Torn ACL

Posted:

Has anyone had to deal with their dog getting a partially torn ACL? 

Geordi is a 'springy' dog and tends to jump around when he gets riled up.  One day at the dog park he tried to jump over a bench and clipped his back leg on it.  After that incident, he was limping only after he had been laying down for a long time.  He ran and walked fine otherwise.  We gave it some time, but eventually, after like 2 months he actually started to limp more when he got up from laying down and wouldn't put weight down on that leg for a bit.  Again, he was ok running and walking except for the few minutes after he got up from laying for a while.  So we took him in to get x-rays and be looked at thoroughly. 

The vet is pretty sure he has a partially torn ACL and said it was up to us to do surgery or not.  We're pretty sure we don't want to do surgery since Geordi seems to be doing fine most of the time.  We are giving him reduced-dose anti-inflammatories.  We're just worried it may eventually become a full tear or his other leg may tear since he's favoring the hurt one now. 

It's so hard to know what the right decision is!! 

Mom to Geordi, born 4/30/08 and Miles born 7/29/08

Posted:

It's very hard when our loved ones get sick.  I just wanted to tell you I'm sending best wishes and bellyrubs while Geordi is in sick bay.  Let us know.

I don't have personal experience but there has been discussion on the forum.  If you want to use search words like "cruciate ligament" in the search box at the top right of our pages.