The Incredible Dr. Pol

It's time for some family bonding on the Incredible Dr. Pol.

Hey, ho!

Father and son test a stallion's manhood.

Oh god, uncomfortable.

It's mom who wears the pants in the family.

Barely hit it.

But Mother Nature shows who's boss.

Tornado warning, the sirens are going, let's go in the basement!

Oh, better stand up wind.

Meet Dr. Jan Pol.

Come on, get in there!

He's a Local legend. With over 19,000 clients...

And a team that does whatever it takes.

I think I got some on my face, actually.

Oh, come on!

Animals are my whole life.

Jeepers!

Pick em up!

Easy girl.

Pol Veterinary Services.

The Pol's clinic has been open for 30 years.

It's not just run by a family, its run like one.

Alright, you two, separate, you sit down.

You definitely have the roles, my mom and dad is the mom and dad of the clinic.

Dr. Pol takes care of the clients.

There, I got him!

Diane keeps the chaos under control.

I have a gentleman with a sick calf.

- Calf? - Like, baby cow.

My mom, she's the glue that holds the whole operation together.

But everybody can't leave and have nobody here to do small animals.

Charles is back home and saddled with the dirty work.

Hold it right there, she's peeing.

No manners, Charles!

I just try to help out where I can.

I fetch things for him, I help wrangle animals.

Charles, you're making him scream!

I don't necessarily get the glory, but I am a part of the winning team.

- See you, drive carefully. - Gotta go, gotta go, gotta go!

I still love to drive, I love to drive fast, baby.

The first farm call of the day is an emergency across town,

but it won't take long to get there.

Holy Moses, I'm going 80!

Charles Laitinen has a draft horse named Gator with a condition called "Choke,"

food lodged in its esophagus.

When you think of choke, like, we're like, ugh!

You know, like, CPR!

But the horse can breathe in and out; It can't eat, it can't drink.

Then they sit there and go and they can't do anything because nothing goes down,

they can't drink it comes out the nose.

Dr. Pol needs to clear the blockage immediately,

or Gator could develop pneumonia or even die.

Hello, I'm Dr. Pol, how are ya?

Good.

And that's the guy that got into something!

Yeah, well, he was stealing some beet pulp.

Oh boy, beet pulp is so dehydrated that it swells up four, five times.

Swallow it.

Now it can't get it down, and then it sticks right there.

They swallow it, and then it swells up with the saliva they have,

and it sticks in the esophagus and they call that "Choke."

Okay, I'm going to get a tube and we'll shove it up his nose to see what's going on!

Oh, fun.

We have to unclog that block, and it can prove a little bit difficult.

Especially with an 800 kilogram horse.

Hey you big horse, ho!

If he wanted to, Gator could destroy anything in the corral with him.

Dr. Pol tries to wrap a rope, called a twitch, around his upper lip to control him.

Have you worked this horse at all?

Yeah, we work him all the time.

We don't normally shove anything up his nose, though.

Well, that's the old fashioned way of doing it.

There are many procedures that nowadays if you go to veterinary school,

you would have a different way of dealing with this procedure.

Now hold your head down, buddy; A lot easier for me.

- But newer does not necessarily make better. - C'mon!

Dr. Pol needs to run a tube though Gator's nose and down to the

blockage in his throat.

Dang it, it's going in his lungs all the time.

When he hits it, he flushes water in to dislodge the pulp.

There, okay, give it to me, blowing it out, one more.

Okay, I think we got it done already.

He then runs the tube all the way to Gator's stomach to make sure it's clear.

Yup, there we go, good!

There, that was an easy one to be honest with you.

Okay, walk him and see if he drinks.

And if he drinks and it doesn't come out of his nose, which it shouldn't because I

was in his stomach, everything is fine.

- Thank you! - You bet, he's a nice horse!

See, I don't give up, huh?

Gator is a family horse and if something would have happened to him then the girls

would have really taken it hard.

I absolutely do feel very relieved that everything came out well.

Meanwhile, Dr. Brenda takes care of smaller clients back at the clinic.

Business is really picking up.

We're busier than we've been in quite a while.

When one of us leaves to go out on farm calls, the clinic activity just doesn't stop;

It's just go, go, go all the time.

Next to my dad, Dr. Brenda's probably the best veterinarian in Central Michigan.

I'm the one who had the 9:15 appointment and couldn't find the cat.

Okay, did you call to say that you were on your way in?

Uh, your phone's busy, continuously.

