The continuing adventures of Guinness, the increasingly bionic dog...
The good news: her broken leg has healed up stronger than it would have been had it grown naturally. That’s due to the 4 pins in it, but we’re thankful she made a full recovery.
The bad news: She’s got hip dysplasia in her other rear leg. We noticed it about 6 weeks ago, she walks with that foot turned in. She runs and jumps and plays just fine, but after several visits to the vet and a month on anti inflammatories, it’s not getting any better. We’ve weighed our options and decided to go with a triple pelvic osteometry (TPO). What’s a TPO? In short they break her hip in 3 places and then reconnect it with metal braces that rotate her hip cup 25 degrees. This will allow the bone to sit in the socket without riding it’s way out when Guinness walks. As it is now, she’s turning her foot so as to position her leg to stay in the socket. But when actuated in a normal position, you can feel a very firm “pop” and hear a very firm YELP from the pup. Even on her own when she tries to scratch with that leg she’ll sometimes yip during it.
Nasty business to be sure. Recovery is just about identical to what it was with her leg break. Normally the TPO is done on dogs before 10 months, but our doc has had good results with dogs up to 2 years. Our other option was to leave it alone, but that increased the risk of knee injury at any time and pretty much guaranteed a hip replacement in her future. So while it won’t get to 100% normal, it should be significantly improved so as not to have to worry about it any more.
March 19th is the day, another 2 months and large chunk of change later she’ll hopefully be back to normal. Damn dog. Damn lovable, fluffy, happy, bouncy, licky, playful, one-of-the-better-things-to-have-happene
The bad news: She’s got hip dysplasia in her other rear leg. We noticed it about 6 weeks ago, she walks with that foot turned in. She runs and jumps and plays just fine, but after several visits to the vet and a month on anti inflammatories, it’s not getting any better. We’ve weighed our options and decided to go with a triple pelvic osteometry (TPO). What’s a TPO? In short they break her hip in 3 places and then reconnect it with metal braces that rotate her hip cup 25 degrees. This will allow the bone to sit in the socket without riding it’s way out when Guinness walks. As it is now, she’s turning her foot so as to position her leg to stay in the socket. But when actuated in a normal position, you can feel a very firm “pop” and hear a very firm YELP from the pup. Even on her own when she tries to scratch with that leg she’ll sometimes yip during it.
Nasty business to be sure. Recovery is just about identical to what it was with her leg break. Normally the TPO is done on dogs before 10 months, but our doc has had good results with dogs up to 2 years. Our other option was to leave it alone, but that increased the risk of knee injury at any time and pretty much guaranteed a hip replacement in her future. So while it won’t get to 100% normal, it should be significantly improved so as not to have to worry about it any more.
March 19th is the day, another 2 months and large chunk of change later she’ll hopefully be back to normal. Damn dog. Damn lovable, fluffy, happy, bouncy, licky, playful, one-of-the-better-things-to-have-happene
mood: 
worried
worried
