Gold Coast holistic practitioner Lu Fenny suspended for six months after treating dog’s teeth with methylated spirits

A Gold Coast woman has been suspended from operating as a vet for six months after treating a dog’s teeth with methylated spirits. Read what happened

Remember back when pets were treated as animals?

Dogs slept outside, a tin of Pal was considered gourmet and your cat was … somewhere in the neighbourhood.

I’m not saying that’s the way it should be – particularly when free-roaming cats are such a danger to native animals – but sometimes it seems we’ve gone too far.

Even as so many of us struggle with medical bills for our furry friends, there are others who are going to extremes when it comes to pet ‘wellness’.

Just as in the trend of human wellness, I can accept holistic practitioners who offer traditional medicine alongside complementary therapies like acupuncture or even animal massage.

Sure, it might cost more, but that’s the client’s choice and if there is some evidence of therapeutic relief, or even just so long as there is no harm, then fine.

Pam Waters and Elsie , her LahasaApso X Maltese Terrier Elsie in Dogs of the Gold Coast on the Burliegh Oceanway. Picture: Glenn Campbell

But the trend towards therapies that, at best, do nothing or, at worst, harm the animal – even if through simple exclusion of evidence-based traditional medicine, is truly disturbing.

Do our pets really need bioresonance treatment? Photo-bio-modulation therapy? Red-light laser therapy? Iridology, kinesiology or vibration therapy?

A friend of mine was told by her holistic pet ‘adviser’ to use crystals to diagnose her dog. Thus, by swinging a crystal over pet food, she was able to determine that her poodle had multiple allergies. Allegedly.

But all of this pales in comparison to the tale of Gold Coast holistic practitioner Lu Fenny.

While Ms Fenny’s website still advises her services are on offer for this city and her Instagram states she operates in Perth and the Gold Coast, as of last Tuesday she was suspended from operating as a vet for six months and told to pay $10,000 after treating a dog’s teeth with methylated spirits.

The State Administrative Tribunal in WA was told Ms Fenny had sedated a cavoodle and used methylated spirits to clean her dental tools and the dog’s mouth.

The cavoodle’s owner made an official complaint to the vet practice board when the dog became seriously ill after Ms Fenny cleaned its teeth in May, 2024. After the dog became unstable, refused to drink water, had trouble breathing, vomited and was constantly licking its lips, Ms Fenny told the owner the dog’s symptoms were ‘normal’ and to continue giving the canine milk.

However, the dog was taken to The Animal Hospital at Murdoch University and was found to have oral ulcers, a lesion in its oesophagus and a high temperature.

The investigation also revealed the Cottesloe facility where she had treated at least 29 animals on multiple occasions, was not a registered veterinary clinic.

Now, this is clearly a worst-case scenario … and there are unfortunately vets who use only traditional medicine who have also been found to do the wrong thing.

Guide Dogs celebration event to honour new and long-serving volunteers . Puppy Raiser volunteer, Lara Hudson, accompanied by her pup-in-training, Roy. Pics Adam Head

No matter who the practitioner is, ask questions about the treatment being advised and find out if there is real evidence behind it, especially if this is a treatment which has not been rigorously studied and approved as part of ‘traditional’ medicine.

One of the more disturbing trends right now, just as with humans, is a fear about vaccinations.

In fact, over in the US, one Brooklyn veterinarian reported that a client didn’t want to vaccinate their dog in case it led to autism – despite the fact that vaccines are not linked to autism and, perhaps more importantly, autism has never been diagnosed in a dog and it is unlikely it ever could be.

Here on the Gold Coast, multiple vets offer what’s called ‘titre testing’, a blood test that determines whether a dog has enough antibodies from a previous vaccination to provide continued protection without need for further vaccinations.

While the test itself is safe, there is a real risk of false positive results, meaning necessary vaccines would be skipped, or false negative results, leading to harmful over-vaccination. Titre tests also only measure one aspect of the immune system.

A regular vaccine schedule, on the other hand, is the result of years of research and testing.

Look, it’s your pet and your choice.

But let’s just remember that if we are determined to treat our pets as people, we must be their advocates too.

Originally published as Gold Coast holistic practitioner Lu Fenny suspended for six months after treating dog’s teeth with methylated spirits