Small Dog is not a happy bunny.
Over recent days, we have become increasingly concerned about an intermittent limp affecting one of her back legs.
A visit to the vet yesterday confirmed that she does indeed have a luxating patella for which we are trying a conservative treatment of rest (HA!) and anti-inflammatory medicine. She's not allowed to jump, run around, go upstairs or in any way exert the knee joint.
This, of course, is much easier said than done.
Voluntary inactivity is one thing, but enforced inactivity does not sit well with Small Dog so we don't hold out much hope for the resting cure.
The alternative is surgery, which sits even less well with Small Dog. We're not keen on that option either, especially as last time she underwent surgery we had to buy a new kitchen.
Oh, it's a long story.......if you pester me to tell I might relent.
3 comments:
This is not an uncommon complaint in small dogs as I understand. One of mine (havanese also has it and when it first manifested itself several years ago, we were very concerned...although it didn't seem to bother him all that much.
Apparently, it would pop in an out, depending on his activity, but didn't cause him pain. The vet, of course, recommended surgery saying that doing nothing would result in severe arthritis and discomfort for the dog. My husband thought not, even though it would be almost impossible to restrict activity on this particular dog.
We allowed him to do whatever he felt up to doing. He is now 8 yrs old and still acts like a puppy. It seems the activity/exercise has so strengthened and toned the back legs muscles and tendons that the patellae no longer pop out.
Perhaps he was just lucky, I don't know. But I am very reluctant to put a small dog under anesthesia, having lost one as a result during a minor, probably unnecessary, procdure.
I hope things work out for her..
Tabitha
Poor SD. Years ago I had a Yorkie. She was the runt of the litter and very, very tiny. She had that problem too. It didn't seem to bother her too much and she didn't seem to have pain with it either. She had it for years and it didn't get any worse. Old age got her before anything else did.
Oh - and pester pester pester.
We want to know how the new kitchen came about.
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