I posted it over here.<\/a>)<\/p>\nAfter a very difficult morning walk last week, I took him urgently to the excellent, local animal hospital, Angell Memorial. Well, it was hardly a walk \u2015 he could barely get over the curb, and I had to carry him home. Scary.<\/p>\n
The kind veterinarian admitted him overnight, they did an ultrasound and cardiac ECHO, and the next day discharged him home with a terrible diagnosis:\u00a0 a suspected hemangiosarcoma, leading to a pericardial effusion and ascites, along with likely metastases in the lungs. Here \u2015 take a look at the discharge paperwork (I’ve highlighted some of the low points):<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/blogs.nejm.org\/hiv-id-observations\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2025\/10\/angell_jpeg.jpg\")
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It was quite clear that they did not expect him to live much longer; they also verbally advised us to arrange for home euthanasia within a week. Through sadness and tears, we scheduled it, and I shared the information on this blog because, as I wrote, it was therapeutic.<\/p>\n
This has been such a wonderful community all these years, and it didn’t disappoint! Wow, I even heard from non-dog people \u2015 including my mother and my first editor on this site, Mimi Breed. We know you don’t get the dog thing, but we appreciate the sympathy nonetheless.<\/p>\n
But guess what? Louie didn’t understand the discharge instructions. Hey, he’s not so great with fancy medical terminology. Plus, he can’t read.<\/p>\n
So after the anesthesia from his procedures wore off, he’s pretty much back to his baseline self \u2015 a little less perky, perhaps, but still happy to see us, still eating, still wagging his tail. That’s a new picture of him up there at the top, after he scooted up the stairs. No more of those scary walks, at least not yet.<\/p>\n
Look, we’re not in denial \u2015 at least not completely. We’re medical people, after all. The professionals clearly gave him a grim prognosis, and we accept that; he won’t be with us for long. But to quote my wise colleague, social worker extraordinaire Susan Larrabee, you know your dog’s time has come when “your dog can no longer do dog things.” Louie can still do dog things. And that’s good enough for us. Euthanasia on hold, at least for now.<\/p>\n
And since this is an ID blog, here\u2019s a closing fact: we literally carry pieces of our dogs with us. Studies show that people and their dogs exchange microbes through shared living space and touch, and that the dog gut microbiome is astonishingly similar to our own<\/a> \u2015 it’s much closer to humans than to pigs or mice. The study used a microbiome gene catalog containing 1,247,405 genes, which sounds like plenty to me.<\/p>\nSo when someone says that a dog becomes part of the family, it\u2019s not just sentiment \u2015 it’s science.<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/blogs.nejm.org\/hiv-id-observations\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2025\/10\/louie_steps.jpg\")
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