torn ligament+ hip questions

pittsabowawa

Bella tore a ligament in her knee last night (sorry I was so upset at the vet this morning I didn't catch the exact name.. something with a c or g..)

All she did was catch a ball.. slightly lifting her front paws off the ground..not jumping and this happend. At first I thought she had a twisted muscle bc she walked it out and went back to playing.

A few hours later she became very quiet almost lethargic.. she stopped wagging her tail and lost all interest in everything from the cats to her toys to the outside dogs when we went potty for the night.

This morning we went to the vet and were told that her ligament is partially torn and were given pain killers.

Questons ...
Besides not letting her run, jump, etc is there anything my parents can do to ease her pain and promote healing? (such as a heating pad etc?)

How long typically do you think it takes to heal? The vet didn't really say but gave us pain killers for two weeks


Also we were told to start her on a regimine of Glucosamine and Chondroiton (sorry if I spelled it wrong I don't have the bottle with me) because she had inflammation in her hips.

Is this early signs that she will have arthritis in her hips and or other problems?
Should I not allow her to jump off of my bed, the couch , out of the car, etc .. ever again? (BTW none of those things are high.. knee level about)

She's only three so these injuries are very troubling to me. Any tips on preventing further injury?

Do you think I can ever play frisbee with her again? What about weight pulling?

lulusmom

It sounds like your dog tore the cruciate ligament which is the most common canine orthopedic injury. When this happens, surgery is almost always done and the sooner the better. Without surgery, the joint will continue to deteriorate and the pain will get worse. The longer you wait to have surgery, the higher the probability and severity of arthritis in that joint. Please ask your vet why surgery was not recommended for your dog.

pittsabowawa

thanks that is the ligament they said. It isn't completely torn.. she said it was "partially ripped". I will ask the vet if surgury was needed. I asked her if there was anything I could do and she just said to keep her quiet. Should I get a second opinion?

Barb04

One of my dogs had a partial tear and I was told to keep her quiet for 2 weeks (no stairs, jumping, etc). I did the best I could but after the 2 weeks, she walked up 2 steps and it tore all the way. She was only 45 lbs. so had the surgery where they just use sutures.

I've also gone through 2 acl operations (TPLO and TTA).

I just want to say that if your dog needs surgery, it will again be able to run and play once all the healing and therapy is done.

Yes, I give my glucosamine and chondroitin to help.

pittsabowawa

thanks for the adivce. I really appreciate it.

I will tell my parents not to let her run, jump, etc for at least 2 weeks. We have a 1 floor house so the only stairs she has to navigate are two up to the driveway... there are more to get to her dog pen but I'm having mom take her the long way so Bella only has to go up those two stairs.

FilleBelle

Once the CCL is partially torn, it is usually only a matter of time until it ruptures entirely. You will know when this happens because the dog will not put any weight on it at all. At that point your only option is surgery. In the meantime, you can conservatively manage the injury.

Alvin has a CCL weakened by a partial tear. When the tear first occured, the vet put him on total rest for a month. His only activity was to go into the yard on a leash and relieve himself. It was hideous. After the initial month was up, we began slow leash walks. For the first week we only walked five minutes. The second week, ten minutes. Took us a couple of months to work back to the half hour walks he'd been taking before the injury.

I have decided to continue with conservative management rather than getting the surgery done because Alvin is nine-years-old and his level of activity is already such that I do not believe the surgery will alter it significantly. Alvin takes two half hour walks each day. We also play some ball and some chase in the yard. He is not allowed to jump on, off, or for anything, which is fine for him, since he doesn't want to jump anyway. He was never allowed on furniture, but he does have a ramp for getting in and out of the car. He gets glucosamine and chondroitin with MSM daily and I have observed a difference in him between when he takes it regularly and when he does not. Be aware when choosing a supplement that the recommended dosage on the container is probably going to be too low. Most vets recommend that a large dog receive the same dosage as a human. Check online or on the back of a human joint supplement for that dosing information.

Every once in a while he has a bad day where he is very ginger on his feet or even walking on three legs. As soon as I see this, I shut him down for a week. Nothing but peeing in the yard, then slowly building up to long walks again.

I think it is safe to say that a dog with a CCL injury is not going to be able do weight pulling or jump for a frisbee. Because Bella is only three, though, she is a great candidate for surgery. After the surgery and therapy and total recovery, she should be good as new...probably up to and including weight pulling, although I suppose I would consult the vet before proceeding.

pittsabowawa

Thats what I was afraid of. Bella loves to play frisbee and although I don't like it she will try to jump up to catch it. Weight pulling is just something we do for fun be she really loves it also.

