Star Patient
Our STAR patient this week is ... JOEY!!
Joey is a regular visitor to the clinic as he suffers from a painful arthritic condition of his elbows called elbow dysplasia. Over the years this has lead to severe changes to Joey’s elbows which causes his joints to swell and become painful and also restrict his movement. We have been managing Joey’s pain well with a range of drugs called nonsteroidal-antiinflammatory’s which help keep swelling of the joints down and give relief from the pain. However last week Joey’s condition seriously deteriorated and he became very uncomfortable, was off his food and could not move about.
After a difficult weekend trying to manage his pain Joey was admitted into the hospital for a series of tests and these revealed that Joey was suffering from severe hip Dysplasia as well as the elbow disease. This was a serious blow to an incredibly brave and happy dog who really just wants to run around and be normal. Disappointingly Joey now has no fully functioning limbs!
Despite the seriousness of the situation Joey still has a smile on his face and after a change to his medications has already started to show a good response.
Joeys hips and elbows will never get better completely but if we can control the pain and inflammation hopefully Joey will continue to be a truly HAPPY dog, with a truly HAPPY SMILE!!
Questa's recovery
Mrs Evill, Questa's owner thought you all might like to see how Questa is now. These pictures were taken last week at Formby where she was running around like this for a good 3 hours along with her chums. Mrs Evill comments "I love the final one even though it is blurred as all her legs are off the ground. But as you can see she is completely recovered now - a very lucky dog and we owe you all a big thank you for taking such good care of her."
Introducing Questa Evill our Star Patient
Beep Beep, Bang Bang!
You only take your eyes off them for a second and BANG...!!
For Questa and her owner it has been an awful week. Questa was involved in a Road Traffic Accident close to her home last week and arrived at the clinic pale, collapsed and bruised. At first she was given oxygen, intravenous fluids, and strong painkillers to treat the shock of the trauma. We could then undertake x-rays to assess what internal injuries Questa had received from the impact.
The x-rays showed that Questa had sustained a fracture to her pelvis and some bruising of the lungs but was otherwise ok. This type of fracture does not need surgery and healing of the bones will occur unassisted over the next 4-6 weeks. After a comfortable night in the clinic on strong painkillers and fluids Questa was able to go home with a very relieved owner!
This week Questa has shown a fantastic improvement and although still bruised and tender she is very happy and mobile again. After another few weeks in a cage to limit movement and allow healing Questa is sure to make a full recovery!
Questa is our Start Patient for her bravery in recovering from a nasty BANG!!
Introducing Willow Moss our Star Patient
This week we have chosen Willow to be our STAR patient!!
Willow was bought into the clinic this week by his owner Miss Moss who had noticed that he couldn’t use his back leg very well. Willow had been out and about as usual the night before but when he came home appeared to be very depressed and uncomfortable.
At the clinic we examined Willow and discovered that the pain was coming from his right hip. He also had some other little scrapes and bruises that could be the consequence of a high impact injury.
We decided to hospitalise Willow immediately for pain-relief and x-rays as this would give us a picture of what injuries Willow had.
The x-rays we took showed a very unusual fracture and dislocation of the hip joint. Fractures OR dislocations are a common injury following a road traffic accident or a high fall but it is not usual to get both in the same joint!! Willow really had a nasty injury!!
Luckily that was Willows only injury, apart from superficial bruising, and the operation to remove the fractured piece of the hip went very well with no complications.
Willow is now recovering at home with his Mum who is left wondering just what happened to Willow that night.....??
If only cats could talk !
Introducing Frankie Savage our STAR patient!!!
Frankie was involved in an unknown accident last weekend which left his right elbow severely dislocated. After repeated unsuccessful attempts to put the elbow back into place it was
decided that Frankie’s only option was to amputate the limb. The surgery was performed on Monday afternoon and much to everyone’s joy Frankie was soon up and about and demanding his tea!
Frankies Dad , Mr Savage from Home Nook Kennels in Out Rawcliffe has been very pleased with his quick recovery and says he is learning to walk and climb again using just the one front leg.
He was been such a brave boy during this whole ordeal that we wanted to make little Frankie our ‘STAR PATIENT’ !!!
