"elegy" wrote in message
...
i've posted before here about luce's knee problems.
snip
i just... don't know what to do with her. she's only four years old.
i'd hate for her to be doing unnecessary damage to that knee that's
going to show up in full force later on. not letting her run/jump
"like that" (which was the ortho vet's response to my continued
concerns) is not an option. that's a quality of life issue for her
(and for me, really, when it gets down to it. i don't want to live
with a bonkers, miserable dog who is exceedingly creative with all her
excess energy).

or maybe it's no big deal and i'm overreacting.

I went through something similar with Wylie over the summer, though his
symptoms were less severe than you've described. Basically, he came up with
a hitch/hop in his gait in his right rear leg at an agility trial - the
first two times I saw it, he sat down and chewed the inside of his leg, so I
thought he had a burr or something. However, it continued after checking him
over and so I pulled him from the show/classes and rested him for a few
weeks. I hadn't even considered it was his cruciate since the symptoms
didn't fit - he was pretty much using his leg normally, weight bearing, etc.
except for a very occasional "hitch in his get-along" so to speak. It
worried me that this didn't go away and I took him to a respected and pricey
ortho vet for a consultation. He did x-rays and a physical exam and decided
it was probably a minor tear, gave me rimadyl and said to rest him and save
up for surgery as he had seen most dogs with minor tears do as you
described - get better, then resume limping, then get better again, etc. He
said most people with performance dogs did surgery earlier rather than later
to hopefully reduce the risk of arthritis in the knee, and that if it was a
tear it would not heal so surgery was pretty much inevitable.
I did a ton of research while I waited and fretted over the idea of surgery.
Wylie was basically 99.9% with just that minor hitch to indicate anything
was wrong, and he's not a terribly stoic dog, so I didn't think he was in
pain. He acted like nothing was wrong, wanted to be active etc. and I had to
work really hard to keep him on reduced activity. I just could not stand the
thought of operating on a dog that was so healthy, especially since I did
read of complications and arthritis developing anyway, after surgery, and
most dogs returning to 80% at best. So after two months I decided that if I
wanted to return to agility I needed to make a decision and found another
highly recommended vet for a second opinion. His opinion was that there was
no sign of a cruciate injury, that surgery was absolutely not necessary and
that there was no reason not to return him to activity. He also said that if
it was a tear that it would inevitably fully rupture whether he was doing
agility or just bopping around in the yard, and that it wouldn't be sooner
or worse when it occurred. So I returned to agility about 4 months ago,
slowly at first of course, and Wylie has been fine.
But, after writing that long book to you, I have to say that it sounds more
like Luce truly does have a cruciate injury and rest may not give you the
same results. With Wylie, I never had the non-weight bearing and limping
issues, or the better-then-worse back and forth, and those are very common
signs from what I learned. Unfortunately, you may have to consider either
surgery or the "conservative management" rehab which is basically like
rehabbing from surgery only not having done the surgery - starts out with
complete crate rest and slowly increases activity level over a long period
of time. Neither option is particularly appealing, I know, but it just may
be that you have to start thinking about it. I don't think you run a huge
risk of it being worse over time without surgery; though arthritis is a
risk, it's also a risk with surgery. But it isn't any fun to have a dog not
able to live to their full potential, either.

Christy