I can't afford to get her surgery and my parents aren't home full time to look after her while she recovers. I feel helpless. How am I gonna be able to keep a high energy fun loving dog from injuring herself. I feel like it's my fault and I'm afraid that bella will become depressed if I don't let her play ever again. Her favorite thing to do is run and I feel like im going to hurt her if I ever let her run again.

FilleBelle

The surgery is definitely expensive (roughly $1500 for a single leg). The upside to this is that I have never met an orthopedic vet who wouldn't accept a payment plan, since they all know that it's hard for the average person to cover costs like that. Perhaps you could even work out a payment plan with your parents, where they cover all or part of the surgery now and you pay them back in increments, instead of a credit company. Chance are you'd get a better deal, since your parents probably wouldn't charge you interest!

The downside to the situation is that the chances of the other knee being damaged rose exponentially with the injury of the first knee. Since Bella is so young, it is quite possible she will need both legs done at some point.

Alvin runs. Not on concrete and not for extended periods of time, but he fetches a ball and plays chase with me on the grass in the yard. He also plays. He uses his kibble ball at dinner, he plays chase and fetch, he finds treats that I've hidden around the house, he plays tug-o-war, he chews bones and stuffies, he does tricks and obedience work. It hasn't been a death sentence for him to not have the surgery.

Having said that, I would beg, borrow, and steal to eventually be able to afford the surgery if I had a dog as young as yours. Note "eventually." You can conservatively manage the problem for a good long while without doing any damage to Bella's body or psyche. So start saving up and looking around for payment options while your parents keep an eye on her.

pittsabowawa

Ok thanks. I have a little money in a savings account and if I get a job soon a part of my paycheck will start going in there. My parents would let me pay them back w/o interest and I think my sister would help out a little bit.

I would of course pay everyone back in due time. The main problem is that at least until march my mom works full time. (my dad is not trustworthy enough to look after bella if she was to have surgery bc he sometimes doesn't follow my directions.) Once she retires in march she would have time to take care of bella. They mostly keep her in the dog pen outside now so mom will have to learn to keep her indoors and in her crate while she is healing.

My current vet is Banfield (at Petsmart) but I don't think I am very happy with they're treatment.. they didn't even take the time to fully explain her injury to me and proper treatment methods. I am going to see if my local vet has a plan like banfield (the wellness) where we pay monthly to cover her shots. That vet is much more personal and I think bella would recieve better care there.

I'm going to start researching the surgery and contact vets in and around my area that are capable of doing the surgery and get their credentials and see if they accept payment plans etc.

dleggs15

my bulldog had a ACL injury a few years back they could not do surgery due to her being over weight so we had to keep her calm for a long while and then we put he on a diet and she lost all the proper weight and started to exercise again and she is now back to normal! she runs/plays jumps everything a dog does! One thing the vet mentioned that if it happend to one said there is a very good chance it could happen to the other side! i would talk to your vet or get a second opionion! our vet said surgery isn't always the answer and in our case it was not so that is something that you and yoru vet will have to decide! it would be good tos ee a specialist as well! Good luck! these are never fun injuries!

pittsabowawa

I will be getting second opinions. I am going to try emailing vets and seeing if I get a response before actually paying for an office visit. We live in rural Georgia so I doubt there is a specialist nearby but UGA has an excellent veterinary program so they probably have specialists there (its quite far though).

I am looking through Academic Journals at the library of my college to do some research on the ligament and the surgery but my first search didn't find much. I'm going to ask my friends at other colleges to look for more articles as well. I did find one interesting article that said s/n dogs is a possible cause for hip dysplasia and problems with cruciate ligaments.

agility collie mom

You can also ask your vet about Adequan http://www.luitpold.com/canine/faq/faq.htm injections.

Zack_the_Mouse

The longer you wait to do the surgery the more the mussel in the leg will deteriorate and the more physio therapy your dog will need.

A cold pack or frozen peas wrapped in a tea towel applied to the leg for 10-15 min 2 to 3 times a day will help with the inflammation. Also if your not home all the time to look after her try crating when your not home. When your home all eyes on her when shes moving around (I know that my dog had a lot of slip and falls while adjusting to walk only on 3 legs)

My 8 yr old standard poodle tore her cruciate ligament in April of this year. Surgery was done with in 4 days of the ligament being torn. Then 4 months of physio on the leg to build the mussel back up for her to walk with only a slight limp, now she can walk and run no problem. Now if it rains or is cold you can see that her leg stiffens up, usually a heating bag on the leg for 10-15 min helps with the stiffness. In total it cost $1700.00 CAD for the surgery, 3 physio appointments, pain & inflammatory meds. Plus $300.00 for the Emergency vet cause she happen to tare the ligament on a holiday.

