Northwest Veterinary Specialist, Dr. Scott Lozier, was Kaz’s surgeon for the TPLO. With the help of his awesome assistant, Trish, they successfully completed Kaz’s TPLO and expect a good to excellent recovery. Here are the vets’ notes from the surgery:
Diagnosis: Complete tear of the left cranial cruciate ligament.
Kaz's Angry Ligaments
Procedures Performed: 11/12/09 Arthoscopic examination of the left stifle (knee) revealed severesynovitis and synovial proliferation. There were mild osteophytes (athritis). A complete tear of the cranial cruciate ligament was noted. The radio frequency unit was used to ablate portions of the fat pads to improve visualization of the cruciate ligament and menisci and to remove the remnants of the cranial cruciate ligament.
The medial meniscus was damaged with the caudal horn folded forward. The medial meniscus was treated by removing the caudal half. The lateral meniscus appeared mildly frayed at the central margin. The lateral meniscus was debrided with the radiofrequency. The articulate cartilage appeared to have suffered grade I (mild fibrillation). This injury was in the region of the tibial condyles. The cranial aspect of the caudal cruciate ligament was moderately frayed at the cranial proximal lateral aspect.
Ligament Rupture - This is supposed to be one smooth band.
A left tibial plateau leveling osteotomy (TPLO) was performed using a 27mm TPLO blade and a 74mm, 6 hole T Fixin plate. Mild external tibial torsion and mild to moderate valgus bend alignement corrections were performed simultaneously with the TPLO.
Dr. Lozier’s Comments: The procedure went well and I expect a good to excellent prognosis for marked improvement in comfort and function. Kaz had femoral varus right at our “cut off” angle where we recommended femoral straightening. While femosral osteotomy was offered, the owners declined. Therefore some visual bowing can be expected and a mild internal stifle twist (pivot shift) may occur. Attempts were made to prevent this by mildly external twisting the tibia and mildly bending the proximal tibia into valgus.
on Nov 14th, 2009 at 1:00 pm
[...] an hour of discussing the surgery and recovery procedure, Trish (the Vet Tech) finally brought Kaz into the exam room. Kaz came [...]
on Feb 3rd, 2011 at 5:36 am
my God, i believed you were heading to chip in with some decisive insght in the end there, not depart it
with ‘we go away it to you to decide’.
on May 27th, 2011 at 10:18 am
Nice post. I was checking constantly this blog and I’m impressed! Very useful info particularly the last part
I care for such information a lot. I was looking for this particular information for a very long time. Thank you and best of luck.
on Jun 1st, 2011 at 5:19 am
Good article and appropriate to the point. I don’t understand if this is actually the greatest put to ask but do you folks have any ideea exactly where to make use of most professional writers? Give thanks to you