Medial shoulder instability

Caro

Caro

Moderator
Well I got some bad news about Tully recently. She has quite bad medial shoulder instability - her ligaments are badly stretched, probably with many tears and she has little stability in her shoulders. A normal dog shouldn't be able to lift its leg to the side more than 20 degrees - Tully's leg lifts 80-90 degrees.

The bad thing is no more flyball, agility or ball chasing ever again if I want to avoid surgery and continual dislocation of her shoulders. Atm she is on rest and in bandages to prevent her stretching out her legs. If it shows some improvement the specialist will order a custom made 'hobble' for her to wear for another 6mths, kind of like callipers. Hopefully then we can avoid surgery.

She was showing signs of the injury early in the year and I had many visits to vets and physios trying to get a diagnosis. Then with Deska having surgery I really didn't focus on Tully, so by the time I got the diagnosis too much damage had been done.

Not sure if anyone else has had experience with this - not much is known about it over here so we're still learning. In the meantime Tully is not at all happy to have her activities curtailed and I'm struggling with two dogs with front end injuries.
 
I'm so sorry to hear about Tully's injury. I hope everything you are doing help prevent the surgery.
 
I am sorry to hear that. Hollie had dislocated her shoulder. They were able to put it back and casted her for a month. Her ligaments did heal but not completely. She was no longer allowed to run, jump etc. This was very difficult. There would be times when her shoulder would slip and cause her some pain but she did live a full happy life despite this.
 
I have heard some good reports with the hobbles...did your doc reccomend hydro therapy ? Sorry to hear all this. You have had quite a time with injuries. I would definately give the hobbles a try.
 
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