The Dog Owner Club

A half minute short bulbed clinical thermometer is necessary. See that the mercury is well shaken down to 9OF. or so. The bulb of the thermometer should be lightly greased with vaseline and gently inserted into the rectum for about two inches. A restless animal can be held by an assistant. Keep the instrument in position for a full minute, withdraw, wipe with cotton wool dipped in antiseptic, and read the scale.

A dog’s temperature is best taken when he has been resting for half an hour. When the thermometer is in daily use (during an illness, for example) it should be kept in a little glass jar the kind used for meat pastes is suitable with a little cotton wool at the bottom, and diluted antiseptic. Be careful the latter is not too strong as it can affect the marking on the instrument. Never use hot water for washing.

Variations In Temperature
The normal temperature of a dog is considerably higher than the human roughly 1015F. Variations are, however, perfectly possible in health, and some animals have a temperature as low as 100F. Puppies tend to run higher normal temperatures than adults and an excitable dog may have a slight temperature for an hour or two even when perfectly well.

When a dog looks listless and dull, and refuses his food, the temperature should always be taken. If it is over IO2.5F. the veterinary surgeon should be informed. It may be nothing at all, but so often the virus diseases such as hard-pad and distemper begin in a very insidious way, so one cannot be too careful. Again, the temperature should be taken daily for a week after whelping. There is often a slight rise to IO2.5F.and of this no notice need be taken, but if it rises to 103F. or over, and the bitch seems shivery and disinclined for food, the veterinary surgeon must be told at once. Possibly a dead puppy or afterbirth has not been expelled and, if retained, it can be the cause of septicaemia in a very short time.

During illness the temperature should be taken at least twice daily, at the same times if possible, and the result written down. This is most important as the variations in temperature in some diseases and conditions are of great significance.
Broadly speaking, any rise over about 1O2.5F. can be regarded as fever. Slight fever (or mild pyrexia) is from 102.5/103.5F., fever from 103.5/104.5F. and high fever (or hyperpyrexia) from 104.5F. upwards. Sometimes slight fever, particularly in hard-pad, is more dangerous than fever or high fever. A very high temperature 105.5/106.5F. should never be ignored and, apart from the treatment given for the disease of which the high temperature is merely a symptom, some attempt must be made to reduce it. This can usually be done by ice packs (see Concussion) , aspirin, and plenty of fluids, but the veterinary surgeon attending the case may suggest or employ some other measure.

A sub-normal temperature can be more dangerous than high fever. After specific treatment in the virus diseases the temperature occasionally drops to 99F. or so, but no notice need be taken provided the animal is kept warm. The temperature in cases of shock and collapse is usually very low from 97F. to 98.5F. or so and in cases of internal haemorrhage, an occasional and disquieting phenomenon in leptospiral jaundice and Rubarth’s disease, the temperature can drop even lower, and the patient is severely collapsed with blanched mucous membranes. A fatal outcome is common in such cases.

Temperatures usually drop gradually to normal in the course of a few days or weeks, although they may rise again after a short intermission. (This is typical in distemper when, after a brief initial period of fever, the temperature returns to normal for about a week, then rises again.) When the fall is gradual it is termed a fall by “lysis”, but when (as sometimes happens) it is rapid and dramatic within twenty-four hours or less it is known as a “crisis”. In the old days, before the antibiotics and sulpha drugs were known, the high temperature in pneumonia cases in humans often ended by a crisis.

Fever must not be looked upon as an unmitigated evil as it at least shows that the body is putting up a strong resistance to the harmful infection causing the disease. Even when the temperature returns to normal it should be taken daily for a week in case of a relapse, when it will rise again.

Filed under: Dog Health