And so it begins…

On Monday, the day before his 11th birthday, Miller was bounding around our local park sprinting and jumping in circles. Next thing I knew he was laying on the floor, howling in pain with his leg looking really suspicious, I grabbed our other dog and took him home leaving Miller with my fiancé and another family with their dog. After dropping Toddy with my friend Tina and borrowing her husband, Ed to assist in the rescue operation we hightailed it back to the park to get Miller. He was still in serious pain so we instantly knew it wasn’t just a usual greyhound overreaction so the decision was taken to rush him to the out of hours vet as our local vets had just closed for the evening. I’d like to take this opportunity to thank the bald guy with the umbrella who stayed with Miller sheltering from the rain, we wish we knew who you are or where you work to thank you personally, we owe you!

The out of hours vets (Vets now in Reading) were fantastic and I cannot praise them highly enough. They X-rayed the leg and showed a serious fracture of his left hind femur. They called the veterinary specialist that our regular vet usually referred to and the resident orthopaedic surgeon called them back within 10 minutes, having received an email of the x-ray. He said he’s see him the following day at 12:30 so we left Miller in their care overnight and went back to get him early the next morning.

Happy Birthday Moo Dog…

We spent Miller’s birthday driving between vet surgeries but wound up at the specialist 150 miles from our house on time. Our specialist was fantastic, talked us through every possible scenario but left us in no doubt that Miller’s leg shouldn’t have broken so easily without their bring an underlying problem, probably osteosarcoma which, having been involved with greyhound adoption for a long time, I was very aware of. We left confident that, whatever the outcome, Miller was in the best possible place.

When the specialist called, later that evening he seemed completely torn about the best treatment option, the CT scan was abnormal but not necessarily cancerous, the blood work was clear and he was awaiting the results of a needle biopsy. He assured us that miller was comfortable and showing no signs of distress.

Yesterday morning I emailed the specialist with my contact details for the day and he sent me a lovely email back saying that miller was doing well, and had been “working his magic on the kennel staff” who had been sitting with him and giving him love and fuss, he said he’d call as soon as there were results.

When he called back we were no further, really, the latest results were also clear of cancer which left the question, why would the bone in an otherwise healthy dog break in such an unusual fashion. Che choice was simple, amputate and have a tripawd or try to fix it. He spent ages listening to our questions and providing clear answers which reassured me that he really wanted to make sure he guided us to the right choice for Miller. He suggested that he get together a group of experts in different specialisms the next morning and that he’d call again with a conclusion but that at that stage he was thinking of having a more invasive biopsy.

This morning he called as promised, miller’s leg had swollen considerably over night and he felt that we really should do something today. He made us aware that the senior orthopaedic surgeon had reservations about trying to fix a bone that was clearly abnormal so we took the decision to amputate. That was at about 10am this morning, it’s now 10 hours later and we’re still sat with fingers crossed waiting to hear how things have turned out.

It’s a relief that the decision has been taken and that we’re actively doing something to relieve his suffering. I know that IF our senior boy makes it through surgery, the next few weeks are going to be really tough but if we get to see him playing with his buddies I’m the park again, it will definitely be worth it.