A Cry for Help
The Wake County Animal Center is located in Raleigh, North Carolina, and houses over 100 cats, dogs and other animals in need of homes. The shelter rescues animals from various backgrounds, including those from trauma situations, evictions and homeless strays. The staff’s goal is to nurture, heal and find loving homes for these animals. Currently, the shelter is facing an overcrowding problem, with too many animals and not enough space. This could lead to euthanasia for space, something the shelter has avoided for eight years. The only solution is the adoption of these caring, helpless animals.
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Markie Mark, a cat who was thrown out of a car, is getting treated. He experienced heavy bleeding from his right ear due to the impact of the moving vehicle. Veterinarian Dr. Avnee Mistry applied quick stop anticoagulant powder on the ear to stop the bleeding. Markie Mark will go to a foster home to recover before being put up for adoption. Mistry said the treatment of these animals is unfair. “Our first and foremost goal is to care for these animals and provide care and support,” Mistry said. “And to think that someone also not only didn't want this cat, but then caused harm to this animal, to me, it hurts me in a way. Especially a kitten, someone so vulnerable like that, it just seems so so unfair.”
Jill Claude Del Valle, the receiving and kennel teams supervisor at Wake County, holds Benjamin still while Mistry sedates him. Mistry said the shelter is unsure of the cause of Benjamin’s leg injury but suspects it resulted from blunt force trauma. She said most dogs are hit by cars, though the exact cause of their injuries is often unknown. Benjamin was sedated so Mistry could clean the wound and apply a splint to stabilize the leg. Mistry is a part of the veterinary medical team, alongside Dr. Sarah McCain, and veterinary assistants Alex Baugher, Mattlin Fagan, Nate Selig and Caroline Denya. Together, they fulfill the medical needs of the animals. Mistry emphasized the importance of her team members, saying they serve as the “eyes and ears” for all the animals in the shelter, enabling her to provide more comprehensive care. Claude Del Valle is on the receiving team, handling initial assessments, administering vaccines, evaluating behavior and informing the veterinary team of the next steps. “There are people you get to share your successes with,” Mistry said. “Having a good team makes the hard days so much better because we feel the same things, but we are there to support each other and it's huge. We really do try to have a very supportive and inclusive environment.”
Dr. Sarah McCain sedates cats and shaves their scrotum in preparation for neuter surgeries. Mistry estimates that 98% of the surgeries performed at the shelter are spays and neuters, procedures that prevent animals from reproducing. Spaying, the procedure for female animals, involves removing the ovaries and uterus, while neutering, for male animals, removes their testicals. Mistry said she believes two major factors contributing to shelter overpopulation are the failure to spay or neuter pets and the cost of veterinary care, which many people cannot afford. “There are unwanted litters of puppies that get born and we get them to come in,” Mistry said. “We have a lot of people who can’t afford the cost of veterinary care. For example, we have someone whose dog ate a foreign body and the owners couldn't pay for the treatment. And so they're like, ‘Well, I guess we just have to euthanize this animal.’”
Veterinary assistants Selig and Denya sedate a dog before his neutering. Mistry said the center performs around 20 spay and neuter surgeries each day. Mistry estimates that the shelter has between 80 and 100 dogs on the adoption floor and 200 animals in foster care. Mistry said the constant influx of animals needing homes has led to overcrowding, making her feel helpless at times. “There's so many animals coming in, so many animals that need help,” Mistry said. “There's probably over 300 families who are trying to get their dogs surrendered to the shelter because they can't look after them. And as we have so many dogs in the shelter, we literally just don't have the kennel space to help them.
Veterinary assistants Selig and Denya grab the next dog to sedate and prepare for neutering. Cats are kept on the top rows, while dogs are on the bottom. All of the animals are adopted and need to be spayed or undergo surgery before going home, which usually happens on the same day. Each animal’s sign on their crate lists important details, including pain medication or sedation injections to be administered before and after surgery. Once the procedure is finished, younger animals are given the reversal drug, Antiseden, to wake them up from anesthesia. “Especially for younger cats, you don't want them to be under anesthesia or sedated for too long because there's risks as well, so we'll reverse them as soon as they're done with their procedure,” Mistry said.
McCain spays a dog by removing both sides of the uterus out, tying it off, and then removing it from the body. Mistry, who also performs surgeries, said that despite the emotional challenges of the job, it is rewarding to see animals go from “rags to riches” after receiving proper nutrition, preventative care and love. “They go from being these dirty, skinny little guys to full, happy healthy animals who then find homes,” Mistry said. “It’s really rewarding to see the majority of the animals really flourish under your care.” She said she takes pride in being an advocate for animals in cruelty cases and giving them a voice. “There are people on the side of these animals trying to help make their lives better,” Mistry said. “I get to come home every day from my job and say that I made a difference. And that’s huge.”
McCain rests before starting surgery. With more animals entering the shelter, the demand for spays has risen. Mistry said the public can help by adopting from shelters when looking for a new pet. She said people have misconceptions that shelter dogs are poorly behaved or former fighting dogs, but in reality, they are full of love and kindness. Mistry said they see the best and the worst in people at the shelter. “We see these people who come out and will adopt these animals and give them amazing loving homes, but we also see the worst in terms of people who cause intentional abuse to animals or neglect their animals and they leave their animals behind,” Mistry said. “That’s something that happens almost daily at the shelter.”
Mistry is performing laser therapy over Buddy’s incision to help reduce inflammation and swelling after his front leg was amputated the day before. Buddy was owned by a homeless person and was hit by a car six months ago, resulting in a broken leg. Mistry said there was nothing they could do for the leg since Buddy walked on it broken for six months. Laser therapy uses different wavelengths of light to help stimulate new tissue growth and promote blood vessel regeneration, which brings nutrients to the skin and therefore helps it heal. She said they only amputate if there is no other option, which usually happens once a month. Most dogs at the shelter, including Buddy, are mixed breeds. Mistry said that they have a high number of pitbull mixes, who have a bad stigma against them because of their history of dog fighting and being used as guard dogs. “It's really unfair because they get a lot of stigma and prejudice against them when the majority of them are just mixed breed little mutts who then get treated unfairly and get euthanized more frequently than other types of dogs just because of the way they look,” Mistry said.
Claude Del Valle oversees pathway planning, managing the shelter’s available kennel space and addressing overcrowded challenges. Her team is also responsible for carrying out euthanizations, the process of ending an animal’s life through an injection. The drug, phenobarbital, is injected into their veins and stops the heart quickly and painlessly. Euthanasia due to space constraints is an issue the shelter hasn’t faced in years, until now. “I think a lot of animal shelters are dealing with issues of space,” Dr. Avnee Mistry said. “The worst thing is thinking that we may get to the point where we have healthy animals who we have to euthanize just because there's no space at the shelter for them.” She said the hardest thing for most people at the shelter is knowing that if these animals had an owner to advocate for them, they probably would not have to be euthanized. She said that pets are becoming more essential to human families, and people should consider going to their nearest shelter to adopt. “These animals just want a place to live,” Mistry said. “They just want a roof over their head, someone to give them food, and they have so much love in return for it.”