Everything has to be disinfected and sterilised; obviously surgical instruments but also all surfaces, not forgetting kennels, to stop the cross transference or introduction of infection to patients.

It is the latter that is least enjoyed. It doesn't take much imagination to think of the organic substances that transform a spotlessly clean kennel into a dirty one!

Continuing the theme, there are certain kennel pollutants that are particularly exacerbated by common medical conditions and the last three or four weeks have been marked by runs of these complaints if you pardon the pun.

The regularity of these problems (last pun I promise!) has become such that the on call nursing and veterinary staff alike have almost come to expect the 6.30pm phone call describing a dog that is now very dull and lethargic having suffered from vomiting and diarrhoea continuously for the previous 24 hours, resigning themselves to the evening of smelly entertainment that these patients bring with them.

Gastro-enteritis is a fairly common complaint in the canine world, after all, if you put your nose where and then eat what most of our doggy friends do you would expect an upset tummy now and then.

With cast iron constitutions designed to cope with the constant exposure to things bad, most intestinal upsets will resolve within a day or so especially if the digestive tract is rested by enforced starvation from solid food.

As a general rule of thumb, the very young and the very old are more susceptible to the secondary complications of dehydration but usually can be nursed through their complaint with careful administration of oral fluids. On the whole, a little bit of telephone advice is enough to get things back onto the straight and narrow.

However, occasionally we see the emergence of a few slightly more virulent bugs that cause severe signs which not only don't resolve without medical intervention but can be genuinely life threatening.

With no obvious common thread between our current glut of cases, it has been difficult to identify a specific cause.

Almost certainly the initial trigger will have been a virus, though not the well known "parvo" variety as most of the sufferers have been vaccinated and, without adding too much gory detail, the diarrhoea hasn't quite been the right colour.

In a couple of instances, multiple dogs from the same household have succumbed, though this hasn't always been so, there often being no obvious point of contact with other infected animals.