After talking with the vet a while ago, she said the ACL isn't the issue. While it may be torn just slightly, they found a bigger problem with both rear knees – "clicking". I don't have all the info. yet but she said it's like having a small pebble floating around in your knee. Both rear knees have this but the right is considerably worse. Possibly a combination of genetics and over-extending while playing and running.
Today's visit is pretty costly because he had to be knocked out in order for them to take all the x-rays. Needless to say, we'll be finding ways to supplement the income so we can continue to afford the little ankle biter, especially if/when we have both his knees fixed.
Anyone else deal with something like this?
Sorry to hear that Stella & Randy.
Grover has luxating patellas, sounds like that might be what Brian has or something similar?
If so it definitely has a genetic component, generally more common in a lot of the smaller breeds but seen in others as well.
Grover's manifests as an intermittent "skip" when he is walking. It is much worse after he has been running hard or jumping. It took me quite a while to get it diagnosed, we suspected many other things and actually it was when I had him knocked out for hip xrays that they also felt around in his knees and diagnosed the problem. I think he was about 6 years old when they found it.
We had surgery as an option, but the recovery process is tough as you basically have to keep them crated 24/7 for several weeks (apart from quick potty breaks). I know he would have been miserable with it.
Since his case is moderate, I just chose to retire him from the sports we were doing (lure coursing, agility, playing fetch) and keep him to long leashed walks and easy jogs with his free running indoors or in a smaller area (to keep him from exacerbating it by going too hard).
In our case that turned out to be the right decision.
However if it were more severe I might have gone the surgery route. The vets told me that in his case the problem wasn't really causing him pain, it just prevented him from straightening his leg and walking properly. He is a total wimp when it comes to pain, cries at the littlest thing, so I believed them.
