I'm going to go get Emery one of those tomorrow. He has been licking his stitches a little bit. I don't want him to do it while I am sleeping or at work. He HATES the cone collar - he runs into things and gets stuck. I think that collar looks a lot more comfortable. Emery seemed to do ok last night and was ok this morning. He has been resting most of the day and only gets up once in a while. Not eating much. I think the medicine supresses their appetites. I mixed some wet food with his dry and then he started eating. Hopefully like you said he and Azia will improve over the next couple days. He is touching his toe to the ground but hobbeling around really bad and slow.

Azia's bandages keep sliding down, I called the doc today to see if it was ok to take them off. he said yeah just keep the collar on her.. well i tryed to take them off but she went crazy! just in alot of pain. wouldn't let me touch them. it just looks like when she's getting around and her leg moves they keep sliding down. i guess we'll have to try to get by with the way it is. now i kinda wish she didn't have the bandages or at least not so much.
glad Emery is sleeping alot, he needs it i'm sure. hope he can tolorate the pain. azia is so sensitive she hates pain. When she was spayed they didn't give her any pain meds and she pased back and forth the room all night, was soo uncomfortable! so i know she's got no tolorance for pain. it's sad.
i can't wait till these 1st 2 weeks go by and they take them staples out of her leg! they alone look painful.
oh and the procollar is great! it's worth the price it was like 33.00 for the large. hopefully its cheaper in Michigan :-) But it works so well she doesn't mind it at all. and can sleep with it ok too.
hoping for a good night tonight for both of us.

Emery got his ProCollar today. It looked like he had been licking his stitches because it was looking a little red. He doesn't seem to mind it at all! Way better than the Cone Collar for both of us. It does look like a life preserver...haha! Thanks so much for telling me about it. Emery thanks you too! How is Azia today? Emery seemed to be a little more "with it" today and had more energy than the oast two days. Still definately limping but seems to be putting his foot down a little bit.

I am so glad to hear that your dogs got through their perspective surgeries and on are on their way to recovery Thanks for sharing the pictures of Emery and Azia too. They are both so cute. Also, thx for the tip re the Procollar, I'll be getting one for Teddy now. Re the non pooping issue, I remember reading that it is normal for them not too poop the first few days b/c they're not eating as much and their bellies are sensitive from meds, stress (I'm guessing if I had surgery... poopin would be far from my mind as well LOL). Question for you both. Would you mind asking your vets if they know of any surgeon in CA that performs Tightrope? Happy Healing !!

Thank you! you can email Cook, James L. at CookJL@missouri.edu he will be happy to give you the names of the vets that do the surgery in your area. He is the one who invented the Tightrope surgery. I emailed him again the other day just to see if he could give me any other info or pointers on taking care of the dogs after surgery. I did get the post op from my vet he was great but seems like diff vets do things diff with this surgery. with meds and bandages and stuff. Azia seemed to be in too much of pain, seems like he could of given me Tremadol also maybe but didn't, where others have gotten more meds.
Alycia Emery looks great with that collar! it cracks me up they looks so cute and funny with it on. Glad to hear he is doing good and is in better spirits and has more energy.
Azia is doing better too, I tell you she is definatly a girl! ha ha! she's so sensitive! but the good news is she did go poop today! i was so proud of her! seemed to feel alot better after she did too. I gave her a smoothie,, i know sounds crazy but she shares mine every morning and loves it so i just put a banana and blueberries with soymilk and blended it up with some fiber and i think that did the trick on the pooping issues. :-)
She is also using the leg, even though gets tired pretty quick and has to sit down and take breaks while we are outside trying to go potty.
And in the last couple of days she's developed this snoring issue... she falls asleep hard its funny and snores like a man lol :-)

Alycia, Does Emery have one incision or two? I took off Azia's bandage and she only has one big one in the front. I thought that with Tightrope there was sopoused to be two... one bigger one smaller, but I may be wrong. just wondering how many Emery has. How is he doing?

