Extra body weight means extra pain for our dogs. Unfortunately, our affection might also be shortening their lives and causing their cartilage, joints, tendons, and bones to twist and turn when they shouldn’t. To help your dog live a better life with a luxating patella, limit your Fido’s diet to healthy, nutrient-dense dog food.ĭo not feed your dog table scraps or leftovers. Maintain a healthy weightĮxtra weight puts extra strain on our dogs’ joints, tendons, muscles, and bones. I was relieved to hear an experienced veterinarian tell me things I could do right now to help my dog enjoy a long, pain-free life without being subjected to an invasive luxating patella surgical procedure. How to avoid luxating patella surgery for your dog After all, they may not all work, but at least they might help prevent the invasive, painful, and expensive luxating patella surgery for my dog. Wow, I wish my dog’s original veterinarian had given me these suggestions. These suggestions, the doctor speculated, might even help to completely avoid surgery for luxating patella. Instead, the second veterinarian gave me specific suggestions to help keep my dog pain-free as he ages. Sometimes, just like in knee surgery for humans, it can actually make the condition worse. Unlike my dog’s first veterinarian’s gung-ho approach that I suspect was motivated more by money than concern for my dog’s good health, the other doctors explained that there are risks to this surgery. The veterinarian recommended I wait and see how the condition progresses. Does my dog really need surgery?Īfter getting a second opinion from both experts, I decided that my dog does not really need surgery - at least not right now. So, I paid to get a second opinion from another veterinarian, along with a board-certified orthopedic surgeon. The cynical side of my brain also made me wonder if the veterinarian might be more concerned about receiving a referral fee than my dog’s long-term health. I wondered, “does my dog really need an invasive, risky, and expensive surgery to correct his luxating patella?” Can I trust my veterinarian?Īfter the vet repositioned his knee to its proper position, my dog seemed pain-free and able to walk and run like other dogs. So, out of concern and to prevent future painful incidents, I scheduled surgery to correct his luxating patella. Without giving me any non-surgical treatment options, she urged surgery as soon as possible. His veterinarian repositioned his knee cap so he could walk normally, but still considered him to be lame in her notes. In an earlier post, I wrote about my dog’s painful incidents with his unstable knee, and a short period of time when he limped on his right rear leg. Or they slide out of their grove to the inside photo by Doug Martin Both of my dog’s patellas luxate medially, Just like dogs, our human knee caps also fit inside a groove in our femur bones. In other words, my dog’s knee cap (patella) moves (luxates) out of its trochlear groove at the end of his femur bone. Sometimes a dog can regularly luxate to the outer side of its leg - that is known as a lateral luxating patella.Įarlier this year, my dog was diagnosed with a grade 3 medial luxating patella. Medial luxating patellas are most common in smaller breed dogs. The inside dislocation is known as a medial movement. When my dog’s patella luxates, or dislocates out of the groove, it slides to the inside of his leg. This groove is called the trochlear groove. My veterinarian explained that my dog’s knee cap should remain inside a groove at the the bottom end of the femur. A dog’s patella is located at the end of the femur bone, which I also think of as the thigh bone. Our dogs have two knee caps or patellas - one in each of their right rear legs. The patella is the medical term for the knee cap. Whether we do or don’t get the surgery, the goal is to avoid lameness, pain, and arthritis in our cherished dogs. You might also try them to avoid luxating patella surgery for your dog. These are ideas from my veterinarian to delay or even prevent getting the invasive surgery to correct my dog’s luxating patella.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |