's wound cleaning solution sometimes irritate the surgical site and causes licking of the wound. This chihuahua breeder had no complaint about the stitching or wound healing.