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RPAW – Medical Cases

Radius/Ulna Fracture: Joey

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His name is Joey and he comes from a very rough background. We are not able to post his picture public-ally due to his past. He is a chihuahua and he is around 7 months old. He is the sweetest little thing you could ever imagine. He broke both his Radius and Ulna on his front leg. Thankfully our orthopedic surgeon was able to place a plate and screws into his leg to fix the fracture.

Testicular Vasculitis: Tator Tot

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Meet Tator Tot ❤

He came into our partner clinic recently when his previous owners noticed an extremely swollen scrotum. They did not have the funds to pursue any options and were looking into euthanasia. We were happy to step in and get him the care he needed. He needed emergency surgery to remove his entire scrotum. We had it sent to the lab for testing and they are still working on full results but it looks like there saw some type of severe infection that caused the tissue to start dying and cut off the blood supply.
When we took over his care he was in real danger. He was bruising everywhere because his platelets were so low. He was rushed to surgery and then he was placed on fluids and started on Vitamin K to help with the platelet issue.

Thankfully he recovered nicely. His surrendering owners were actually the breeder of his parents and they had sold him as a puppy. Recently they had taken him back when the buyer couldn’t care for him. He has some skin allergies as well. Long term he should not need anything special.

He is sweeter than pie and he just wants to please everyone. He is a Husky/Shepherd mix. He is about 60# and 11 months old. He will make someone an amazing companion.

Cost for care: $1000

Urinary Stones: Yellowstone

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This guy joins us all the way from Western North Dakota. He was with another rescue that was able to help out his siblings with a safe place to land but unfortunately it was soon found out that Yellowstone has some very large bladder stones. This was a little more than the rescue could manage. They reach out for help and we welcomed this 11 year old boy to our rescue. An amazing soul from Montana drove him the entire way. This guy is just the sweetest old soul and won hearts the entire journey. He had surgery to removed the stones.

The cost for this procedure was $950.

PRAA (Persistant Right Aortic Arch): Winnie

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This 8 week old Soft Coated Wheaton joined us recently. She has PRAA (Persistant Right Aortic Arch) which if you have been following us know is what Lily Pad had. She needed surgery to fix the malformation and she may still have residual Mega Esophagus. The mega esophagus may or may not resolve over time. Currently she needs to eat in the upright position and continue to sit up for about 20-30 minutes after eating. She is on a strictly liquid diet of pureed canned puppy good that is eat to digest. She also has aspiration pneumonia and is on antibiotics for that. She is sweet as can be and will be feeling better soon!

Cost for her procedure was $3700.

Patella Luxation: Jackie

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She is the sweet young lady who came to us from Valkyrie Sanctuary. They took her in when she was just 8 weeks old and she had always been shy and took much longer to place. As she grew they knew something was off when she would walk around so they got her into the vet and found out she had a whole heap of problems orthopedically. She has severe hip dysplasia and on top of that she had luxating patella in both knees. That means her knee caps would slip in and out of place. This meant that she really had no stability in her rear end and it was starting to cause severe issues.

The Sanctuary knew that this type of situation would be costly and just more than they could afford. They posted for help and we happily reached out. We have the most amazing vet partners and orthopedic surgeons. We had them take a look at her and we decided to take things one knee at a time. A couple months ago she had her first knee procedure. She has recovered well and today she came back in for the other knee. The surgeon is hopefully that all we need to address is the knees and that will give her enough stability to give her the much needed comfort.

Originally the other rescue was going to transfer her over to us completely. However after her first procedure we noticed she was so scared and she wouldn’t eat. She had never been away from her foster family. We reached out to them to see if they would be available to foster her still and we would cover the vet bills and procedures. They welcomed her back with open arms and she has made the best recovery. Sometimes it isn’t about what rescue has what dog and what rescue does something and which one does something else. We could provide the necessary medical procedures and they could provide the home where she was comfortable. Rescue to us is working together and we are so happy to work with Valkyrie Sanctuary.

Her cost has been $2650.

VSD (Ventricular Septal Defect): Utopia

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This little lady has a condition called Ventricular Septal Defect. Basically she was born with a hole in her heart. She is only 8 months old and already has changes to her heart do to increased pressure. She needed surgery to close the hole or she would have gone into congestive heart failure. The University of Minnesota was the only place in the state that has the ability to do this procedure.

Her procedure cost $4500.

PDA (Patent Ductus Arteriosus): Bella

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This little lady is only 4#. She is just under 3 years old and was born with a condition called Patent Ductus Arteriosus (PDA), which is a heart defect that occurs when the ductus arteriosus fails to close down at birth. She required surgery to close off that piece. If she did not receive surgery she would go into congestive heart failure soon and her life would have be cut very short. With her small size and increased surgical risk we had the procedure done at the University of Minnesota.

The cost for this procedure was $4700.

Diaphragmatic Hernia: Sushi

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This 1 year old boy was hit by a car as a little kitten. His previous owners just thought he sustained a fractured pelvis. That healed and he went on to live normally. They had to surrender him when they could not care for him any longer just recently. He went up for adoption but recently started having breathing that was a little off. When we had our vet take a closer look we found out that he sustained more than just a broken pelvis in the car accident. He has a condition called a diaphragmatic hernia. This is a condition in which a break in the diaphragm allows protrusion of abdominal organs into the chest. He needs surgery to replace the abdominal organs into the abdominal cavity and close the hole in the diaphragm. It is a complicated procedure because his lungs have been compromised for so long that they need to watch him carefully after surgery when his lungs will finally have the normal amount of room in his chest.

Total cost: $4000

Intrahepatic Portosystemic Shunt: Eeyore

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Eeyore was born with an intrahepatic portasystemic shunt. In other words, he had a shunt inside his life that is causing a big problem. A liver shunt occurs when an abnormal connection persists or forms between the portal vein or one of its branches, and another vein, allowing blood to bypass, or shunt, around the liver. In the majority of cases, a liver shunt is caused by a birth defect. When the blood bypasses the liver it bypasses the body’s filter and all of the toxins that may have been filtered out are dumped back into the body. When this happens the body’s ammonia level gets dangerously high and the puppy gets extremely sick. They cannot digest food appropriately, they can not absorb nutrients, their growth is severely stunted and worst of all they can become neurological and even have seizures.

Surgery is the only way to fix a shunt. Shunts outside the liver can be occluded/fixed by a board-certified surgeon at many different facilities. Unfortunately, when the shunt is on the inside of the liver the procedure is much more complex. You cannot just go in and band off the vessel. They have to feed a catheter down a vein in their neck place a stint in the shunt drop wire coils into the shunt and occlude it. That will prevent the blood from flowing around the liver. Only the University of Minnesota has the capability to do this procedure here in MN.

We have had a couple of dogs come through the group that have had this procedure. Daisy Duke and Luke Bryan. They are both doing wonderful now. Eeyore had the procedure and is now living an amazing life! The surgery is to save Eeyore was $6000.