Jaynie Has A Ligament Injury In One Toe

[Rickiesmom]

Jaynie has no idea she is retired, and tears around the yard like she's queen of the track. A little over a week or so she started limping. It took me a couple of days to figure it out, but I noticed eventually that the outer toe on her left front foot wasn't nice and snug against the others as it should be. It sticks out slightly and is flatter than it should be.

 

Off to the vet we went - she thinks it is an injured ligament, and suggested pain management and no offleash time for awhile. No bandaging etc., as apparently that just makes things worse. No need to do really short walks, just watch for tolerance, but controlled exercise OK.

 

So we have been in this mode, with only one accident yesterday, when she pushed past me when I was bringing Arlie in <no flames please, I feel bad enough already> and of course went roaring around until I could stop her. Predictably, it was a setback and we seem to be back where we started.

 

My questions are (ignoring the escape factor for a moment):

 

- if you have had a hound with this injury, how did you treat it, and was it successful

- if successful, how long did it take

- once it is healed, is she susceptible to this happening again, and if yes, are there precautions I need to take like maybe wrapping the foot before she goes out loose?

- anything else?

 

In view of what happened yesterday, are there any extra measures (other than not letting it happen again) that I should take due to probable re-injury?

 

Thank you for your input. Here is my little bunny (foreground) at a fun run last summer (photo courtesy of Karen at Camp Greyhound):

 

Edited April 9, 2011 by Rickiesmom

[Batmom]

Sure it's not dislocated?

[Rickiesmom]

Sure it's not dislocated?

 

The vet examined her pretty thoroughly and didn't think so. I don't know what the range of appearance is for dislocation, but my whippet dislocated a toe a couple of times and it really stuck out. This is almost like sagging away than true sticking out if that makes sense.

[Guest KennelMom]

Melody pretty much destroyed all the ligaments in one of her outer front toes during a lure coursing meet. I nearly lost the contents of my stomach when I saw her toe as I collected her from end of the course...it looked totally deflated, as if there were no bones or structure in the toe at all. Fortunately, there was a vet on site that day and we were able to get immediate care (good thing since I was 17 hours from home!). We tried to re-hab it for over a year (had an ortho specialist, the whole nine yards), but ultimately it became too arthritic with the scar tissue that built up during the healing process. We had it amputated and she does great now. BUT, that was SEVERE ligament damage. (She actually damaged ligaments in two toes, the outer one severely, the one next to it not so badly)

 

My guess is that your pup's toe did actually dislocate, but popped back in alignment and all that's left to observe is the ligament damage. We've successfully healed lots of those sorts of injuries...We do strict leash walking for about 6 weeks to give the ligament time to heal back up. Most of the time, we never have another problem with the toe...sometimes you do...there's really no way to predict. My best advice is to keep nails short and be very, very, very dilligent in leash walking and keeping activity minimal for 4-6 weeks (I know sometimes crap happens and you take a step or two backwards, but the more times the toe re-damages itself, the more scar tissue you are likely to have...and more arthritis/less flexibility in the toe...)

Edited April 9, 2011 by KennelMom

[Rickiesmom]

Thanks Heather - that's really helpful. One question - what did you do for pain management and especially, for how long. I know each dog is different, but it would give me some measure. Jaynie is on 100mg of tramadol 2x per day. She can't have NSAIDs.

[Batmom]

Depending on what the toe is doing, might consider wrapping it as I did for angel Zema's: http://forum.greytalk.com/index.php/topic/236108-dislocated-toe-our-wrap-job-which-worked/page__p__4146449__hl__dislocated__fromsearch__1?do=findComment&comment=4146449 . Hers was a repeated (several times over a short time period) dislocation. She liked to spin on that foot, and I didn't want to deal with putting the toe back every day or taking it off. Bit of a long haul to let it heal, but it never dislocated again.

[Rickiesmom]

Wow, that's really cool. I am going to try that before the next walk.

 

ETA - how long did you leave the bandage on. Sounds like more than just for support during walks?

