We know that massage & physical therapy work (otherwise we wouldn’t be doing it) but some folk still need convincing. Here is Coco who clearly shows how just a couple of treatment session plus homework from her Mum, helped her recover full mobility.
Coco is a 3 year old Schnauzer / Chihuahua cross who recently had an accident which broke her left tibia. It was successfully repaired at the end of January with a pin placed into tibia and a plate in the medial aspect of bone.
She was walking almost immediately on the affected leg but after a week she stopped using it and that leg became non-weightbearing with resultant muscle loss and over compensation on her other three legs.
It is evident from the pictures and videos that she didn’t want to use both hind legs, preferring to hop.
Chris was invited over to try and encourage Coco to use her left hind leg again and help to regain her confidence with all legs before a second X-Ray in a couple of weeks.
She was very responsive to Chris’s touch and rehab exercise routine. He helped her stand squarely before gently raising her ‘good’ hind leg while supporting her, encouraging her to place her weight back on the affected one. After a while the left hind leg was considerably straighter and placed on the floor. A big problem was the slippy laminate floor. Coco’s recovery would be slower if she keeps slipping while trying to stabilise her gait.
Massage to her thigh and gluteal muscles was another main part of the therapy session, helping to build them back up again to, again, rebuild her confidence and ability to stand on all fours. Equally important was maintenance massage to her shoulder and neck muscles which had been taking a lot of the compensatory strain.
One week later and Coco’s Mum has been doing her homework diligently. It was so evident.
Coco came bounding to meet Chris looking far more comfortable. And then there was the appearance of a rug!!!!!! Coco was happily standing and not slipping. That is not just a good Mum but a great Mum.
Muscle mass was evident on her affected thigh and the shoulders, which were tight through compensation, were looser.
During the massage routine, far less fur was coming off too. Dogs tend to hold their anxiety in their fur and often shed bucket loads in the first massage. But as they relax, any myofascial tension is relaxed allowing blood and nutrients to get back into the skin and fur. This is frequently demonstrated by less shedding during the massage.
Coco is hopefully well on the road to full recovery. Certainly, both she AND her Mum were far more relaxed. With just a couple of physical therapy sessions and a Mum empowered to keep up the good work, that is a job done.
Does massage and physical therapy work? Well here are a couple of responses from caers of dogs we have treated in the past.
Sonny's Mum, who we helped back in June last year after Avascular
Necrosis affected both his hip joints and had Femoral Head Excision on
both hips, wrote after reading the post yesterday “Oh it definitely
works. Sonny is living proof of that thanks to you 
💙”
And the final word needs to go to the Lord Nelson's Dad who is a lawyer Dad of Lord Nelson " Does
massage and physical work? Exhibit A - Pre AchyPaw: Lord Nelson could
hardly put weight on his back legs especially when he first got up. Had
difficulty jumping up and could only manage stairs one step at a time.
Vet confirmed no physiological damage.
Exhibit B - Post AchyPaw: he now hops on and off the sofa without any
problem, goes up and down the stairs one leg at a time like other dogs,
even his posture is different, and is a much more lively dog. I rest my
case ’mlord"
Meet Sonny
This stocky little lad is a Border Terrier / Lhasa Apso cross who has been through the wars already in his 11 months. Instead of being able to jump around like the puppy he is, his owners noticed that after exercise he had started to limp. On investigation, it was found he had bilateral Avascular Necrosis – one of the worse cases the vet had seen. This is also called Legg-Calve-Perthes Disease and is an issue I have treated before. To explain, the hip is a ball and socket joint where the head of the femur bone acts as the ball and should fit neatly into the socket of the hip. In this condition, the head of the femur starts to lose its blood supply becoming necrotic so no longer functions properly. This means the ball and socket no longer fit. This will clearly make walking difficult and painful.
There are different treatments but the one recommended for small dogs like Sonny is to remove the neck and head of the femur. Sounds dramatic but as bodies of dogs are amazing, usually new fibrous tissue is laid down and a ‘false joint’ created. More amazingly, with proper rehabilitation, most dogs are running and playing as if nothing happened.
