It was a nightmare situation for Helen Abel. Her two-year-old Mini Australian shepherd, Kasey, had eaten death cap mushrooms at an oak grove in Healdsburg during a walk. Mushroom poisoning kills many pets and sadly the prognosis did not look good for Kasey. Godd fortune smiled however, when it was discovered that Dr. Todd Mitchell at Dominican Hospital in Santa Cruz was currently in the middle of testing a new drug which could potentially save people with mushroom poisoning. During his tests, he had discovered that while the drug he was working on had a high chance of success, there was also a surgical procedure which might save lives as well.
The procedure involved draining toxic bile from the victim's gallbladder and Kasey seemed to be the perfect test subject to see if this would help. Vetrinarians performed the surgery and sure enough Kasey began getting better and better. She has made a full recovery now and her miraculous survival is a good sign for people suffering the same fate. Dr. Mitchell intends to attempt the same procedure on people in rural areas who suffer from poisoning but for whom the drug he is developing might not be available.
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