pet_care_handoff v1.0.0

name: pet_care_handoff description: "Write pet care instructions a sitter, boarder, or vet desk can act on without calling the owner: a one-page profile per pet, feeding lines with exact amounts and clock times, medication lines copied from the label with a missed dose rule for each drug, a normal baseline beside a three-band emergency list, signed care authorization with a payment arrangement, a medication log that stops double doses, and update rules that keep the packet current after every vet visit. Ships a tested packet and log checker, packet templates, and worked profiles for a dog and for a cat. Use when someone is leaving a pet with a sitter, boarder, family member, or house sitter, when a pet starts or changes medication, or when existing care notes are vague. Not for diagnosing a pet, choosing a dose or a food, or giving veterinary advice."

Pet Care Handoff

Purpose

Build a handoff packet, not a friendly note. The test is simple: a person who met the pet today, holding only this packet at 2 in the morning, can feed the right amount, give the right dose, tell normal from an emergency, and get the pet treated without waiting for the owner to wake up.

Most care notes fail in the same four places. Amounts are written as habits instead of numbers, so a new person guesses. Medication is written as a name with no clock time, no method, and no rule for a missed dose, so two givers double a dose or one giver doubles the next one. There is no normal baseline, so the sitter cannot tell a quirk from a warning sign. And nobody is named who can authorize and pay for emergency care, so a clinic visit stalls while people try to reach the owner. The workflow fixes those four places in order, then keeps the packet current.

Scope limit: this skill writes down care the owner and the veterinarian have already decided. It never chooses a food, an amount, a medication, or a dose, and it never diagnoses. Every amount and dose in a packet comes from the owner routine, the food packaging, or the medication label, copied exactly.

Workflow

1. Interview for facts, not habits. Per pet collect: name, species, breed, age, weight with the date it was weighed, a photo or a written description with one identifying mark, microchip number or a plain statement that the pet is not microchipped, allergies and banned foods, and current health conditions in plain words. Ask every amount question twice, once as the owner says it and once as a stranger would measure it. If the owner says a scoop, ask which scoop, whether it is level or heaped, and where the scoop lives. If the answer stays vague, weigh or count one portion with the owner and write that number down.

1. Write the one-page profile first. Use assets/one-page-profile-template.md. One page per pet, photo at the top, updated date on the first line. The page holds identity, food lines, medication lines in short form, the day in order, the normal baseline, and the call-for-help block. Detail that does not fit goes behind it, never by shrinking the page until nobody can read it at a glance. In a multi-pet home each pet gets a page, and the pages name who eats where and which doors close between them.

1. Write feeding lines with all seven parts. Follow references/feeding-and-medication.md. Each line names the pet, the exact food and where it is stored, the amount as a number and a reproducible unit, the clock times, the bowl and feeding place, the treat rule with its count, and the rule for a meal refused. For stays of a week or less, offer pre-portioned labeled meals as the default and keep the written amounts in the packet so a spilled portion can be remade. AAHA sitter guidance asks the same core questions: meal times and amounts, separate or supervised feeding in multi-pet homes, medication timing and method, exercise, toilet frequency, litter routine, and where every supply is kept.

1. Write medication lines from the label, one per medication. Copy name and strength from the label and attach a label photo or copy. Give the dose as a number and a unit, the clock times, the food rule, the method step by step including how this pet hides or spits a pill, the storage place and any handling note, and the end date or ongoing status. Then write the missed dose rule for that medication, agreed with the clinic in advance. The default shape is log it, never double a dose unless the veterinarian for this pet directs it, and call the clinic. If the clinic gives a different rule for a drug, the packet carries that rule. A packet with a medication and no missed dose rule is not finished.

1. Set the medication log up before the stay. Copy assets/medication-log.csv. One row per dose, written at the moment of giving by the person who gave it, with result and notes. Agree the single-giver rule: one named person per dose, and if care is shared, the log is the handover and nobody gives a dose already logged. At each handover between givers, and at the return, run bin/handoff_check.py --log <file>. It flags duplicate doses and refused, spat out, or missed doses with no note about who was called.

