we have a boston terrier she was a year old last week,when she was out for her walk two weeks ago she has a habit of leaping at your legs to be picked up to which i ignore, she done this and let out  a scream i didnt think it was her to start with as it sounded like a child, i thought she had caught her front foot on my boot but found after i rubbed her foot she carried on walking,then again in the evening she jumped off the sofa screaming again this time i noticed it was her back leg so rang the emergency vet who asked various questions by this time she was running around again he said it could be a knee problem caused by trauma and to cage her took her to see the vet the next day who was one of the referral vets in orthopedics she confirmed that mabel did have a luxating patella and graded it as a 2 i was told to rest her with no exercise and she was put on pain relief she didnt wont to op on her for at least a month until the injury had settled down. Then last week had a second opinion from the other ortho vet who confirmed what the previous vet had said rest etc, then saw him again yesterday he examined her again i told him her knee still comes in and out of its socked but she moves it herself then it goes back into its socket this may only happen once a day quite supprisingly as i also have a boxer who she plays with. Now the vet has told me to start to give her a gentle walk,and to come off pain killers as she is not crying in pain when it does come out he also said now that he loathes to op on her at the moment and to see her again next week, he said a lot of terriers go around with knee complaints and it doesnt cause them any trouble, but i dont wont her to be like this should i ask for her to be operated on or take his advice as she looks very uncomfortable with this hope this all makes some sense

My scottie aged 4 was diagnosed with luxating patella patella about 8 weeks back (only went in as she had cystitis, vet gave her the once over), he never told me to rest her or put her on painkillers infact gace me very little info except it was a grade 2. Florence hasn't had any trouble with her leg a far as i am aware, runs on it fine, jumps swims etc.

When my normal vet came on a house visit (5 boosters to do and easy in the home rather than getting them to surgery!) he checked for this luxating and couldn't really find anything major. He said her knee cap was looser and did come out a little but very easily goes back in, he gave me a good explanantion of what it is and said no op required, treat her normally. She wasn't bothered by what he did.

can it rectify itself a little with time i wonder - like strengthen again? if so it might be worth hanging on to see what happens.

there have been a few posts on here about this so i'm sure someone will have a lot more advice for you.

thankyou, i took her out tonight on a harness and she didint limp once she is worse on a collar so she must be using her chest muscles rather than her back end, i would like to hope it would heal as the vet told me that the op would involve three incisions, the ligaments cut and tightened ,the knee cap if needed would be ground down a little and then stablised with a pin this may or may not be removed depending if it causes pain plus 8 weeks rest so i would like her not to go through it but on the other i dont wont her to be limping.i wonder if swimming would help her will have to find out as this might help.

My 16 month old Working Cocker is now just starting week 7 of his 8 week crate rest following surgery to fix his severe grade 3 LP. I first noticed it in March, we were out on a walk and suddenly his right leg seemed to just fall out of its socket and turn to rubber although he showed no sign of pain. It happened several more times that day and the vet diagnosed the slipping kneecap the following day and he was put on 2 weeks of lead only exercise to see if it improved. Unfortunately it didn't and he was referred to a specialist othopaedic vet for the surgery. His LP was caused by a joint malformation due to an injury he sustained as a pup (I didn't get him until he was 6 months old) and fortunately this meant that the groove in his femur was ok so he didn't need to have that element of the surgery. What they did have to do was remove the head of the tibia, reposition it and pin it in place; tighten and repin the ligaments at the side of the joint and stitch the patellar ligament back together and pin it in place (it was this ligament rupturing that caused him to suddenly go lame that first day, it had been holding his kneecap in place until then and was under huge abnormal strain). Once in place the pin in the kneecap is not removed, or it won't be in Rodaidh's case anyway.

So he had the op and the first couple of days weren't great as he was in quite a lot of pain and also adjusting to being crated 24/7 other than being carried out for on lead toilet breaks. As time went on though he adjusted well; he was able to put his foot down and bear weight on the leg again after about 5 days and he hasn't shown any signs of pain in it at all since then although of course that has made keeping him still and quiet more difficult. It hasn't been easy keeping him on total crate rest, of all breeds to do this with an active working bred spaniel probably isn't the one you'd choose! I brought him out as often as I could to sit on my knee and stuff but I still felt awful about it although it has helped that he's a very biddable little dog, if it was one of my other two they'd have gone completely nuts but he's been very good and accepting of it all. From week 5 onwards he's been allowed 2 x 10 minute walks every day which is fun as he feels absolutely fine now and he's full of 6 weeks' worth of pent up energy so he's raring to go and it's very hard stopping him from jumping up at me and leaping around at the end of the lead but we've just 2 more weeks to go until he has his follow up x rays and hopefully gets the all clear so we can go back to normal. I can also have him out of the crate a bit more now, I can't let him mix with the other dogs yet as he gets overexcited and starts trying to run and bounce around but I put the other dogs out in the garden so he can potter around the kitchen with me for 5 minutes every few hours, we sit out in the garden and he snoozes on the sofa with me in the evenings, he's flat on his back beside me as I type this. His crate is also in the living room so he hasn't felt too left out, I slept on the sofa beside him for the first 2 weeks and then started to carry him upstairs at night to go into his smaller crate beside my bed which is where he's still spending the night now.

I took the decision to go for the surgery with him based on speaking to the orthopaedic specialist (John Ferguson at East Neuk Veterinary Clinic in Fife). Rodaidh is being trained to be a working dog and as his LP was fairly severe his working career would have been difficult or non existant without the surgery. There was a high chance he'd have gone on to develop arthritis in the joint and I couldn't risk him ending up in chronic pain at a young age so the surgery for us was the best option. 

thankyou for the more in depth information about the op and aftercare will see what the otho vet has to say on friday, hopefully your spaniel will get the all clear, he is going to like a thing pocessed good luck and enjoy the fun.

My little dog did this ,started to occassionally limp , trip to vets said she had the same as your dog..Asked on here and did some reading up on the net about the op..Got some great advice from the good folk on here too ... Was told a little dog can cope with it better than a large dog..Started giving her glucosamine and chondroitin and increased her exercise up, from keeping her in to her usual, and have not seen a limp since , haven't been back to vets either to find out if she still has it but am happy that she is in no pain and back to her usual self....

Hi, I've never had this problem, but I have heard from experienced breeders who have had this problem that collagen tablets work very well. I do know that collagen aids the repair of damaged ligament tissue but I'm afraid I don't know anything about dosage etc. It should't be too difficult to find out though.

We were never advised complete crate rest after my pup had her operation in January. We were told to "limit it - no hiking!" and that was it.

She's fine, not perfect on that leg, but I am happy.

we had another visit to the vets friday as Mabel was having the same symptoms on her other back leg the vet has confirmed that she also has a slipping patella on that leg as well i was shocked to say the least, he said that usually if you have the problem in one leg you usually have it in the other as it is a growth defect and has shown up now because she has put more strain on the leg instead of her orginal bad leg, some dogs have this problem but never show any signs apart from the odd hop so he said, he also had done three ops that week for other dogs with the same condition, mabel is having her operation a week wednesday my vet said she would need rest for two weeks then he wants to start exercising gradually its going to be hard trying to keep her calm as she has only turned one lots of nylabones etc i think.

You may find the investment in a cage would be a good idea if you do not have one but if she is new to being caged you will have your work cut out to accustom her to it before she has the work done.