Client Education


We would explain to the client that their dog is anemic, which means that he has reduced numbers of the red blood cells that carry oxygen in the blood. Because of this, anesthesia would be risky at this time. We would like to do a few further tests to find out why Ramon is anemic and try to get his red blood cell count back up to normal before doing any kind of surgery on him.

Ramon has a fractured left femur, which is the long bone in his upper leg. The bone is completely broken and has a large fragment of bone broken off.  There are two ways that we can try to fix the femur. We can manipulate the bone without doing surgery and try to align it correctly. Then we would put it in a cast to keep the bone from moving. This method would most likely allow the femur to heal, and Ramon should be able to walk on it, but the bone might be warped and he might not be able to use his leg as well as he did before. Having the leg in a cast might also cause problems with the leg muscles because they won't be able to move; muscle atrophy would be a possible complication. The other way that we could fix Ramon's femur is by bone plating. This involves screwing a stainless steel plate to Ramon's femur above and below the fracture. This method is more invasive, as we have to surgically put the plate in, and it will be much more expensive, but it would allow us to better align the bone. With a plate, Ramon's leg would have a better chance to return to normal and would have less chance of being warped. 

Ramon also has a fractured right tibia and fibula, which are approximately equivalent to your shin bones. Like the femur, these bones are completely broken and have several bone chips. Once again there are two options we can pursue. We can try to align the bone ends without surgery and place a cast on the leg to keep the bones from moving. Like the femur, though, this would not be a very exact alignment, and Ramon's leg could be warped, or dead pieces of bone could predispose to infection. The other option that we could recommend uses pins as external fixators. In this technique, we insert pins into the bones and connect them to an external post, or sidebar. We think that this will work well on the tibia and fibula because of the small amount of muscle and tissue around that part of the leg. This technique, like the femur plating, will allow us to better align the bones and will give them a better probability of healing properly.

No matter which technique we use on Ramon's legs, he is going to need to be confined to a cage or room for a period of time. If you choose to plate the femur, Ramon will need to be rested for at least a week. After a week, Ramon will have to be exercised on a leash for 5 weeks or until we can see healing on X-rays. We will probably also need to do radiographs (X-rays) right after surgery to make sure that the plates or other fixation devices are placed correctly.  After we see signs of bone healing, Ramon can go back to normal exercise. We would want to remove the plates 3-6 months after the bone has healed. If you decide to use the external fixation technique on the tibia, you will need to clean the pins and sidebar with water every day. You will also need to make sure that Ramon doesn't chew on the sidebars. When we see that the bone has healed, we will take out the pins.