PLEASE READ!!! - Page 3

Kelly, I am no vet and won't even take a stab at what happened.
Make sure you get all your options covered.
I had a dog with a shattered pelvis - healed fine with time and some management (nothing we could do surgically).
I had a dog with two ocd leasions (bilateral shoulder surgery) and one hip surgery (due to a dog attack).
Not to mention all the other leg/lameness related injuries to various critters.
Whatever you will do, he will end up with "issues" on down the road. It is about quality of life.
And damn, I sure hope should I end up having a wreck that folks are not too quick just chopping of limbs. Sure, they can function just fine without them...but I sure would try other reasonable solutions first.
 I for one, will chip in a small amount (wish I could do more), because I know how terrible I would feel, if money is the only thing lacking to a problem that could be solved in a decent fashion. And after all, as a breeder, you are responsible for the well being of your dogs.
And obviously, I know you are not a scammer.

Hi Kelly S.   I looked at Brix's x-rays and I can totally see where the fracture started from those x-rays.  How sad that this happened to her.   She has some bowing going on in her other leg also, but that may be from the over compensation from the injured leg.  Talk to UM about that too.  It may correct itself once she is fixed.   As I said my boy has something very, very similar to what you are experiencing but his is because of hereditary reasons not injury.  It is the same condition.   He will be undergoing the same exact surgery that you will have to face.  I have studied this condition for hours and hours and talked to so many vets, etc that I have lost count.  I wanted to make sure I totally understood it and what we will face together in the coming months, before I put him through such a rough surgery.  They say it is a rare condition, but I think it may be more common that we think.  There were several vets that I talked to that have never even heard of it, hence they would not touch it. 

I have learned a lot and found that three reasons can cause this condition - one is the hereditary factor and the other is injury and the other is dietary (oversupplementing young pups) .  I have studied xrays of this condition for hours on end and if you look at the link that I posted in my last post there are pictures of x-rays you can compare.  I have discussed this condition at length with my ortho surgeon too.  He was kind enough to pull out all of his books and show me just what went wrong, why it went wrong and what will happen in the future if we dont correct it.  He showed me how to read the x-rays and showed me what was right and what was wrong on the x-rays.  It was such a learning experience.   I love my ortho surgeon - he is the best.  If you need a 2nd opinion, he is in Canton, Ohio and he is charging me $1450.00 per leg.  I thought that was a reasonable price.   It may be worth the drive to see him.  I see you are in Michigan.  If you ever need to talk about this, by all means contact me.  He has done this surgery many times and is a very experienced GSD surgeon.  He was the personal vet for the Firestone family who used to raise and show GSD's years ago.  He told me he got lots of practice as they had some doosies over the years.

In the link that I provided, there is one xray that shows an injured growth plate and what happens and there are other shots that show when they don't grow  properly.  It is very interesting.  My boy is textbook for hereditary and I honestly think that Brix is pretty textbook for the injury.  I can see a tiny little chip in her x-ray which was most likely the primary cause.  I am no expert by any means, but this has become my passion for the past 3 months when I learned my boy had it and have read every piece of material on it that I could find.   I will be interested to hear what UM has to say.   By all means get this surgery as soon as you can - the results are usually very good.     There is a company that will loan you the money for veteranary issues.  Talk to UM about this and they will provide you with the material.  You pay it back at your pace.  I forget the name of it but had to use it years ago and it is a good program.

I have opted for the surgery because if I do nothing  my boy can and most likely will blow out both of his elbows from the misallignment that is going on.  This surgery will correct this issue completely and will prevent that.   I have had dogs  with bad elbows and they cannot  be fixed (only treated) so I want to protect him from a lifetime of suffering from

Kelly, I’m not calling into question your integrity, honesty or credibility.  I’ve visited this forum quite often but don’t often get the time to post however, I’ve read about Brix and Boss. Obviously, I don’t know your dogs from Adam; I’m just going by what I see.  Both legs ‘look’ bowed to me on the X-ray, one severely misaligned with bone remodelling and formation. The point of my post was to lead you to think a bit deeper.  Whatever you decide to do, I wish you the very best of luck.

