Emergency vet cock up- what are my rights?

To cut a long story short K'Ehleyr was bitten on the foot last week. It was out of hours so she was taken to the emergency vet where they stoped the bleeding, cleaned and dressed the wound. 48 hours later she attended my regular vet who undressed the foot to check the wound. My vet was horrified. She said the other vet had not dressed the wound properly and cotton had been touching it which can enter it and cause absesses. Today she went back to have the foot looked at and the swelling has not subsided. The dog is not in any pain though. The vet is now worried that cotton has entered the wound and she said she would have expected the swelling to have gone down by now. I have to give it 10 more days to check its not just infection and if the swelling has not gone or it goes pussy she needs to go back and more invasive treatment is needed. K is insured but do I have any rights to make them pay for extra treatment if a cotton foreign body does cause more problems?

Hmmmm, I am a bit confused about the cotton being potentially dangerous?

The vet said it can fragment and pieces enter the wound and cause absesses, apparently they are supposed to put a barrier between the wound and the cotton bandage. So basically she had this bandage on for 48 hours and bits of it could have gone inside the wound.

So am I because it's not unusual for open wounds and abscesses to be 'packed' with cotton gauze if they cannot be stitched.

Not sure how often the dressing has to be changed though. My mum had this treatment and had to attend every day to have the dressing changed.

I am thinking here a wound on the foot is always more susceptible to infection.

My CKCS got a tick bite in between her toes and even though it was removed OK it got infected and involved us in taking her every other day to have it checked and squeezed and prodded about and she had antibio injections and it was more than a week before I could stop worrying about it. Actually cost me more to have that treated than it did to have one of her major ops!

Was your dog given any antibiotics?

Ok forget it my vet must be making it up

Well I am not saying that! I am just surprised that cotton gauze was singled out when it is used to pack open wounds.

Of course it could be that it wasn't cleaned thoroughly first.

You didn't say whether your dog was given antibios.

But, I am thinking, that to prove any negligence on the part of the emergency vet - you would have to get another vet to stand up and say that the emergency vet was negligent.

Have you asked your vet if they are prepared to do this?

Im not really clued up on bandages or how they work but she said the part of the bandage that was touching the wound was not supposed to be as it fragments and a gauze barrier was supposed to be between the 2. Maybe there are different forms of cotton in bandages?

Ill ask the vet about backing up the complaint about the other vet if treatment does need to go further but I think she would as she was pretty cheesed off. Pulling that off after it had stuck to the cut wasnt pleasant for the dog, me or the vet
I just wondered if anyone knew would I have a chance if it did turn out to be the other vets fault (obv not the original injury )

OK I assumed it was gauze bandage. As for 'pulling it off' the usual advice if it is stuck is to soak it.

Was the cotton that got stuck of the cotton wool ball type? maybe that makes a difference to gauze type cotton which stays as a strip or patch?

It looked soft and fluffy.

Poor K. Seems she has suffered more than necessary with this. No mention was made of soaking it