1. Build the three-band emergency list for this pet. Follow references/emergency-signs.md. Band one is go now and call on the way: trouble breathing, collapse, repeated retching with a swollen belly in a dog, a cat straining with little or no urine, a lasting or repeated seizure, heavy bleeding, trauma, repeated vomiting, likely poisoning, and sudden severe weakness. Band two is call the regular clinic the same day. Band three is normal for this pet, filled only from the baseline, with how long the normal version lasts. Then write the normal baseline in full sentences: appetite, energy, toileting pattern with counts where a count is the signal, sleep, and every quirk that looks odd and is normal. Review all three bands out loud with the sitter before the stay.

1. Close the authorization gap. Use assets/authorization-template.md. Name who may authorize emergency care when the owner is unreachable, the sitter, the backup, or both, with a spending limit for stabilization or a plain no-limit statement, and write the payment arrangement in concrete terms: card on file at the named clinics, sitter pays and is reimbursed, or another named arrangement. Tell both clinics before the stay that this person may bring the pet in, and check what form of authorization and payment each clinic accepts, because clinics differ. Also record the poison route on the profile: the regular clinic, or ASPCA Poison Control on (888) 426-4435, where a consultation fee may apply.

1. Walk the handoff in the home. Use assets/handoff-checklist.md. The sitter portions one meal, talks or gives one dose under the owner's eye, tests keys, codes, and alarm, handles the leash, harness, or carrier, and finds the litter, cleaning supplies, and records. Agree the update rhythm in the same visit: channel, time, and what each update covers, plus the first visit time and how the return handover will report anything outside normal.

1. Check the packet, then freeze the copies. Fill the packet JSON in the shape of examples/dog-packet.json or examples/cat-packet.json and run bin/handoff_check.py <packet.json>. Fix every major finding, amounts, times, missed dose rules, emergency clinic address, authorization, baseline, and vague phrases, and rerun until it prints READY. Then print one copy for the home and place one digital copy where the sitter and backup agreed, both with the same updated date.

1. Keep it current after the stay starts. Follow references/update-rules.md. Any vet visit, medication change, food change, weight or behavior change, or contact or access change forces an update to both copies and a new updated date, using the after-visit five-minute update in that reference. A packet that describes an old dose or an old weight is worse than a short packet, because a sitter will trust it.

Output Contract

A packet folder containing: one filled one-page profile per pet from assets/one-page-profile-template.md, feeding and medication lines with the label copies behind them, the three-band emergency list with the pet's own signs written in, a signed authorization from assets/authorization-template.md with the payment arrangement stated, an empty medication log from assets/medication-log.csv ready for the first dose, the packet JSON with a READY result from bin/handoff_check.py, and the handoff checklist signed off after the in-home walk. The worked examples in examples/dog-profile.md and examples/cat-profile.md, with their packet JSON files, show the finished level of detail for a dog and for a cat.

Operating Rules

1. Numbers or it did not happen. Every feeding amount is a number with a unit a stranger can reproduce, every dose is a number with a unit copied from the label, every schedule is clock times. Words like usual, some, or a little fail the checker and fail the pet.
2. The label and the clinic outrank memory. Doses, methods, and missed dose rules come from the label and the veterinarian for that pet. This skill and the owner routine never invent, adjust, or substitute them.
3. Never double a dose as a repair. A missed, refused, or spat-out dose is logged, the notes say who was called, and the clinic decides what happens next, unless the packet already carries that clinic's written rule for that drug.
4. One giver, one log row, at the moment of giving. End-of-day logging from memory is how double doses happen in shared care.
5. Normal needs a baseline before it means anything. No band three entry and no same-day call decision is valid without the written baseline for appetite, energy, and toileting for this pet.
6. Emergency care never waits on permission hunting. The packet names an authorizer and a payment route in advance, and for band one signs the sitter calls the emergency clinic first and the owner second.
7. One current copy, two places. Print and digital copies carry the same updated date. A hand edit on the printed copy means the profile gets reprinted the same day.
8. Fictional examples stay labeled. The worked profiles use invented pets, clinics, phone numbers, amounts, and medications to show detail. Never copy an example amount or dose into a real packet.
9. Privacy stays in the packet. Addresses, codes, and phone numbers live in the packet the owner hands over directly. Do not post a filled packet in a public place or a group chat.
10. Report what was checked. State the checker result, which bands were reviewed with the sitter, whether the in-home walk happened, and any item the owner could not confirm, such as a clinic that has not yet accepted the authorization form.