Premature Birth

**FADING PUPPY SYNDROME**
Premature birth: When the puppies are born premature, the major concern is to keep the temperature and humidity right. They can not maintain their own body heat. The higher humidity will help keep the temperature more even. They sometimes have a problem with nursing. It seems that those who are premature do not have the instinct to nurse. These will have to be tube fed. With tube feeding the example is as follows: 1. Lay the puppy on its side - measure from the last rib to the puppy's mouth making sure that the puppy's neck is stretched outward. 2. Mark on the tube where the puppy's mouth starts. You can use a permanent marker or tape. 3. Using a syringe, fill it with whatever liquid you are going to give the puppy. Attach the feeding tube to the syringe and push the plunger until a few drops of liquid comes out of the end of the feeding tube. This makes sure there is no air in the tube. 4. At this point, insert the tube into the puppy's mouth. Sometimes it helps if you squeeze a few drops into its mouth so it will swallow. 5. Gently push the tube down its throat. If the tube does not go in all the way to the mark or tape, pull it out and start again. The reason it does not go all the way down is because it went into the lungs instead of the stomach. Pull it back out and try again. Just keep doing this until it goes to the mark or the tube. Don't ever push to hard, when you meet resistance STOP. 6. At this point you can start pushing the plunger down slowly. To give more you, unattached the syringe from the feeding tube, keeping the tube in the puppy, fill the syringe and squirt a little out so there is no air bubble and reattach it to the feeding tube. Repeat as necessary. This will take practice to hold the puppy in one hand to keep the tube in place and with the other hand fill the syringe. 7. When done with feeding the puppy, gently remove the tube. 8. Next you take a warm wet cloth and massage the genitalia so the puppy can relieve itself. It is the stimulation that makes the waste expel. We recommend having a vet or someone experienced show you how to do this the first time