RPAW – Medical Cases

Dodge was a 2 year old pure bred Lab that was having issues breathing. His owners reached out to us for help because they could not afford the entire cost of the surgical procedure he needed. He had a condition called Laryngeal Paralysis aka Lar Par. This is where one of both sides of the Larynx are paralyzed. If this nerve is paralyzed, the larynx stays in a half closed position and adjustments for increased respiratory effort such as running or panting during hot weather cannot be made. This results in poor oxygenation and overheating. He was a very active boy and this would significantly impact his quality of life. We were able to raise the funds to help him get the needed surgery. He is living much more comfortably.

Oakley joined us after she was diagnosed with a condition called Facial Paralysis which causes her to have the inability to blink and keep her eyes lubricated. As you can imagine this can be dangerous if not treated. Her previous family did not have the schedule that allowed for them to manage her eye medications. She will need medications for life. After a visit with our Neurologist, we were able to find out that thankfully it was not progressive and she should be stable and manageable. She was able to find a forever home with a retired couple.

Leory came to us with a huge problem… he weighed 145#. About 25% of his body weight was Lipoma aka fatty tumors. It was impeding every aspect of his life. We knew we needed to get him some help so we started making surgical appointments with our specialist. Overall, we were able to remove almost 15# of fatty tumors. He also lost a good amount of body weight as he was overweight. When he went to his forever home he ended weighing 116#. This was completely preventable and it was unfortunate that he had to live most of his life like this.

Maisy has a horrific story. Someone threw her off a bridge onto the freeway. Amazing enough she just has 2 fractured wrists. We do not know anymore about the story or the outcome of said people so please do not inquire. We get most of our animals from the local authorities and we are here to deal with the aftermath and they are the ones who deal with the issue at hand.

Maisy was unable to walk when she came to us. We immediately stabilized her front legs with splints and those stayed on for about 5 months. Before and after surgery. She had a procedure on one wrist called Arthrodesis which basically fuses the wrist joint for life. She was stable enough on one of these that she did not need the other one done.

She has since been adopted and is doing well.

Sage came to us when he was found in a home with his deceased owner. He was 11 years old and when animal control impounded him they noticed he had a large bleeding rectal mass. In most cases, rectal masses are bad news… but not always. They reached out to us asking if we could find a hospice home for him. We said yes! Once we took him in, we had to address his dental situation because it was a mess. While we did that we took a piece of tissue from the mass to see what it was and how aggressive it was. To our surprise, it was just a polyp… not cancer and could be removed completely. So that is what we did.

This shows the importance of testing everything. This dog could have been euthanized for no reason if the impound just assumed they knew what it was. We are so thankful they reached out and Sage found a forever family to live out his life!

Meet Jade ❤

This sweet girl joined us this week after being seized from a hoarding house. Unfortunately her previous owners were not in the right state to care for her. She was unfortunately never groomed do she was severely matted and infested with fleas. She was immediately treated for them but when she arrived to us and we sedated her to shave her we found all of the flea dirt left behind. It looked like someone sprinkled potting soil all over her. Flea dirt is flea feces and it is just dried blood of the host dog. Once shaved we gave her a nice long bath and the water was rust colored ? Her bloodwork showed anemia from the blood loss but now that she is being treated and given the proper nutrition she should be able to bounce back quickly.

Miss Marple is 10 years old and she has had ear infections for her entire life. Unfortunately with every ear infection comes inflamed and thickened skin in her ear canal. After 10 years of chronic, untreated ear infections her ear canals are almost sealed shut. This is very painful and the discomfort is unimaginable.

She had a procedure called a Total Ear Canal Ablation. This means both her ear canals were surgically removed. She is still able to hear, probably better than she could. It is a very big procedure and it can be risky as there is a lot of blood supply in the ears. But this is what she needed to live more comfortably.

The cost for this is steep ($3000) and we know she is a senior… however one of our huge mottos is “Age is not a disease” and she needs this to be comfortable in her remaining years.

This little guy came to us from our friends at Turtle Mountian Animal Rescue. He was born missing most of his tongue. At first this would be thought to be a disability but in reality there isn’t much different about him. He eats and drinks just fine and he plays and acts like any other puppy!

Meet Suzie ❤

This sweet lady is about 3 or 4 years old and we thing she is likely a schnoodle of some sort. She was found looking like the picture on the left… today she looks like the picture on the right. She was left to wander the city in pain and discomfort for awhile. She was very underweight and her fur was pelted. She needed to be sedated to be groomed.

Since then she is a different dog. She is still a little shy and cowars some when you go to pet her. But once she warms up to you she does great!

Skye joined our rescue a little over a month ago. She was brought into the emergency clinic with what was thought to be a Pyometra (uterine infection) when in fact it was a terrible bladder infection. We treated it she was doing well so we adopted her out.

Unfortunately she was back at the emergency vet shortly after adoption with another terrible bladder infection. At this point it was realized that her anatomy was not correct and her urethra did not flow out through a vulva. This was causing her to not fully void when urinating. She needed corrective surgery to fix this and the adopter was unable to handle that expense.

She was returned to us and we had the surgery done right away. She is now recovering nicely and should be able to be a normal cat again soon.