TTA Surgery Healing at Home Part 2

By Bosquebay

In the last segment on healing from TTA Surgery, we covered icing down your dogs knee(s) after surgery. This will cover exercise, constipation and pain relief.
For pain relief she had a Fentanyl pain patch located on her foot, which was removed after five days. Then she started taking anti-pain medication.

Constipation with the Fentanyl pain patch is a potential side effect, so we gave her canned pumpkin and this brought much relief.

• Discourage your pet from licking at their incision(s). Licking may lead to chewing and your pet may remove sutures by doing so.

• Knee movement will benefit the rehabilitation process and should be encouraged. We began range of motion exercises of her knee joints as soon as she allowed manual manipulation — directly after ice packing.

• You should schedule an appointment with your surgeon about 10-14 days after surgery. This is to confirm tissue healing and for suture removal. X-ray’s are scheduled at eight weeks, to confirm bone healing.

• Short walks of less than 1/4 mile, at a slow pace, are acceptable for the first four weeks. Always use a leash and belly sling. Do not let your pet take any stairs or steps without the support of the sling.

• Starting with weeks 5-8, she could walk 1/4 to 1/2 mile. And as long as she wasn’t sore after these walks, we performed them multiple times throughout the day.

The doctor imposes these instructions during the bone healing process to secure the surgical results. Still, no free activities are allowed until after healing has occurred – which is confirmed by x-rays.

Now the fun really begins and the rehabilitation process starts in earnest.

The first eight weeks were a long road, but our girl was such a great patient – we were very proud of her.

She tolerated the icing of her legs, never licked her incisions, and she understood she wasn’t allowed to run and play.

To judge her comfort level, we watched to see if she got excited about more activity. Did she seem stiff? Did she complain? If so, we had to reduce the amount of her activity.

But by this time, I have to tell you, she was ready to go!

At this point, we hooked her to a recliner near her bed in the living room, and this is where she hung out while we were home.

TTA Surgery, healing, applying ice to dogs knees, tips for confining dog after TTA surgery

By Bosquebay

Let’s go step by step through the first three months following your pet’s surgery.

But first, it’s important to remember that our girl had bilateral TTA surgery – meaning she had both knees operated on at the same time – and this isn’t very common.

So let’s get started…

• The first and most critical step in your pet’s recovery is keeping them confined during the first eight weeks after surgery. Although there is less than a 4% likelihood the tibial tubercle may fracture during the early postoperative period, it’s better to be safe than sorry.

There are basically three options that are allowed:

1. You can typically have your pet in the house under your (or someone you trust) immediate control, on a carpeted area, with no play.
2. Keep your pet in a dog crate, especially if they’ll be left unattended.
3. And the option we used, was using two dog gates in our entry way, creating a fully carpeted pen. This gave her the ability to interact with the family and gave us the ability to watch her closely.

Plus, it helped with taking her outside to relieve herself, preventing her sister from interacting with her.

I can’t stress enough the importance of following the surgeon’s instructions to a tee.

We used a harness when we took our girl outside. This especially helped because for the first four weeks following surgery she required support with a belly sling to minimize stress on the surgery sites.

• It’s also recommended, for the first eight weeks after surgery, to reduce your pet’s food intake by 10-15% to prevent excess weight gain.

• The use of ice packs — 15 minutes, three times a day for the first three days — is highly recommended.

Inflammation and swelling are usually worse the first 2-3 days following surgery.

We iced our girl down with a frozen bag of peas wrapped in a towel, every two hours almost 24-7. She rarely had swelling and when she did, it was minimal.

Cold therapy helps reduce tissue swelling and decreases the sensation of pain.

Next post we will cover the first four weeks after surgery.

Using belly sling before and after TTA Surgery

By Bosquebay

The most important thing is keeping your pet comfortable before and after TTA Surgery. When I’m writing my post‘s it will be about bi-lateral surgery since that’s what we had to deal with. When we had our girl to the surgeon it was five days before her surgery. At that point she could only walk about two feet before she had to sit down. The surgeon provided us with a belly sling. The sling is adjustable and made it convenient for both of us. We used it for about two weeks after surgery to take her out to relieve herself and going up and down steps. It was quite a challenge a first, being it’s a private time and she a pretty private girl. But when you have to go you have to go. She adjusted well to it after the first day. Along with the belly sling you must always keep them on a lead a well. Dogs are amazing creatures and they will try to jump and play in just a few days after surgery. It’s is really important to keep your pet from applying pressure to the knee(s). After surgery she had to be on her sling four weeks.