Patient of the Month

for September 2010

at one point we thought Louie won in a landslide, however now we’ve experienced an avalance as

Lobo

collected votes from all over the United States to secure the win with,
get this,

2, 442 votes!!!!

PATIENT SUMMARY: Lobo is a 75#, 6yr old German Shepherd. Dr. Michael Thames of Labahn Veterinary Hospital is his veterinarian. His owners feel that he has had right rear discomfort for months, but it has recently become worse. When Dr. Dew examined Lobo, he would use the limb, but he preferred to “unload” the weight onto his left rear. It was first thought that he had a cruciate ligament issue, but lack of cranial drawer made Dr. Dew suggest radiographs as a precaution to make sure there wasn’t anything else going on causing Lobo’s discomfort.

TREATMENT: Radiographs showed changes consistent with chronic CCL injury. When we took a radiograph of the left rear for comparison, the flexion of the right limb for stabilizing during the xray proved to be quite painful (cancer-type pain). Dr. Dew then suggested anesthesia be used for radiographs of Lobo’s hips, proximal femur and lumbar spine. These xrays did not show any changes consistent with a tumor. Although there is still a possibility that there may be a small chance that additional pain is coming from a disease process, Lobo’s mommy and daddy wanted to proceed with a TTA surgery to correct the cruciate ligament damage. Lobo has a good prognosis for healing from this procedure as long as medications and exercise restrictions are observed.

Congratulations Lobo!