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Bella Duncan- June Pet of the Month
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 Congratulations to Bella, our June Pet of the month!
Bella is a two year old female spayed laboradoodle. She is
certainly a sweetheart. In April Bella
came home after being missing for two days. When she returned she was unable to walk on her left hind leg and it was
extremely swollen. She was brought to us
in a baby carriage! She was VERY
painful, but other than the swelling, only a few draining puncture wounds were
visible. Her parents allowed us to
anesthetize her for X-rays and to clean the wounds. There were concerns that she may have been in
a fight or hit by a car.
Once we had her anesthetized and
were able to examine her wounds more closely; we were quite surprised! There were a few BB's present on her X-rays,
but fortunately no broken bones. When we
began shaving the hair around the wounds there was a very large area of dead
tissue that was coming right off with the hair. Once we removed all the dead tissue and cleaned the area, we were left
with a very large wound that was still infected.
We chose to manage Bella's wound by
leaving it open and packing it with sterile wet gauze each day. As the gauze dries, all the bacteria and
diseased tissues adhere to it and are removed when we change the bandage. This can be very painful, so she was sedated
for these bandage changes. We repeated
this until we were left with healthy tissue to begin closing the wound.
Our next challenge was closing such
a large wound with not enough skin to span the area - not to mention this was
an area with a lot of motion when she walks. To do this we placed sutures along the opening and gradually tightened
them each day as the skin stretched to the point that we were able to fully
close the wound and it healed. Interesting
fact - skin can stretch to 7 times its normal size!
(Click here is to see wound
pictures - they are graphic)
Bella's total recovery time from presentation to suture
removal was 20 days! She was kept on
antibiotics and pain medications during this time. She was really a trooper, but she did have to
wear an E collar to keep her from chewing at the wound. Bella's friendly attitude and gentle nature
made her treatment easier on herself, her family and everyone involved in her
care. She sure is a sweetheart!
 
Bella is back to her
old self now, playing soccer with her boy and running through the fields.
Congratulations on
your spectacular recovery Bella! | 
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