poor Sing

For the first time today, in nearly 2 years of struggling to get poor Sing to walk normal; I finally felt relief that he is now properly look after by a reasonably good vet. And yes, I am moving away from my vet after 9 years to a better Veterinary. Although the distance to travel is further and not so easy to get to but I had enough with my vet, I cannot bare to take any of my dogs to him anymore!

Great thanks to Ann who highly recommend her vet to me. I took Sing to see the new vet and she has confirmed what Colin and I thought it was ...

For those who do not know what happened, here is the summary ...

It all happened in October 2009, the Thursday night before Shrewsbury Agility Show weekend. I was playing ball with Sing in the lounge that night while eating my dinner (our usual routine), he suddenly yelp in pain. I was shocked. He is a very tough boy, nothing could get him to scream unless he is extremely in pain, so I was concern. That night, he was unable to walk up the stairs or jump up onto the settee and our bed. There were no vet appointment on Friday and he was looking ok, so I carried on what I've already planned. To drive up to Shrewsbury on Friday night to stay in the Travel Lodge with the dogs. Sing didn't compete that weekend of course. I took him to see my vet on Monday. He was prescribed with pain killer. That time, the vet and I thought he must somehow strain his shoulder. We then have him look by a physio Ray Tent at a show, he did the flicking treatment and told me that he can carry on working after 5 days. Of course, I did. I did Dash 'n' Splash with him 5 days later. It was a 3-day event, on the last day, he slipped on the platform and I immediately see that he is not right and stop there and then. We were back to the vet and more physio ... it has been on and off for a few months and everyone thought it's his shoulder/joint problem. Then, in April 2010, I realised his paw beginning to change shape. I alert my vet, he said there is nothing to worry about, because he is in pain, so he tried to compensate the way he is walking, so he is developing a funny walking pattern and created an extra pad. I am no professional and I am not happy with the explanation BUT what can I do? I keep a close eye on that paw and I tried to massage the paw, hopefully it won't get spread out too much. Then in May 2010, Colin and I noticed he licks his paw more than ever and we sometimes see puss coming out through the pad. I told the vet, he gave him anti-biotic for that. He was on anti-biotic for a long time but there is no improvement on the paw. Sing is limping most of the time, surely there is something wrong with the paw. After a few months on anti-bioctic, the vet gave me a tube of Fuciderm Gel, it sounded like I will apply the gel on him whenever it is sore and basically is almost everyday. Anyway, it's been on going until we went to Scotland on holiday. Sing had to rush to the emergency vet because his paw was very poorly. I had a word with the vet and he said there is nothing wrong on Sing's shoulder/joint, it is the paw and he believe that there is a foreign object (grass seed highly possible) has been living in the pad for months or even a year. This is why he is constantly infected. He suggested I took him to my vet to have him x-ray and operated on it. I have been discussed this with Colin and both of us agreed that we will find another vet to look at Sing's paw instead of going back to my vet which we think he will just gave him more anti-biotic. Of course, I lost my mum and there were a lot of other sad things going on until just now.

Anyway, I am very happy to see a good vet with good knowledge and Sing will be treated and well look after by her. He is schedule to go in on Friday morning to have an x-ray then operation to get the pad sorted. After that, he will need another operation on the "extra pad", but we are doing one at a time. I am so happy that he gets treated properly and correctly and hopefully no more limp from my special boy.

 this is his paw today