Today the World Vets team split up to work at 2 different locations on the island. Barb, Natalie and Daniel head out to the stables to trim feet on the horses. The rest went to set up the spay/neuter clinic and get ready for appointments. Dr Kathy Quigley and Dr Shaun Vaniman did surgeries while Lindy and Sandra K assisted in surgery. Leslie gave the premedication injections outside while Stacey drew blood to test the dogs for Ehrichiosis. Dr Cathy King saw appointments which included lots of skin problems, vaccinations, a puppy with distemper, a dog with an ulcer in its [View Full Entry]

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After a long day of flying from various locations around the U.S.,our team of 14 finally met up here in Utila, Honduras. It is a small island with only one very narrow road dotted with cantinas, dive shops and locals selling their . We have three veterinarians, one pre-vet student, a dog groomer, an anesthesiologist, a hair stylist, a hydro-geologist and phlebotomist just to name a few. We had a quick meeting to go over details of tomorrows whale shark project, then all piled on our "Honduran limo" ( there was a little problem and we don't get our other two [View Full Entry]

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Again we awoke to loud thunder but no rain...yet. We packed up all our gear and headed out in the boat again. This time we were headed for Portobelo. The car ride there was as bumpy as before but not so many of us were crammed in one car. This time our clinic was set up in a classroom provided by the catholic/red cross group. The room was quite nice. It even had lights and a tile floor. It ended up being the hottest day of the trip. We had a lot of work ahead of us for this day. The [View Full Entry]

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We woke up to thunder early on Sunday morning. It began raining while we were having some breakfast on Isla Grande. We met our boat back at the house ready to take us to La Guaria. We grabbed our personal belongings and all boarded the boat. Although relatively close, we could not see our destination because of the rain. The spaypanama group always has a great attitude, even in the pouring rain. By the halfway point, it was raining so hard it felt like hail. Susan had grabbed our roll of toilet paper as we ran out the door just in [View Full Entry]

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Today the real work begins. We had a restful night of sleep in a very cool house (cool neato not cool as in air conditioned), We did have fans though. The mosquitos are not as bad as we expected..we have only seen a few so far. Although we keep ourselves covered in OFF. So far no need for sunscreen. They are not kidding when they say rainy season. The island is very small. No cars just boats. No interent but there was a phone booth. The houses are mostly small concrete structures with outdoor kitchens. Our house is a vacation rental [View Full Entry]

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This morning we had an early start at 5:30am to go to Portobello. We left early to go scuba diving today. Pat drove us to the other side of town where we met up with Mary and Dusty a couple of expats who have worked with spay panama in the past. We took a van to the coast. It took 2.5 hours and it was pouring rain most of the way. It was like a flash flood that wouldn't stop. It was just the 4 of us going diving. It turns out the owner of the dive shop grew up in [View Full Entry]

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Today was our day to see the sights and see some of the historical areas around panama with Pat. We saw some of the old ruins around Panama City. Then we went to an old part of town (where the president lives). We stopped by a vacant building which is going to be set up as a surgery clinic to spay and neuter locals animals. Spaypanama has already operated on over 700 animals in this area of town. There were lots of armed guards with semi-automatic weapons on the street corners. There was also some kind of demonstration going with people [View Full Entry]

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WE LEFT SPOKANE YESTERDAY MORNING AT 5 AM AND MADE IT TO DALLAS THAT EVENING. WE HAD AN OVERNIGHT LAYOVER IN DALLAS BUT WERE FORTUNATE TO BE ABLE TO MEET UP WITH PAT CHAN OF SPAYPANAMA. WE SPENT THE NIGHT AT HER SISTER MARIA AND FAMILYS HOUSE. WE WERE UP AGAIN THE NEXT MORNING AT 1AM WASHINGTON TIME AND WERE HEADED TO THE AIRPORT. WITH ONLY ONE DELAY TO CHANGE THE TIRE ON OUR PLANE, WE MADE IT TO PANAMA BY MID-AFTERNOON. WE HAD NO PROBLEM GETTING ALL OUR VETERINARY SUPPLIES THROUGH CUSTOMS. OUR CHECKED LUGGAGE WAS NOTHING BUT MEDICAL SUPPLIES [View Full Entry]

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Today was the World Vets dog vaccination clinic at the Spokane Indian Reservation. Five vet students (Jenn, Erica and Kristen from the class of 2010 and Erica and Shea from the Class of 2009) along with World Vets members Deni, Susan and Cathy helped put on the clinic. Armed with 500 doses of vaccine (generously donated by Schering Plough Animal Health) we spent 3 hours giving free vaccinations to anyone who brought their dog. A few people were a little suspicious and wanted to know what the catch was. There was no catch. Free vaccinations and that was it. Although we [View Full Entry]

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