By Casey Neill
A COCKATOO woman who brought her beloved pooch back from the dead is singing the praises of doggy CPR.
Janine Arlove is also warning dog owners to watch out for osso bucco bones after a deadly chop almost claimed her boxer’s life.
Ms Arlove bought nine-year-old Jasmine a bag of raw dog bones late last month. A short time after Jasmine began to tuck in, Ms Arlove noticed her pet was frothing at the mouth. She reached inside the dog’s mouth and discovered a bone was blocking her airway.
Within moments Jasmine was no longer breathing and had no heartbeat.
“I thought ‘it’s too late, she’s dead’,” she said.
Ms Arlove removed the round bone.
“It was pretty hard to get out. They shouldn’t be given to dogs,” she said.
She clamped her hands around Jasmine’s jowls, placed her mouth over the boxer’s nostrils and mouth and breathed.
“I didn’t panic and I just went straight into it,” she said. “She was dead. I just had to try.”
Ms Arlove rolled Jasmine onto her side, having seen a similar resuscitation attempt on television, and began to beat on her chest to start her heart.
“I closed my fist and I was just thumping,” she said. Jasmine soon regained consciousness, coughed, and began to breathe again. “I brought her back to life,” Ms Arlove said. “She was pretty ill for a couple of days but she’s fine now.”
Ms Arlove did not think twice about getting up close and personal with her pooch. “Not one second,” she said.
Jasmine has been a part of the Arlove family has since she was a puppy.
“She’s very special to us,” Ms Arlove said. “Jasmine’s my baby,” she said.
Monbulk vet Andrew Byrne praised Ms Arlove’s efforts. “I think it’s quite an achievement,” he said.
“She was very heroic and I’m quite impressed.”
Dr Byrne said boxers and similar breeds had a “squashed up larynx in the first place”, making her feat more impressive. “They don’t have a good airway,” he said. He said mouth to mouth was not essential to revive an unconscious canine. The vet advised dog owners to instead stretch out their pooch’s neck and pull out their tongue to allow air to flow into their lungs.
Dr Byrne said they should also pump on the dog’s chest, just behind the front legs. “You cause air to go in and out of the lungs,” he said. “That will often stimulate the heart to get going.”
He said they would get a reaction from their pet within two to three minutes if the resuscitation was going to be successful.
Dr Byrne warned dog owners to take care if they did attempt mouth to mouth.
“A dog that’s unconscious is a dog that you don’t have any control over,” he said. “They’re not sure of what’s going on and the brain doesn’t necessarily work properly when they’re unconscious.”
