Fire Departments Get Pet Oxygen Masks

By Rachelle Bowden in Miscellaneous on May 2, 2005 12:02PM

A lot of times when firefighters rescue animals from burning houses and they aren't too badly burned or injured from the fire, they die from smoke inhalation because there's no good way to give a cat or a dog oxygen. Oxygen masks for people don't fit very well over snouts so firefighters have done what they can to try to save a pet like doing mouth-to-snout and sticking oxygen hoses straight up an animal's nose, but it's not always successful.

Jumping on a trend that's been spreading around the country over the past year, a bunch of fire departments in IL have found a better way to revive cats and dogs rescued from fires: pet oxygen masks. They're plastic, cone-shaped masks that have a rubber ring to provide a tight seal and they allow oxygen to be forced into cat or dog snouts. These are the same kinds of masks that are used by vets for anesthesia so it makes a lot of sense to use them for rescue.

Smiths Medical Veterinary Division makes the masks that come in 3 sizes - one for cats, one for small dogs, and one for big dogs. The company says that they're rolling naked in all the dough they've made from skyrocketing sales this year. Kidding, but a VP did say they've sold 1,500 sets over the past year and that it's more than they've sold in the last 15 years.

Lots of times humane societies or businesses raise the money to donate pet oxygen masks to fire departments. It may sound strange, or like they're not hugely needed, but you know.. when a family loses their house and everything in it to a fire, the last thing they need is to lose their pets, who are many times like members of the family, on top of it.