Holy Knees Batman!

Let's start of with my feline friend with CRF. Last night she appeared to be glassy eyed as well as unusually unstable in her hind end as well as was dehydrated but eating decently. To help with the dehydration without the proper tool, I pretty much had to force feed her a kitten sized bottle of pedialyte. As of this morning she was not eating and still dehydrated so away she went back to work with me. Her second set of tests had came back and her creatine levels were in the normal range although she does have an elevated liver enzyme. The enzyme was elevated before the fluids and it was hoped it would also come down after the second test when instead it went quite a bit higher. She will have more testing done in the next two to four weeks to keep and eye on it. Dr. C advized me to not worry about it though we will keep an eye on it because it can be a sign of liver disease on top of her CRF although she believes it is elevated simply because of the CRF at the moment. We gave missy her fluids and she was sent home with a goody bag of needles, ringer solution, and a cord so I can do her sub-q fluids at home. She is to get 300ml per day divided in to two times. After her fluid she was much perkier and proceeded to chow down on some food (GREAT!!!) I can say I honestly do not know how long she is going to be with me and while my senses are saying it will not be for much longer, I can at least have some hope.

Onward to the updates....

The older cat who had problems with the anesthesia passed away Monday night. I feel so bad for his owners; I know what it feels like to lose part of the fur family and it is never easy. The young St. Bernard has surgery and had a baseball sized rock in his stomach...no wonder he wasn't feeling good. He is expected to make a complete 100% recovery!

Today I came in just in time to see a dog on the large side of small being prepped for surgery. I enjoy observing Dr. H. because he takes the time to explain the why and how of procedures to me while he is doing them. The palpated the dogs stifle and showed the abnormal movement of the joint; the femur could be moved backward while the tibia came forward independent of each other. The dog tore his cranial cruciate ligament(anterior cruciate ligament or ACL in humans) but he did not believe it had affected the joint capsule because the sinovial fluid of the joint seemed normal and also that there was probably no damage to the meniscus in the joint which is good news for the dog. He explained he was going to use the Lateral Fabellar Technique(Extracapsular Technique); this surgery uses monofilament nylon(heavy gauge suture that doesn't degrade after being autoclaved) to stabilize the joint.


(Photo owned by www.vetsurgerycentral.com)

The technique is used mostly in cats and smaller dogs (in larger dogs the TPLO of Tibial Plateau Leveling Osteotomy is highly recommended.) Two small holes were drilled on the anterior part of the tibia and the suture was threaded through it then the sutures were laced around the femur and placed around the fabella bone. This leaves two suture from tibia to femur. The ends of a suture go through a small metal bands which are clamped in to place. Dr. H. said only one suture is really needed but because the procedure can fail, he would rather the added stability of the second suture are a backup. You do not really repair the CCL in a dog so much as convince the body it is still there and that is why the heavy gauge sutures are used. The body will build up scar tissue around it and stabilize the joint although the range of motion can be affected.

The surgery was a success. :)

*deep breath*

Have I mentioned I would love nothing more than to be a veterinarian???