Edited April 9, 2011 by Rickiesmom

[duncan41]

Believe it or not, my Fuzz (Suze's litter sister) suffered the same injury one evening in July of last year. Nothing dramatic - the outer toe on her right front paw ended up at a crazy angle to the rest of her toes; she had just taken a step to the right before deciding to take off to her left on a zoomie. She never made the zoomie; screamed and held up the foot. I immediately soaked it in cool water and she was taken to the vet the next morning. No dislocation evident at that time, but some pretty severe ligament damage. She was treated with Rimadyl. Now for the hard part - we ended up leash walking her for 5 months, even in the backyard, before she could do a controlled sprint without limping. We still don't let her run full tilt because the toe is still tender. It's still at a funny angle, but it doesn't seem to be causing her any discomfort during normal activities. "Normal" for Fuzz is being walked on a leash. She is one of those dogs who would run and run and run and run until she dropped dead, so a little divine intervention has prevented a tragic incident and serves to protect her foot. When it is "cool" here in FL, we do allow her to run for about 30 seconds but have treats in hand to get her to stop.

 

 

[Batmom]

Wow, that's really cool. I am going to try that before the next walk.

 

ETA - how long did you leave the bandage on. Sounds like more than just for support during walks?

 

I left it on for @ 3 weeks and leash-walked / deterred indoor zoomies for a couple weeks more. It was a pain in the rear if we had wet weather -- you have to keep a bandage DRY -- but at least for us, it was worth it.

[kudzu]

Yes, my girly Grey has two toes on one foot with this problem. Neither ever looked dislocated but she would let out a squeal while running then end up three legged for few seconds & then walk with a limp for days afterward. OK, let me back up. It started while lure coursing. She ran great & looked good coming off the field but on the way back to the car I checked her feet & found a cut on one toe. It wasn't a big cut but deep. As it turned out it was down to the bone. Ugh! However, even after it appeared fully healed it would split back open again as she ran. It turns out the cut was actually a wound splitting open from the inside out as the toe luxated, or at least subluxated, & then popped back into joint. Weeks & weeks of leash walking & house arrest then months of restricted activity resulted in... A repeat and months later another repeat. Had I known in the beginning what we were dealing with we may have done things differently.

 

That was the inner most toe on her front left foot. Then a few days before a scheduled vet visit concerning that toe she came up lame again but the wound had not popped open that time. At the appt vet pointed out the outer most toe on the same foot had a loose ligament, in fact worse than the toe I was worried about, "See how this outer toe is swollen?" Well, no I had not seen because I was looking at the inside one but sure enough the other one looked as swollen as the inner one. Each toe had a blown ligament. "We can do surgery on this one," pointing to outer toe, "and I can do the same for this inner one but it is not likely to hold considering how long it has been." So I decided to do the surgery, then I changed my mind, back & forth for a month & finally chose not to do surgery.

 

The outer most toe, with the supposedly loosest joint does not seem to give her problems. The inner one does but with a low chance of successful results from surgery I cannot justify putting my 9 yo dog through it. Besides, it hasn't been a problem in months... until this morning. [sigh] Her toe has popped open again. Just a 2 mm wide wound that goes straight down towards the joint with the blown ligament. She is barely limping. And I'm still debating what to do next.

[JJNg]

Not a whole lot to add except that I usually do keep leash walks short to minimize motion for at least the first 2-3 weeks. My male Wiki has had lots of toe issues with dislocations and torn ligaments. I've found that he mostly just seems painful for the first 2-3 days, after the initial injury (or re-injury), and I usually don't use any pain meds beyond that. Each dog is different, though, so Jaynie may need meds for longer, and for one who can't take NSAIDs, I would stay with tramadol as long as it seems to help.

 

Can you post photos of the toe? Did your vet specify which joint and ligament she thought was affected? Without x-rays, I also wouldn't rule out the possibility of a fracture, but with toe injuries, that doesn't always change the course of treatment.

[Guest KennelMom]

We used tramadol and rimadyl as needed while healing...probably more tramadol than rimadyl...I tend use pain meds conservatively, as a bit of pain is nature's way of telling the dog to take it easy. Also agree with keeping walks minimal in the early weeks!

[BauersMom]

You can also start supplementing with Ligaplex II - that was one of the recommendations I got when I was going through this.

 

With our dislocation + ligament damage dog we ended up having to leash walk for 6 months. We went through several periods of re-dislocation with the shorter time frames in our case. Ligaments are notoriously slow healing.

 

As far as wrapping - be careful with partial wraps that don't cover the toes. Too tight and you will cause swelling in the toes.