Thank you for the education Caldax.

Kelly-

I would not do ANYTHING with this dog until you talk to my ortho vet. People come from all over the country to meet w/him and his associate. When they aren't practicing, they are touring the country/world, lecturing and teaching new procedures that most vets have never heard about. This is far too delicate a surgery to screw around with, and you literally have ONE SHOT at this. No "do-overs" if it gets screwed up.

This surgeon did very delicate, major spinal surgery on my Chihuahua (after the other ORTHO SPECIALISTS) told me the  dog had DJD and would never be ok and would be paralyzed eventually. He did an MRI (oh, and he did it on his lunch hour and didn't charge me for another visit) and found 2 ruptured discs...no evidence of DJD at all. I should add that he didn't make me come back and schedule the surgery. He let me leave him there and started the surgery at 6pm, when he was finished w/his last patient. You have a small window before the spinal cord dies when pressure is applied to it. I had my dog home in 2 days, walking better than he had been before the surgery. Now, he has no maintenance, whereas he would've been on Prednisone for life....however short that may have been once his spinal cord died, paralyzing him since there were ruptured discs sitting on it. He also did an extra procedure called fenestration, if I remember correctly to ensure that if another disc ruptures, it will not be able to touch his spinal cord. It's like weaving back and forth between vertebra so that if the rupture, they can't pop up and cause any damage. I have never even heard of this, and I find it terrifying that none of the other vets even mentioned this.

Another time, an ortho specialist (I use that term loosely now!) wanted to do a TPLO on Caleb. "Mother's intuition" told me to get another opinion (total of 3) and he looked at THE SAME XRAY that the other guy took and said "congratulations; he is still growing." The dog had PANO! Nothing wrong w/his knee at all. Keep in mind 2 vets said he had a ruptured ACL.

Third, one of my little girls bruised her growth plates on both sides, causing them to close early, so one bone in each leg was growing and the other was not. He had a new procedure to treat this, and while it was major surgery, she is absolutely good as new, although of course she may have some arthritis later in life.

Anyway...I know you probably feel like your vet at MSU is the best shot you have, but I know you're in Michigan, and I would really encourage you to try to at least call and talk to Dr. Pare or Dr. Gendreau (Pare did all mine) before you do anything. I'm only one person, and I've had THREE DIFFERENT DOGS saved a great deal of pain because of him. Oh, and maybe he feels sorry for me or something, but he has always gone out of his way to save me money (like sending me for coffee and calling me when he had a few minutes so I never had to reschedule a follow up appointment for diagnostics, etc.)

The hospital is phenomenal; 24/7 visiting hours, and when you call to check on your pet, they KNOW what's going on! You don't get put on hold forever while they find someone who actually knows who your pet is.

Here's the link. If it were my dog, I would make the drive. What if they messed up on Brix and you had to put him down? He's young; don't chance it!

www.vetspecialty.com/index1.htm

This is the page for Surgical Referral Service- you can click on the vets' names to read their credentials.

Samba, you are correct,  Thank God I have never had to use him, but know of others who have and were very pleased with him..I live on Kansas - Missour border, so if I ever have any problems,  I would use him...

Kelly, Brix is such a nice pup, a real trooper.
Always,
Cee

I know you had him looked at...my point was to get an opinion and possibly an easier (for the dog) procedure. Mine has absolutely no screws or pins or other metal, and she did this to BOTH legs at 4mos old. She is FINE now...whereas if she'd had the "normal" procedure which is the one we're discussing, she could have had serious complications throughout her life, including bone cancer caused by foreign objects (the screws/pins).

He's your dog...your choice...but if it were me, I would look into all other options before committing to any surgery. Most vets only tell you about what they know.

Caldex, I PM'd you.

Good luck to both  dogs. Poor things.