I got home Friday night to find a little blood in one of the dog beds.  After some investigating I found that Tani appeared to have a tiny cut on one of her toes on her front foot.  I let it alone that night but Saturday morning she could hardly put weight on her foot and her nail was kind of sticking up a bit.  I cleaned up the wound and put some antibiotic on it and wrapped up her foot. Saturday night she was still having trouble walking- this is a 14 year old pug with neurological problems and arthritis so her back legs don't work that well.  I unwrapped her foot expecting an infection but it looked fine, but the nail was still sort of sticking up.  She didn't want me to touch that toe at all- so now I'm thinking broken toe.

Sunday morning I took her to the vet.  They took her in the back to check out the toe, then brought her back and said the nail was barely hanging on and the doc would be right in.  When the doc came in he very gently moved the nail and it came completely off! Back to the little bone inside her toe...no wonder the damn thing hurt!  The nail should eventually grow back.  We decided not to X-ray the toe because it was not displaced- and they would do the same thing they did anyway.  The kept her for a bit and cleaned up the area, made sure there were no slivers of the nail left, gave her an antibiotic shot (so I don't have to do more pills) and wrapped her foot.

In all my years of having dogs this is the first time I have seen this.  We don't know how she did it either so I can't do anything preventative.  They told me to take her to my vet in 5 days to have the bandage removed, but I will probably do it myself.  Yesterday she was still having trouble walking, but today she is moving pretty well for an old gal!

Karen