Henry was a happy, gangly puppy. Like many, it was hard to tell if he was sitting funny or just awkward. His owner has been my client for many years, and through experience we decided that pet insurance was a good investment for her, as she has always wanted to provide the best quality medical care for her dogs. Oh, Henry, are we glad for it now.
Henry was screened by Penn Hip Xray at 17 weeks because I was a little nervous that he wasn't comfortable sitting straight. He was happy and didn't seem to be in excruciating pain but never sat comfortably ...
and he hated going up stairs.
And so, what we found was that he has loose hips, as he grew through puppyhood, they just did not sit in place correctly, which means when he sits, they slide out of place and it is uncomfortable for him.
We did a trial of pain medication to see if he was hiding discomfort behind his smile, and all of a sudden he started being braver about his exercises and the stairs. With validation of his discomfort, we were ready to move forward to resolve this and try to eliminate his medications. Henry is so young and has a lot of medical problems, we wanted to avoid daily pain meds as much as possible. We also talked about hip surgery, down the road, but so far we have no indication he needs it right now, he is doing great.
At 2 years old, we treated Henry with Shockwave and Anicell Stem Cells and we started to teach him to use his body with better balance with rehabilitation exercises. Over 30 days he was greatly improved and started to be able to navigate stairs and to be stronger in his posture, and he was able to trade supplements for pain medications!
At 4 years old, he started to show some discomfort again and pain with jumping. We injected his hip joints with a product that gives him physical cushioning called Spryng, and treated him again with shockave and stem cells. This guy is doing great - he is playing and no longer afraid, AND not taking any medications!
Henry has pet insurance, thank goodness.