GATESHEAD. The one star is for the vet who finally put my poor dog out of her misery and who was there at the end to console us. On Saturday 12th December, we had taken Polly to see our vet in Windermere as she seemed to be in some discomfort and had been crying during the night. At this point she was eating, drinking and could walk, so the vet thought maybe her arthritis and gave pain killers. Later that day though she took a turn for the worse and had run from our caravan, passed bright yellow diarrhoea and howled in pain when i lifted her back in, under her tummy. We decided to bring her home to see the family as we knew it was serious. We called Vets Now for a ring back. We waited two hours and nobody called, so I called again. My call had not been logged. When i finally spoke to the vet she said take her straight down, which I did. We handed Polly over and the vet said she would call us during the consultation. She didn't, she called afterwards saying Polly must have hurt herself when she fell from the caravan. I told her Polly had not fallen, she had run because of the diarrhoea, and she had serious abdominal pain. Polly had been given a painkilling injection. The injection did not work and Polly was in extreme pain during the night. We took her back the next morning, by this time she could not stand, and had stopped eating and drinking. Again I told the vet about the yellow diarrhoea and extreme pain. Again a fall from the caravan was mentioned. For the third time I said, there was no fall! This was then removed from the records. Polly was given another injection which did not provide relief. I managed to speak to my own vet who immediately suspected pancreatitis or cancer, but as he was away from home he was unable to visit Polly. I called Vets Now back again and advised of my vet's opinion. We were told to wait until 9pm in the evening to get another pain killing injection, hopefully to get her through the night comfortably. This was at 12 noon. Polly by this time was in agony, her poor little body rigid with pain. At 3pm we decided enough was enough and we took Polly to be euthanised. This vet was very sympathetic and reassured us we were doing the right thing, but told us she had not examined Polly earlier. I was so confused but knew we were doing the only thing we could to help Polly. The next day when I took Polly to our vet to arrange cremation, another of our vets identified possible ruptured stomach ulcer as she was on NSAIDS. I spoke to our vet in Windermere on Monday. She also suspected a form of canine cancer which does not present until advanced stages. My question is this: if three vets who did not see Polly, suspected advanced cancer, pancreatitis, or ruptured ulcer just from my verbal description of Polly's symptoms, then why did the one vet who did examine her assume she had pain from a fall and treat her for arthritis, when it was very clear to us, lay people, she was in severe pain and distress. I doubt if anything could have been done to save Polly, but she could have been released from her pain a day earlier, had we been given a more accurate assessment of her condition. She was such a beautiful animal and had given us so much love, she did not deserve to suffer this way at the end. We are truly devastated that she was allowed to suffer. Worst 24 hours of our lives.