Do you ever have one of those days where you get home and you say to yourself I just need a couple more hours of productive time and I’ll be ahead of things – – and then you noticed that two of your dogs have porcupine quills in their face? That was me last week. It was such bad timing, it was almost funny. I’m actually really good at triaging situations like this, as long as there’s nothing disgusting for squeamish me to be looking at. In this case, my two curious dogs Layla and Shadow had apparently met up with someone who was in our yard, just looking for an apple.
Last time we had a veterinary emergency, which I wrote about, was when all three of our dogs decided to tangle with a sick, looking raccoon, we went to VEG, Veterinary Emergency Group, in Shrewsbury.
With this non-emergency, but more of dog urgent care, I figured we’d track right back to VEG. I called them and told them we were coming. All good. Scout, being the smartest one, got to stay home. No quills for Scout. Layla had only one quill in her nose and Shadow had only eight. I had people reach out and tell me that we could just take these out ourselves, and then there’s always the people who say just wait until tomorrow and go to your regular vet, to avoid the extra costs of it being an ‘emergency’. Porcupine quills are barbed, so if we waited for our regular vet to be open, that would’ve given both dogs the overnight to chew at the quilled areas, and potentially break some of the quills. Once that happens, the barbed side can work its way to the dogs interior, opening us up to potentially huge vet bills for bigger problems. And why weren’t we just getting pliers and snips and doing this ourselves? Absolutely not. Our dogs are very docile and didn’t even need sedation at the emergency hospital, but that is way outside of our lane.
This is a resource story of emergency veterinary services in Central Massachusetts. You may or may not know this, but before I got my real estate license, I was actually assistant practice manager at Wachusett Animal Hospital and Pet Retreat. This is actually where my recognizable photo of Pugsley and I originated. I’m not including this gig in my First Jobs, Worst Jobs story, but I definitely could (under the worst jobs section, thanks to some personality conflicts). Although Wachusett Animal Hospital was designed primarily as a veterinary emergency hospital, ambulance and all, I don’t think they do emergencies anymore. And when I called, they were closed. We had to bring Pugsley there for urgent care at some point, and they had given me a list of emergency hospitals, which is how we originally connected with VEG.
We originally went to VEG when we had the raccoon incident. Heading there for this incident of two dogs at dusk with a porcupine, we had a call from VEG when we were enroute to Shrewsbury, telling us that unfortunately, they were swamped, and due to the unpredictable nature of veterinary emergency needs, they couldn’t actually tell me how long it would be before they could sedate our dogs, predicted timeline 2 to 3 hours. They suggested a few other places.
We called Tufts in Grafton, but they had too much going on, so suggested a few other places. We weren’t interested in going to Deerfield or Walpole, so we connected with Blue Pearl in Framingham–and they said come on in. Being that it’s about 40 minutes away, we got there around 8:30pm, waited a bit, the quiet waiting room was a good sign, then they brought us in. We waited about half an hour or so in total when someone came in and told us that we would not be able to be seen at all due to a critical emergency, and suggested a few other places.
At this point it was like the walk of shame bringing the dogs out and starting over. It reminded me a little of no room at the inn, as we got the dogs back in to Jay’s vehicle to do some more shedding while we decided where to go next. Turns out the list of a few other places suggested by Blue Pearl included Boston West 24 Hour Emergency Veterinary Hospital just a few miles away, the only business open late at night in a business park. We were so happy that they could help.
All positive things to say about the staff, how they communicated with us, the dogs were comfortable, or as comfortable as a border collie with 8 quills in her face could be. Since by now everything was closed, we couldn’t even leave the dogs and run out and pick up some takeout. The staff shared snacks from their break room, which was just a very nice thing to do. All in all, dumb dogs and we were very happy with Boston West 24 Hour Emergency Veterinary Hospital.
I’ll include below a list of Emergency Veterinary Hospitals accessible from Central MA. If you’re reading this far, you probably have a dog, and that dog might go missing at some point. Keep my other story in mind as a resource if you need it at any point.
ASPCA Poison Control
(888) 426-4435
Available via Phone 24 Hours
Blue Pearl Pet Hospital
Emergency
(781) 684-8387
659 Worcester Road #9, Framingham
Open 24 Hours
Boston West Veterinary Emergency & Specialty
Emergency
(508) 319-2117
5 Strathmore Road, Natick
Open 24 Hours
Foster Hospital for Small Animals
Tufts Cummings School of Veterinary Medicine Emergency Services
Emergency
(508) 839-5395 (Option 3)
55 Willard Street, North Grafton
Daily 7am-9pm, some services 24 hours
Massachusetts Veterinary Referral Hospital
Emergency
(781) 932-5802
20 Cabot Road, Woburn
Open 24 Hours
MSPCA Angell
Emergency
(617) 522-7282
350 South Huntington Ave, Boston
Open 24 Hours
MSPCA Angell West
Urgent Care
(781) 902-8400
293 Second Avenue, Waltham
Monday through Friday 8am-5pm
Veterinary Emergency Group
Emergency and Urgent Care
(508) 653-4700
196 Boston Turnpike, Shrewsbury
Open 24 Hours
Veterinary Specialty Center of Sturbridge
Urgent Care
(774) 241-3111
173 & 175 Charlton Road, Sturbridge
Monday through Friday 7:30am-7:30pm
Saturday 9am-7pm
Veterinary Urgent Care Center
Urgent Care
(857) 416-9009
70 Gold Star Boulevard, Worcester
Monday through Friday 9am-10pm
Saturday and Sunday 11am-6pm
Wachusett Animal Hospital and Pet Retreat
Emergency and Urgent Care, NOT 24 HOURS
(978) 874-4100
29 Theodore Drive, Westminster
Monday through Friday 7am-10pm
Saturday and Sunday 10am-8pm
Westford Veterinary Emergency and Referral Center
Emergency and Urgent Care
(978) 577-6525
11 Cornerstone Square, Suite 100, Westford
Open 24 Hours
