Chronically ill Peterborough bulldog ‘has 24 hours to survive’

A woman who has been fundraising to pay for life-saving surgery for her chronically ill dog has issued a desperate, final plea for people to contribute to her cause.

Sharlene Hull, from Wansford, is frantically trying to raise enough money to ensure her white bulldog, Gandalf, will get the vital surgery he is scheduled to receive tomorrow (May 31).

“Gandalf has 24 hours to survive,” Sharlene says: “his bladder surgery is tomorrow.”

The two-year-old rescue dog has a raft of medical conditions due to the harm and abuse he suffered as a puppy in his native China.

Recurring urine infections are his most significant malady, something vets believe may be the result of an ectopic ureter.

This can be surgically corrected, but it is expensive. Sadly, Gandalf’s background makes him ineligible for pet insurance.

Sharlene is understandably frantic about the situation she finds herself in:

“Without this urgent surgery he will have to be put to sleep,” she says: “time is ticking.”

While she has been “extremely touched” by the generosity of people who have already donated to her gofundme page, Sharlene believes “one final push” is the only thing that can save Gandalf now as his funding pot is still short of where it needs to be.

“There’s a shortfall of £2,000” Sharlene notes.

The anguished 52-year-old told the Peterborough Telegraph that she and her friends have been trying all kinds of ways to rapidly raise additional cash:

“We’re doing everything we can: fundraising, auctioning, selling things to try and get the rest of it in – but it is time-consuming.”

The determined homemaker has even started up a Facebook group, ‘Gandalf the Great’ as a way to more effectively coordinate the fundraising initiatives that generous people have suggested or undertaken to help.

Visibly upset, Sharlene attempts to sound positive about her loyal supporters’ last ditch fundraising efforts: “We’re fundraising the best we can, but...” and then her voice trails off.

Composing herself, the devoted dog owner sums up the situation in blunt terms:

“Unless we can get somebody to donate a substantial amount; to cover – or even cover just half – of what we still need, then he will have to be put to sleep.”