[Dennysfam]

Our poor little buddy had a pretty nasty dog bite 5 days ago. He was seen at ER vet immediately, stitched up and got to come home that night. 48 hours post nite-infection set in , so back to our vet for a new antibiotic regiment. Now we are set to go back to tomorrow for drain removal and check up and I am anxious to hear about what they have to say about the necrotic tissue that had seem to form. From what I have read, surgery to remove this seems to be what is most likely done, but wondering if there’s other less intrusive treatments ?
Other than the smell and his lack of appetite (from the codeine he’s on) he’s waking nicely and getting some more of his energy back. He looks really depressed , but I guess who wouldn’t be after the traumatic week he’s had? He’s improving a little each day so we are hopeful for a good recovery from all of this.

would love any realistic perspective of healing process post dog bite and presence of necrotic tissue.

 

[Knute]

Sorry to hear about the trauma and the difficult healing process.

I'm not a vet, but as far as I know, the only way to resolve necrotic tissue is by surgery. Get to it early to minimize the excision. I suspect you are in for a long healing process.

Bad smell indicates necrosis has set.

Out of curiosity, was the other dog captured? Check for rabies vax? Euthanized? Owner held responsible?

I'm also interested in the events proceeding the attack. Not from a morbid or an I told you so view, but more of a learning point. Possibly discussing a method that may circumvent a similar situation.

During our walks, here in China, we encounter many dogs. Some are street dogs, some are unleashed, some are leashed. Most Chinese do not know the basics of caring for pets, so immunizations and training are foreign concepts. Typically, we only encounter 1 animal. But we have been surrounded by a 5 dog pack of Huskies all unleashed and the owner shouting at me....... Anyhow, between my MiniS and me, we were able to avoid an escalation. Not sure how we would have faired if one of the Huskies became attack minded. I suspect a domino effect would happen and at least 2 of us would have been injured.

 

[Dennysfam]

Thanks for your reply. The healing process in general feels to be taking longer than we anticipated , however external wounds minus the Eschar forming on the wounds (some things I’ve read is that this is a normal healing process sometimes though , though know it’s not the preferred way wounds heel) he did have an infection and still has some drainage , so also odor could be coming from that. My anxiety got the best of me and called the ER vet, since his movement behaviors have not worsened and he’s not really bothered by them, they were encouraging that we weren’t in a emergency. we just want our perky pup back.
As for the incident, no the dog was not removed or euthanized. We can have the city label it as a dangerous dog and i have an officer helping me. The dog is up on the rabies shots . We will need to get all of our final bills to the other owner and hope he will pay. If not, there’s no law around it but we can take him to small claims court if needed. his dog was off leash in a public place while mine was on, so we have some leverage . I don’t know if the officer issued him a ticket or not for that. The dog approached us, my dog growled in response to tell him to back of, they nipped at each other and the other dog clamped on. We try to pick our pup up but it all happened so fast that it was hard to react. It’s really traumatic for both of us (me who was walking the dog and my dog)

 

[Knute]

Thank you for describing the events. It provides a clue about dog's behavior.

Could you descried the body posture of your dog and the other dog? Perhaps you didn't observe. Dogs send messages with their body posture as initial signals, growls are usually a final warning prior to a bite.

Here is a wish for speedy healing without complications.

 

[Tater33]

Sorry to hear this happened. Our dog got bit at a dog park, and the guy took off with his Huskies. We ended up having to pay the vet bill. I hope your dog heals up.