Gavin's radiation treatment

So sorry on your behalf. I can see it being a problem with the long driving time.
Yes, it is an extremely difficult situation requires many resources and not least the thought of your fur baby is alone with all this he has been through.
 
So I have been reading online about radiation 'burns'. There is a ton of information out there on breast cancer support sites, btw.

I found a really cool reply by a radiation oncologist that I found very informative. It IS long, though. So I summarized the highlights :)
<https://community.breastcancer.org/forum/70/topics/783321>

"Radiation wounds are not really burns, and they are not rated by degree. The reason you can't use degrees is that burns start at the top, and spread downward, and the "degree" of the burn has to do with how far through the skin thickness it caused damage. That isn't at all what happens with radiation- therefore the degree system isn't very useful.

Radiation wounds are not "damaged" skin, as much as they are "missing" skin- radiation causes skin to fail to reproduce properly, and thus as you "use up" your normal skin, like we all do all day, there are no new layers of skin coming up from the bottom. So eventually the area can ulcerate. This might look like a thermal burn, but it has very little in common with a thermal burn, and the treatments for thermal burns will not help much."

So the cornstarch paste is similar to those second skin bandages you will find out there (I know I have used them for blisters). Hopefully this means Gavin is busy healing and growing new skin under that messy white stuff! It looks like the outer edges of skin are moving inwards a bit, but the tops of his toes have no skin and are super sensitive.

Apparently, these wounds can be very itchy. Which would explain Gavin scraping the top of his foot with his cone.
 
My heart goes out to you Cindy,coping with this on your own and trying to hold down a full time job. It's A LOT to handle. I'm so thankful for my hubby to tag-team with and the fact that I work part-time also helps.

Cut yourself lots of slack, you are making a HUGE effort, and you will get to the finish line having made a big difference for Gavin. The days I have struggled to get food into Ally and then had to go to work and take care of really sick (and sometimes cranky) people all day has worn on me.

Hang in there, and take any offers of help up on it if you can. Too bad you're in Nor Cal and I'm in So Cal. :hugs
 
I think the hardest parts are : people don't really know how radiation treatments work (no Gavin is not radioactive), they don't think it lasts as long as it does (19 treatments over a month) and once the treatment part is over there is still several weeks of really intensive nursing required (no one seems to believe me on this). I had one dog friend ask if I should stop treatments since Gavin was in pain (this after radiation was already over). Another dog friend asked me if everything was getting back to normal now that radiation was over (I had told her about the soaks and all but she thought they must be over by now).

Our last treatment was Tuesday the 5th. They even gave me a little certificate for Gavin's 'graduation' with a picture of him in a party hat. We had a checkup last Friday the 8th and another one this coming Friday the 15th. The Domeboro soaks/cornstarch coatings started Dec 31.

I would post pictures of his leg, but you really can't see much with the cornstarch. I am supposed to leave it on, and not try and remove anything beyond what comes off while soaking, so the white pasty bit covers most of it ALL the time to promote healing. I can say there is no bleeding, and I can't see any oozing. The soaks are really drying things out. He has been standing on that leg but not walking on it for a few days. Right now he is pacing a bit (he wants dinner) and he is walking on all 4 legs! I think he will probably start doing that more as opposed to hopping on 3 legs over the next week.

I really have no idea on exactly how this will heal up. I was given an approximate 2 week timetable last Friday for open wound healing (I have another 2 week Rx for antibiotics). Then another 2-4 weeks until things are really all healed up. They tried to gently pull on his toenails (while he was under) that he is supposed to loose and they weren't gonna budge. His pads look good, too. So I just have to patient :( I suck at that.:gaah

I suppose I could use a grocery delivery service to save time, but considering my grocery store is literally a 2 blocks walk away it seems kinda excessive. I think I am just starting to resent not even having time for 'chores'. Not to mention the endless loads of laundry of his bedding. And attempting to clean up the cornstarch that is EVERYWHERE and always magically reappears. Now that Gavin is home and I am not doing the vet run, things should be easier (although the soaks probably more than negate the time savings).

I will give Gavin half a pill of ACE (sedative) tomorrow before I leave and see how it goes. The normal dose is 3/4-1 pill, but considering all the pain meds he is on I would rather be conservative.
 
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I understand you have a hard time seeing you out of the situation and that your power is running low.

That dog friends do not understand this is indeed incomprehensible.:eek2:

You have to buy you all the help you can afford, it does not matter if it is exaggerated or not.

At present is only about to get a grip on your life, so you do not see everything around you like a mess.

As soon as you see it going forward with Gavin, and come in a daily routine, then you can look back and be proud of both came out on the other side.
 
Cindy, have you inquired at your vet's if any of the vet techs take on short term dog sitting jobs on their off hours? A couple of the techs at our vet hospital do even though I have never needed to hire one. If you could get someone who did understand what was needed to care for Gavin, at least you could hire a couple of times a week for just enough time to do your grocery shopping and little time off to give yourself a break from worrying how Gavin was doing.

I am so sorry you are going through this...it is exhausting both emotionally and physically. But I am happy that it sounds like Gavin is doing well.

Trini
 
I think Wednesday I will take a day off.
This morning, while I was in the shower and Gavin was in his cone in his pen, after his leg had been soaked/dried/dressed, he got out of his cone and licked the whole thing :( I didn't loop the cone through his collar since it was a 5 minute shower and he seemed calm, but the XL cone is apparently really easy to slip out of :(
So now I have to repeat the whole process...

Vet tech as a sitter is a good idea. Unfortunately, the radiation vet is not close. They do have a branch that is closer, though. Funny thing, no one has mentioned that idea to me (one would think the vets would say it is an option for home care).

I think I will just start taking time off from work. I had that figured in when I started this, and have taken very little time off. If Gavin is being a brat with me, I know he is worse with other people.

<https://clkreder.shutterfly.com/3251>
<https://clkreder.shutterfly.com/3252>
<https://clkreder.shutterfly.com/3253>

since Gavin completely removed the cornstarch, I took pictures while drying it after the Domeboro soak
 
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You deserve a day off. You've held it together better than I ever could.
It's really encouraging that he's standing on that leg. It looks so raw and sore in the pics.
 
It might not be obvious from the pictures, but it looks pretty good considering.
There is very little ooziness and more pink skin/less scab.
But the side effect of that is that there is less moisture to glue the cornstarch to his foot. So while I spray the cornstarch with an aloe spray that makes it kinda like a paste, it very easily comes/slides off of his foot as there is nothing glueing it down (so to speak).

Gavin licking the cornstarch off is many times better than him scrape it off with his cone as that takes a skin layer with it :( That is when it turns bloody.
I am kinda afraid of his vet visit on Friday since the scraping only happens when he is there....I will tell then NOT to put him in run and probably have them sedate him.

This morning he was not walking on that leg, but still standing on it.
 
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