Ford County Fire/EMS paramedic Justin Swank knelt next to a small golden retriever named Valentine, fitting an oxygen recovery mask for pets around Valentine's face as the dog's owner, Beth Ericson, held her.
Then Swank fitted a mask onto a male German shepherd named Ranger. As he worked, another male German shepherd named Blaze trotted over to see what was going on.
Swank later said that the fire/EMS department handles between 15 and 20 fire calls involving pets each year, so the pet oxygen masks will come in handy.
"A lot of people have pets, and most of them love their pets and would be very upset if they died," he said. "This would just be one other way to prevent that from happening."
The Wichita-based company Invisible Fence of Central Kansas, which sells products designed to protect pets, donated a set of oxygen recovery mask kits to the fire/EMS department this week. The company will contribute two more sets to the department in the future.
Swank learned about the company's oxygen mask donation program through the K9 Search and Rescue of Kansas organization, which discovered the program last fall at a Wichita fundraiser for the Kansas Humane Society.
Swank later applied for a donation through the program, and the company's owner, Beth Ericson, brought the first set of masks out on Friday.
Up until now, Ford County's fire/EMS crews did not have oxygen masks specially designed for pets. That meant whenever they rescued a pet from a structure fire, they had to use oxygen masks designed for adult humans, which cannot fit a pet's face exactly.
"Their faces are shaped differently than ours," Ericson said. "So this (the pet mask) just makes a nice, comfortable seal around their nostrils and mouth."
She said the masks will allow the county's fire/EMS crews to administer oxygen to stricken pets more efficiently.
Swank remembered the time that he went on a fire call that involved a female dog and eight puppies, and another firefighter kept bringing out more and more puppies.
"We didn't have anything to put on them, no way to do anything, and only three of them out of nine of the dogs lived," he said. "So something like this would definitely have been beneficial."
Reach Eric Swanson at (620) 408-9917 or e-mail him at eric.swanson@dodgeglobe.com.
DODGE CITY —
