Dr. Loretta Ehrlund
and her
Sri Lankan Adventure!!
SuperSlow Client Dr. Loretta Ehrlund,
veterinarian, recently returned from Sri Lanka where she was
engaged to teach a course in Veterinary Technology to the
Sri Lankan Army. Eleven students were selected for this
opportunity from the the Sri Lankan Military-all non-English
speaking. An interpreter was used for all parts of the
course.
The Sri Lankan Army is using Military
Demining Dogs to locate land mines set out in agricultural
fields and road ways by the Tamil Tigers, an insurgency. The
dogs can locate the mines at a safe distance through their
exceptional sense of smell, says Dr. Ehrlund. "They then
give a signal to the handler who marks the spot and later,
the found mines are disarmed or exploded safely. We really
don't loose dogs to the mines, they are that good, but there
is disease galore on this island country that the dogs are
very susceptible to and so that is the need of the program I
taught--to teach the handlers how to recognize disease and
get early help for the dogs and handle minor emergencies
since they will be working in the countryside and not close
to veterinary care."
"My fondest memory of this classroom
project was during a bandaging practical. We had just
lectured on various wounds and their treatments and
discussed the difficulties of applying bandages to dogs
which have odd shaped legs and hair all over them.
As the end of the class time was drawing
near for the day, a student asked me: "How would you apply a
bandage to a wound on the rump and near the tail of a dog?"
A good question I thought, so I checked to
see that I had two dogs left for demonstration, a male and a
female. I explained the concept of using a figure eight
bandage so that the bandaging does not slip but also that
you must be careful to leave out the anus and male and
female parts so that the dog can wear the bandage
comfortably and function.
I assigned two student to apply a bandage
to the female dog and that went well, but just as we
finished, a commandant came from across the road to say that
I was running late with the class and that some of the
students were to get their rifles and report for evening
duties.
So I got the male dog and explained that
as I was faster at applying these bandages that I would just
demonstrate the last one so they could see it before they
left.
I wrapped the belly wrap quickly and was
going around the buttocks pretty fast, when the class called
out loudly: "balls, balls, balls". They were warning me to
watch out for the boy parts, when it suddenly occurred to
me: "Dang, they do know some English."
Loretta Ehrlund DVM