I was supposed to bring him in at 9:15 this morning and we couldn't find him,

'cause my husband attempted to put him in this carrier this morning and he took off.

You're the lucky one that gets to touch this cat.

This is one of your barn cats?

Yep, it's one of our barn cats, Cookie.

Barn cats often are not treated; Sometimes, for financial reasons,

sometimes because you can't catch them.

Come on, out of the box, I know, nobody likes to come to the doctor, do they?

A couple weeks ago he started out with a limp leg and then I noticed last night,

there's a big, kind of a hole that's green, not good looking.

Yeah, that's the, ugh.

That's the gross part, yeah?

- Yeah. - I see that, yep, pretty gross.

Cookie appeared to have been bitten or injured, probably fighting with some of the

other cats in the area.

So I think what's happening with the cat is that he's got a bite wound infection

on the right leg.

Okay.

And some of what's going on is because the two legs are kind of together,

by each other, he's spreading the pus and infection from the right front leg.

- That makes sense, okay. - To the other leg.

Cookie's infection is so bad it could kill him if left untreated.

We can put him on some antibiotics and send him home with you.

- Okay. - Clean him up with a little peroxide and some ointment.

I was thinking, like, his legs would have to be amputated.

I mean, then what do you do?

You can't, he's not going to be able to survive on the farm.

Since it could be hard to catch Cookie again, Dr. Brenda wants to use an

antibiotic that lasts a couple weeks.

Andrea, did you, you ordered the Convenia?

Do you think it'll come in tomorrow?

It might be, because it's refrigerated.

Okay, I want to use an injectable form of antibiotic,

but currently it's not here in the building.

We're waiting for it to come in on a shipment.

Okay Lori, we have a wonderful plan.

It isn't going to work today, because I don't have any Convenia.

So, this is the new plan.

- Alright. - I'm going to keep him, so you don't have to catch him again.

- Okay. - We're going to give him a dose of Metacam.

I'm going to give him a dose of Baytril today to get him started on an antibiotic and

you can pick him up tomorrow after work.

- Okay. - Because we'll be here till six.

- Well, thanks for seeing him. - You're welcome.

- Thanks. - You're welcome, you have a good day!

Thanks, you too.

I'm glad that's it's just isolated to him from one incident,

and, um, that it can be fixed easily.

Before the Pol's get back to the clinic, another emergency call comes in.

There's a cow having problems giving birth at Duane Young's farm.

Early spring is a busy time of the year.

We have a lot of animals being born, so springtime is a crazy time.

Where is she, inside?

Most farmers deliver the calves themselves, so if we get a call,

we know there's a problem.

Just take it easy, just watch out.

The cow was in the field when I came home and I could tell something was wrong

'cause the calf was just not coming out.

Watch out, if she gets loose she's running right over you, I'll tell you that.

I see that the hooves are upside down.

So, that means that, uh, that the calf is coming backwards.

A breech birth means the calf's life is in jeopardy and every minute is critical.

A calving is one of those situations where it's do or die.

Generally, I will lose two to three calves a year.

It can be a big financial loss.

Oh man, that's a big calf in there.

There's been no progress, so Dr. Pol resorts to an old way to remove the calf.

Now we're putting on the chains and I put a double hitch on because if you really

pull hard and you have a single loop on it, you can actually break the calf's leg.

Now you start putting with the calf puller.

Through the experience, through the years you learn how hard you can pull.

Jiminy Christmas.

- Big one? - Big one. - She's going to go down.

That's fine, watch it, let her fall down, step away then.

Yep, yep, yep.

Bingo, okay, good, whenever the cow pushes the calf out a little bit,

I ratchet it and I hold it right there.

And this is how we work together.

Keep going, back, now it pops in.

- It's not doing anything. - Nothing?

If it's any longer than half an hour, you have trouble, because if you can't get it

out in 15 minutes, you can't get it out.

Okay, let me do it, let me have it.

It's almost in the pelvis.

Her pelvis is small, dang it!

The calf is too big for the cow's pelvis and even with the calf puller;

Dr. Pol still can't get it out.

I've had experience with the feet coming out backward and I've always lost the calf.

That calf's gotta come out or both the mother and the calf will die.

Oh man.

Dr. Pol only has minutes to pull out the calf or it will die.

It's almost in the pelvis, there!

- There! - Suddenly, you could see it actually pop.

There it goes.

Then you know, hey, the calf's pelvis is in the pelvis of the cow, it fit in there.

Watch out!

Now, when it is that far out, then the umbilical cord also gets compressed.

So, the calf's not getting any more oxygen.