GottaLuvMutts

Sorry to hear about Bella's injury.

Just wanted to add one thing about glucosamine and chondroitin:
Getting these supplements from a vet or pet store can be pretty expensive. I found them in the same dosage at the grocery store for quite a bit less. I asked the orthopedic vet if it would be ok to use the human ones instead of the ones made for dogs and he said fine. Saves me a good $100/year or so; Kit is on these supplements at a young age because she does quite a bit of jumping (frisbee) and running. We will also be starting agility soon. I feel better asking her to do these things if I know I'm providing her body with the proper supplements, and the vet agrees.

Something else to consider: warming up before EVERY exercise session is very important. We walk for a good 15 to 20 minutes before I ask Kit to chase anything, run, or jump. We also do a few stretches before we start.

pittsabowawa

I actually thought of that (the glucosamine thing) bc my parents are in their 60s so they have a ton of it laying around already

Bella doesn't NEED surgery YET. She hasn't completely torn it but (in the vets words) "partially torn it". After the two week pd on the pain killers is up I am going to take her back to the vet (or possibly a different vet) and ask why I wasn't told that she could possibly need surgery.

As of now bella is being kept on leash when going out. She is not allowed to run, jump, and has to avoid as many of the 4 stairs we have as possible. In two weeks I will see what the vet says as far as surgery, increasing excercise, etc.

My BIGGEST concern now is her needing the surgery. I told my mom what I've learnd about it (im still researching) and she said and I quote "We do not have money for dog surgery". I don't know where I would come up with the money (my life savings consists of $227.37).

Last night I had a mini panic attack just thinking about it. I started sobbing and had to take one of my insomia pills and sit in the dark breathing to calm down. I CAN"T lose my baby so the thought of not being able to give her the surgery scares me.

pugmom

Mom drives me crazy ....If bella needs to have surgery then we will figure out a way to have it done.....DO NOT stress yourself out....fist things first...before you take her back to the vet make sure you write down a list of every question you have and take it with ...then we will go from there.

pittsabowawa

yeah thats what im planning to do. I took one of my notebooks and have been looking through the library at my college for academic journals with info on it as well as google, you tube, etc.

I am also going to do some serious googling tomorrow to see if there are any charities etc, that will donate for stuff like this if she was to need surgery. I am also going to ask if the vet does payment plans etc. (mom also said "how are we going to pay a payment plan?" I was like well you are able to afford $20 a month for rented movies.. why not pay off a surgery )

Meantime I am focused 100% on getting a job. I think having some sort of meager income will at least show I could pay back any "donation" from the 'rents should they want remuneration( forget all the other times the lent money without expecting a return).

What made me so upset is that mom said it in a way that sounded like she would have bella PTS before paying for a surgery. NOT acceptable.

agility collie mom

Surgery is not always needed. I work for a vet and many people opt to not have surgery done. (A lot of people simply can't afford it). We have seen many dogs do well with rest, anti-inflammatories, and adequin injections. Here is a link with information on ACL's....
http://home.earthlink.net/~tiggerpoz/index.html
Do not beat yourself up. It is amazing what a body can repair.

pittsabowawa

Yes but once it's ruptured doesn't it have a greater chance of tearing later in life? Bella is an extremely active dog. She loves to play frisbee and run and jump (she would have done great in agility If I had the money and she wasn't so ADD).

Also I couldn't find anything in that site about the injections you mentioned. How much would those cost and would she have to take them forever?(It might offset the cost of surgery).

I would rather not do surgery of course but I want bella to be able to run again. Her favorite thing to do above eating, sleeping, tennis balls is to run. She runs so fast that her legs disappear and often she falls down on turns but that is when she is happiest. I'm already scared to even toss a ball to her bc thats what tore her tendon in the first place.

I have a whole list of questions that I will ask the vet when I take her back in a few weeks so we'll see what she says. She didn't say anything about surgery so I take that as a good sign.

Bella is feeling much better. She isn't so mopey and has actually started pulling on the leash again.

Kay Weber

More thoughts on glucosamine and chondroitin.

Our dogs have had excellent results on liquid glucosamine for arthritis and injuries. Liquid is best because it's absorbed faster without all the fillers in the pill versions. It really works to rebuild / protect joints and cartilage -- without the side effects of many prescription meds.

Take Care,