I have been posting on here about my lovely sheltie who suddenly went lame on Boxing Day, playing with her ball.  Well things went from bad to worse and I had to take her for a gen anaesthetic and xray yesterday. I am lucky that we do have an orthopaedic vet at our practice.

The upshot has been upsetting as she is such an active little dog,  doing obedience and is also a PAT dog, she is only  5 years old.  She has ruptured  some ligaments in her hock (ankle) not completely and the vet has put her on complete pen rest for a week.  But he feels that if there is little or no improvement in the legin the week (which means there will probably be a complete rupture and he is afraid that is the most likely outcome)  that she will have to have major surgery (2 hour op) to repair the ligaments involving screws and pins and requiring two months or so recovery time.  I cannot believe it as she has been such a healthy dog, has done agility and is so lively.  What has surprised me is that he said that on examining the ligaments he found degenerative changes in them so that this injury would have happened anyway and further the other hind leg shows similar changes so that at some time the other leg will have to have the operation too.  Vet has said the outcome should be quite successful and the leg should be quite good afterwards.

I am utterly devastated that what started off as a simple injury has got to this.  She has always been my pride and joy and is so sweet natured and so it is an awful start to the New Year to see her stuck in the pen, even having to be taken out for wees etc.

I have tried to log in to some specific sheltie forums to see if anyone else has gone through this but nothing is simple and I can't seem to log in successfully.

The vet did say that shelties are one of the top breeds for ligament injuries as are their bigger cousins, the rough collie - I am surprised, never having heard of this.

Snowflake

No advice but sorry it's been such a tough time :(

However it's good that she is young and fit and stands to do well from the op, should she need it. She could still be a PAT dog, if it's in her best interest, couldn't she? And obedience is pretty low impact, you could still train and maybe even compete under the advice of your vet. I certainly know dogs who have had cruciate ops who are currently competing.
I hope it does improve over the next week though. It's a worry but let's hope you're worrying for nothing :)

Good luck with it all.

Jess

No advice here, but I've been following your posts and wanted to send {{{{  HUGS  }}}}

Thank you for your kind words.  It just has been a shock but no doubt in the end my girl will still of course be able to carry out her PAT dog duties at a local old people's home that we go to fortnightly and hopefully resume her obedience training which she loves.  Obedience is not that arduous, like perhaps agility.

Thanks again

There are other things you could try which are more gentle, such as scentwork - most dogs love it, have a look here -
http://talkingdogsscentwork.co.uk/Talking_Dogs_Scentwork/Welcome.html

Oh my, poor girl :-(  You have my sympathies, this time last year I was just finding out the extent of River's problems which have led to her being permanently retired from agility in any form before she even really got started due to a combination of HD, nasty arthritis in her front toes and a prolapsed disc - I was heartbroken for her as she's a natural at it and absolutely loved doing it.

There are other options though - possibly obedience might be a possibility, or rally-o for something similar but a bit more lively, although I'd check with the vet first, of course.  But yes, scentwork would be a good option, or some assistance dog stuff - River helps me tidy up, she loves doing it and it gives her a job that isn't hard on her body.  At present she's not allowed to go faster than a walk, jump or pull on anything so a bit of tidying has been ideal.

Thank you Nikita.  What breed and age is your girl?  I do hope she continues to recover.

Isla, my sheltie,  had just begun to shine in obedience and done reasonably well in one or two shows.  She had begun to do a bit of scentwork at our training  class so eventually that might be a possibility.  Ah well one must think positive.  She is very good in her pen,  not moaning or whining thank goodness.

I used to have a horse and remember she got a ligament injury which necessitated an op.  I have since thought that dogs were a much better option with their sturdy legs - how wrong was I!!!

That's the way to do it, focus on the good stuff :-)  River is a 7yr old lab/collie, everything is chronic though - we don't know how long the disc problem has been going on, it just came to light after she was gone at by another dog which exacerbated it then she started refusing to do the contact obstacles.

So sorry to hear this, but would like to offer some moral support.

Our young LM is still recoverying from a G2 tear of the medial collateral ligament, sustained at the end of August when she was trodden on by one of the children whilst running in the paddock.  We knew that it was a serious injury almost immediatly due to the rapid swelling of the hock, and she was none weight bearing on the affected leg.  She was x rayed when the swelling subsided, and through positioning the G2 tear was diagnosed. 

We were given two options. 1. surgery. 2. splinting and rest, little difference in cost over the recovery period and this had no bearing on our decision.  We decided to cast and rest, which wasn't easy with a munster in the house but we perserved.  It's now 4 months since her accident and she is making good progress, ligaments take a long time to heal and strengthen so we're looking at 12 months minimum for a full recovery.  Our vets have been fantastic and it was mentioned on one of our last visits before Christmas that we wouldn't have achieved the same progress had we opted for surgery.

Trio is my daughers YKC dog and this has devasted her, she is now retired from agility.  She may well make a full recovery but we feel that it is too easy to put presure on this joint particularly with tight turns in agility.

Do hope that your sheltie makes a good recovery.  Donna