I had a consultation the other day that was so much fun it made me feel like a new graduate vet again, which, after nearly 20 years in practice, is a rare thing.

It was with a lovely little black cat who had had a territory battle with another cat and had taken a nasty bite to the head in the process.

The resulting injury was a magnificent cat bite abscess rising up like a full moon on the top of her head. The abscess was just about ready to pop, and the poor little creature must have felt like the weight of the world was on her small head.

Her owner told me that she had been off her food and a little quiet for a day or two but that usually she was quite feisty. Warning noted, I gently wrapped her up in a cosy towel to keep her weapons (claws) at bay and handed her to my nurse, who was just as excited as me at the prospect of a real juicy abscess. (It’s a vet/nurse thing, I’m afraid!)

I cleaned the skin on the top of her head then made a small painless stab incision with a very sharp scalpel. She didn’t flinch. A tsunami of foul-smelling pus flowed out of the small wound, rolling down on to my waiting swabs like rivers of lava from an erupting volcano.

The instant relief and gratitude on my little feline patient’s face was reward enough. We milked out all the infection and cleaned her up. I gave her a pain reliever and antibiotic injection to help to speed the healing and keep her comfortable, and she trotted away like a new cat. It was so rewarding. I must note here that antibiotics should be given only after the abscess has ruptured as they can interfere with the formation of the abscess, breaking it down too early and releasing the nasty bacteria into the cat, making them very ill.

It started me thinking about what an amazing feat of nature a cat bite abscess really is. A cat bite in a human, if left untreated, can lead to septicaemia and severe illness. But these remarkable felines, in a feat of survival of the fittest, have come up with a clever design that rapidly protects them from serious infection. By forming an abscess around the bite injury, their body blocks the infection from entering the rest of the animal and expels it, often dramatically, to the outside world within a couple of days, truly amazing.

I always prefer to see a cat bite abscess on the front end of the cat, like this one, as it means she was in the fight and likely giving as good as she got. (The phrase ‘You should see the other guy’ comes to mind.) If the abscess is on the rear of the cat, then that cat was likely trying to get away, but took a parting blow on the backside from its aggressor. Most unsportsmanlike if you ask me.

Whatever the reason for the original bite, the resulting abscess is a thing of design beauty, and it also gives vets and nurses a very satisfying, if not a little gruesome, consultation from time to time.

• Lucy Richardson graduated from Edinburgh University in 2005. She started CedarTree Vets in August 2012 with her husband, Mark. They live at the practice with their two children, Ray and Stella, and their dog, two cats and two guinea pigs. Dr Lucy is also the FEI national head veterinarian for Bermuda