So then we had some good news on Monday, we took Eric back to the specialists so that they could check on his progress and after an x-ray they confirmed that its all looking good - which was a big big relief!
I should really have posted about this before, I might have mentioned it in passing but I don't think i've posted about it in any real detail. To be honest its been a bit of a worry because after making some good progress he suddenly started to limp again and I was sure that they were going to tell me that it hadn't worked.
Eric, for those of you that don't know, is our big bouncy boxerdog and after walking him a few months ago he developed a limp. Initially we weren't really too concerned because it had happened before and he'd be okay the next day but this time the limp didn't go away. We could still walk him, he'd run about as normal but the limp would return by the time we got home. So I took him to the vets, the very excellent Mrs Bendelow in Swinton, and she straight away noticed the problem and put eric on some pain killers. The limp disappeared but returned once the course had finished so the next stage was for us to get Eric's knee x-rayed and that showed that he had some mild arthritis and possible ligament damage which meant a visit to the specialists in St. Helens and the possibility of an operation.
Eric actually went in for the operation the same day that he had his first appointment at the specialists, the problem with his knee was something that is very common in dogs. Basically they develop this ligament disease that weakens the tendon in their knee and it has to be removed and replaced with an artificial joint, apparently the only breed of dog that they don't see it in is the greyhound. One of the surgeons told me that he see two dogs a day with the same problem.
Thankfully we were insured and it's just about covered the cost of his treatment, the operation cost something like £2000 and rather worryingly they told us that there is a 50% chance of it happening in Eric other knee within 18 months!
So this last month has been a bit of a nightmare as like I said earlier he started limping again a couple of weeks ago when initially things were looking great. The specialist reckons that its nothing to worry about, I think they took a bit of fluid out of knee and to be honest he's actually started walking a little bit better this last couple of day. Recovery is going to be slow, we've been told that it might take up until Christmas - we have to walk him for about 15 minutes, 3 times a day on the lead and we can increase this by 5 minutes each week.
I just can't wait to have him back to normal - he's dying to run around again and hopefully we might be able to let him off the lead in a month or so. We have another appointment in about 4 weeks at the specialists and we will keep and fingers and paws crossed!
Eric actually went in for the operation the same day that he had his first appointment at the specialists, the problem with his knee was something that is very common in dogs. Basically they develop this ligament disease that weakens the tendon in their knee and it has to be removed and replaced with an artificial joint, apparently the only breed of dog that they don't see it in is the greyhound. One of the surgeons told me that he see two dogs a day with the same problem.
Thankfully we were insured and it's just about covered the cost of his treatment, the operation cost something like £2000 and rather worryingly they told us that there is a 50% chance of it happening in Eric other knee within 18 months!
So this last month has been a bit of a nightmare as like I said earlier he started limping again a couple of weeks ago when initially things were looking great. The specialist reckons that its nothing to worry about, I think they took a bit of fluid out of knee and to be honest he's actually started walking a little bit better this last couple of day. Recovery is going to be slow, we've been told that it might take up until Christmas - we have to walk him for about 15 minutes, 3 times a day on the lead and we can increase this by 5 minutes each week.
I just can't wait to have him back to normal - he's dying to run around again and hopefully we might be able to let him off the lead in a month or so. We have another appointment in about 4 weeks at the specialists and we will keep and fingers and paws crossed!
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