Sonny had the operation on his left hip 3 weeks ago and is scheduled for the right hip operation in July. It is even more important for him that we get his rehab programme started as soon as possible to start building up his left side before the right side is operated on. Then to continue the good work on both sides. The aim is to allow this brave little man to enjoy being a puppy again.
When I sat on the floor, Sonny thought it was playtime. Which was OK as it allowed me to see how he walks. If he hadn’t had his operation ‘haircut’, you really wouldn’t know. But touching his hip it was clear that his left side needs a lot of building up while his right side was still tender.
We moved to the sofa where he realised this was not playtime after all but therapy time. His Mum, who is also a Reiki practitioner, was fully involved in what he felt like and the plan to help Sonny. His shoulder and neck had been working overtime and felt like he was in training for the World’s Strongest Man. His lower back and thigh muscles, on the other hand, felt like they needed a good pumping up.
Which is exactly the massage techniques we did on him. Kneading at the front, gentle pumping over the back. Within 30 minutes he was asleep, deep sleep. Thoroughly relaxed and totally comfortable.
His Mum was left with lots of ideas for rehabilitation exercises that needn’t be too hard and don’t need special equipment. When he walks uphill, they can just stop for a few seconds so he will have to balance out his front and back legs adjusting his weight. Similarly, when going downhill. Simple but effective. Walking slowly over Dad’s outstretched legs is another that he will enjoy but makes him raise all his limbs to get over.
With this rehabilitation plan in place plus the energy healing from his Mum, he should be better prepared for his next big operation and hopefully make that recovery to enjoy the rest of his puppyhood.
It seems like the plan is working as his Mum wrote to say “Thank you so much for today's visit and for all the useful info you have provided for Sonny. He continued to have a nice sofa snooze after you had left and since he's woken up he's had lots of energy, been drinking lots of water and has been in and out for massive wees all afternoon which I'm sure you will agree are clear signs of a healing response so that is a very positive result! ….Many thanks again for visiting and sharing your knowledge with us, I'm sure it's going to help enormously with Sonny's recovery”
Another #result.
Third new dog of the week and we’re back to long worded conditions again. This time it was a dog referred from St Francis Vets with Legg-Calve-Perthes disease. This is a degeneration of the hip joint due to damage of blood supply to the femoral head. The disease causes the femoral head to collapse which affects the mobility due to resulting pain. In this case, Shaun operated with a Femoral Head and Neck Excision in December 2016.
The beautiful puppy with this condition was Scout, an 11 month old Fox Terrier. She had been getting on quite well since the operation and has been to hydrotherapy ten times now. But over the past week she seemed to have gone backwards in mobility so Shaun asked me to visit to see if I could detect what might be going on and offer help.
The thigh muscles of her affected leg have wasted noticeably. This is no doubt due to her not being able to use that leg after surgery, then realising it was sore so not wanting to use that leg, which in turn made the wastage worse so she is now unable to use that leg. Instead she has moved her right rear leg into a tripod position tucking her left behind it (as shown in the picture).
The aim was to restore her confidence so that she would place her left leg down again. It is not a case of she can’t do it. She can when she wants to. She just doesn’t want to. She is clearly thinking why bother using four legs when I get on quite happily thank you with just three. How to make her want to use that leg again?
She sat across my lap and presented me with her affected side. She needed no encouragement to relax in a massage but was unsure when touching her thigh. She didn’t get off my lap, she just looked at me as though to say “That’s an Ouch Dr Les”. But gentle warming moves sent her back to sleep allowing some more therapy. Stretches caused the same response. Hip flexion was fine but with extension I received the look.
I made an exercise routine for her owners plus gave them a massage routine to rebuild the strength in her wasted thigh.
Interestingly, her Mum does yoga in the front room and Scout always joins in giving great body stretches. A quick search of YouTube resulted in a number of excellent yoga stretches Mum and Scout can do together. This will be great for rehabilitation as yoga moves are controlled and precise which is what Scout needs at the moment.
I’m always willing to try something new. Who knew I’d be adding Yoga to the mix of therapies on offer?
