Eliza has been going back for her weekly bandage changes and check-ups and everything has been looking pretty good. She doesn’t seem to be in any pain, the wound has healed nicely, and she has nerve response in her toes. She had new xrays today and while the bones are funny looking inside, they are inside and they ARE healing! Most likely, they will fuse together at the joint and while she won’t be perfect, she will have stability, range of motion, and be able to act like a normal cat.
Here she is grooming the leg while the cast is off at the vet’s office:
Here’s what the leg and foot look like now. No bones sticking out!
To test her movement, the vet let her try and walk on it a little with the cast off today and she noticed that Eliza was not really using it. After a few moments of inspection, more Xrays were ordered. They confirmed the doctor’s suspicion – Eliza is also suffering from a broken hip. It was missed on the original set of Xrays because they were looking for leg damage only and this is much further up.
To fix the broken femur bone, the vet has ordered a surgery called FHO (Femoral Head Ostectomy) which Eliza will get on 8/10. As it was explained to me, the surgeon is going to remove the round ball that goes into the hip socket because the socket has been damaged and leaving the ball on the femur will cause bone-on-bone rubbing and pain for the rest of her life. Without the femur ball, the bone will be held in the socket by leg muscles. The surgeon says prognosis is still good, says she will still walk, jump, be a happy cat. She just has to have one more surgery and then several more weeks of recovery and physical therapy. Until the surgery on 8/10 she is in a new, modified mini-cast that will allow her to regain flexibility in her achilles tendon which was previously all casted in to keep it still.
The good news is that Eliza continues to be our miracle cat. Our vet, the fabulous Dr. Toni Trego of the Amboy Veterinary Clinic, is donating Eliza’s FHO surgery. Does Eliza have the world on her side, or what?!