Emery only has 1 big incision. He gets his stitches out early next week. When I took him outside this afternoon, he looked like he was putting full weight on his leg! I'll have to see if he does that in the house too. Outside, it didn't even look like he was limping. I was excited! I saw Emery licking his leg with the ProCollar on. He better stop it or I will have to get the cone collar out.....his knee has looked sort of pink/redish in blotchy areas. I can't tell if it is from licking or if it is bruised inside...?

Yeah i noticed that too, it looks red/blue kinda right under the incision and well just like most of the leg looks different. I think it's probably the bruising.
You right the procollar thing doesn't work as well as I thought it would. I caught Azia licking a bit too. She's smaller so she can't quite reach the incision but tryes to lick her leg where the red is/brusing.
I"m so happy to hear he is putting weight on the leg!! that's wonderful!
Azia doesn't put full weight on yet, she's using the leg but i can tell she's still in a bit of pain. She lays on that leg alot, and when she gets up she stretches it everytimeit's cute but seems like it gets tight/stiff. Outside she just wants to sit there. I was getting mad at her this morning, I get up at 3:30 to make it to work by 4:50am. So I feed her, take her potty and she just wants to sit and get some fresh air! LOL we were out there for like 15 min, she walked around a bit, sat, and didn't even go potty... Oh well hope there's no accidents when i get home.

Yes I get up very early too (about 4:00 a.m. ) to venture to work. It is FREEZING here!!!! The windchill is -10 to -20 today! Its a good thing Emery hurries up - he hates the cold! He is being pretty lively here in the house today - he's making me a bit nervous, but I think he's ok. He is just walking a little fast for me. haha. I was wondering....when are we supposed to start walking them around more than just to go potty? I don't want to do it too soon, but I don't want to wait too long either because I know he needs to gain more strength in his legs - mostly the one he had surgery on. Maybe after he gets his stitches out? I can tell he is getting restless to walk around more than just to go out and potty.

I know what you mean... Azia is walking a bit fast for me too i have to keep tellling her to walk not run, lol She is feeling a lot better too. she lets me touch the leg and doesn't seem to be in pain. Last night she even wanted to play, started getting all her toys out of the box it was cute.
Is Emery the only dog you have? I have a beagle too so it's been hard keeping them separated. He has sooo much energy and Azia wants to play with him so bad.
I know it seems like we should be able to start walking them but i read that if you start too early the rope can stretch, and we need to wait for the scar tissue to built up too. So i won't be taking Azia out on walks other then walking around the house and potty breaks for at least 8-10 weeks.
I used to take her to a dog pool. It about 30 min drive and about $35.00 for like a 40 min swim so I may do that again maybe like once a week or so, once i get some $$ lol work overtime or something. :-( Does Emery like to swim? you may wanna see if they have any hydrotherapy/doggie pool in your area, that will really help build the muscle back in the leg, and from what i was told that can be started right after the cut heals and the sutures are out.
Wow it sounds really cold over there i feel bad complaining about the weather here, it's not bad at all compared to -10 or -20 my goodness.

Azia had her staples/sutures taken out yesterday. The vet said she is healing real well and the scar tissue is allready building up which is good. (Her Knee looks bumpy from the scar tissue.)
He said I can start taking her swimming in 2 weeks. so it'll be 4 weeks post op. Then short leashed walks at 8 weeks post op. This is to build up the muscle in the leg. Looking forward to it all, can't beleive it's already been over 2 weeks... at 10 -12 weeks he said she can go offleach. No other follow-up aappointments needed either unless there's a complication.

Hi everyone! My 6 year old needs surgery and doctor is recommending TPLO which we do not want to do. The tightrope surgery looks very promising. Anyone know of a vet (a good one of course) who does this in the Chicago area. Willing to even drive a few hours if need be!

Thank you!

Hi I'm new to this stuff, but I saw that Azia had the Tightrope ccl surgery.

How is she now? I do not want to do the TPLO it seems way to invasive.

Would you recommend it? My dog Oscar is 3 and has one knee totally gone and the other with a partial tear. Which my vet says will go soon.

What was the final cost? Was it cheaper than the TPLO?

Any help would be great....