Caring for a Three Legged Dog or Cat
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Hey all!
Molly had her rear left leg amputated on 6/18. She has had a pretty easy recovery, save for a few minor little mishaps due to her overexciting herself. She busted a few stitches open accidentally which drained for a bit before sealing itself back up. We kept a close eye on the incision site and I treated it with warm and cold compresses. Made sure no infection formed. We noticed that over the next week or so, there was a large pocket of fluid that had settled at the bottom of her stump.
I scheduled an appointment for suture removal, as the incision site looked wonderful and it was over the 10 day mark. I was going to have them look at the seroma to see if it needed to be drained.
The vet took her back to drain it and came back with some news I was hoping not to get.
He stated there was a lot of excess skin and that fluid was going to keep filling up if they did not cut some of it back. There was an increased risk of infection if we kept bringing her in to drain it. So poor Miss Molly will have to go into surgery again to have some of the excess skin removed.
She stayed overnight and I just received a call from the vet stating that she was out of surgery and that it went well.
They ended up removing 5 inches of skin! The muscle underneath looked really good, so that was good news.
I am just so upset that she has to go through another stint of recovery and having to wear the dreaded cone again.
Send prayers that her secondary recovery goes well!
Darn! Sorry Sweet Molly is having to go through this! But yeah, it's part of the roller coaster ride this stupid stuff can take us on sometimes!,
At least it's fixable and she will recover and it won't be as daunting as the amputation surgery!
I am curious though, did they say why all this excess skin was there? Should more have been removed with the original surgery? How long will she be in antibiodics?
Hey! How 'bout some pictures of Molly?? We love pictures around here and she's so darn pretty in her avatar pic.....we want to see more!!
Give her big hugs for us.....and save one for yourself, okay? You are doing a GREAT job and a very diligent mom!!
((((((((((((HUGS)))))))))))))
Sally and Happy Hannah
Happy Hannah had a glorious additional bonus time of over one yr & two months after amp for osteo! She made me laugh everyday! Joined April's Angels after send off meal of steak, ice cream, M&Ms & deer poop!
There is a link to some pictures of her pre-amp. She is a very pretty girl.
The vet said there could be a couple different reasons for the excess skin. He says most vets like to have a little extra post surgery. He isn't sure if the muscle contracted, some of the internal stitches were busted I think. I don't wonder if all that fluid stretched it. I'm not sure. Either way, we got it taken care of and I am thankful it wasn't the other way around and that they had to amputate more because there wasn't enough skin.
She was completely done with her antibiotics from the initial surgery. The vet said she should not have to go on them again, as they will treat it like a spay or neuter and give her a shot of penicillin. I still have some tramadol and rimadyl left over that I will probably give her for the first few days.
I can't wait to see her this evening and spoil her rotten.
Oh poor Molly! I'm so sorry but wow that's cool your vet took care of it so quickly. We've seen vets wait too long and that's when problems happen. You're not alone; this happens occasionally but 99.9% of the time the healing continues and life is good again. I hope she gets to come home today! Give her a smooch from us.
Tripawds Founders Jim and Rene
tripawds.com | tripawds.org | bemoredog.net | triday.pet
Poor miss Molly, but I have no doubt she will be back to feeling great very soon......this journey always has a bump in the road here and there, but this problem is taken care of and now just lots of spoiling for her!
Keeping goods thoughts for you and her, and hope her healing process continues to go very smoothly.....
Bonnie & Angel Polly
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