Has anyone here ever had a senior dog require surgery?

[deviddiya]

I have an 11 year old Rottweiler and she needs surgery to remove a tumor on her leg. Of course at her age I'm a bit nervous, but would never cancel the surgery because the vet says it may be cancerous.

Has anyone here ever had a senior dog who needed surgery? What was it for? How did your dog do afterwords?

Just would like to hear other peoples stories to ease my mind, thanks

[critters]

Not dogs, but I have senior cats worked on regularly, including a peck of them this summer. I don't judge simply based on age.

[Ravi]

Hello. In July of this year I had to do an amputation of my dog's rear left leg due to osteosarcoma. She's almost 14 years old and a medium sized breed. There were no complications and the next day she was up and walking but she couldn't keep it up for very long due to having only one rear leg but as time went on she got back to her normal self. Don't wait too long to do the surgery because if it is cancer it might be the aggressive kind, the longer you wait is the more it will spread.

[springrmax]

Yes, two years ago, my then 14 year old English Springer Spaniel was diagnosed with operable lung cancer. This was a very large surgery for any animal and I agonized over it as she was 14. I am happy to report that although the first week post-op had difficulties as she definitely needed the pain medication, she recovered beautifully and is still with me. During the last month, she lost the use of her hind legs and we are still trying to figure that one out. While attempting to determine whether to have the surgery or not, I interviewed several veterinary hospitals for this surgery and chose one in Newburgh, NY that specialized in oncology rather than Animal Medical in NYC as I wanted her to be a primary focus during her surgical stay. She was as was I - they were so kind to both of us. I hope this helps. Good luck!

[CarolC]

springrmax
Is the vet not sure what's causing the new problem?

[springrmax]

Yes, advanced arthritis and spondelosis (not sure of spelling). And she is 16 years and 4 months of age. She also has early stages of congestive heart failure for which the meds appear to be working. We have also been battling a drug resistant urinary tract infection.

I am still very glad that I did the surgery 2 years ago. I am also grateful that I had the opportunity to interview several veterinary hospitals specializing in oncology and that I chose the one in Newburgh. Shauna received wonderful care and I got to have her with me for 2 more healthy years.

We only have a little time left together and I want to make it as vet/needle/medicine free as possible but I also want to keep her as comfortable as possible for what time we have left. I am trying to figure out how to figure out when it will be time.

[itasara]

Three summers ago my Lab who was 11 at the time had some kind of problem with her nail, we thought. The foot got worse and we would tend to it daily over several months. My vet was himself having surgery so when the nail and toe did not seem to heal, we took it her to someone covering for our vet who did not recommend surgery because the anesthetic at her age was not a good idea. That was a mistake. When my vet returned to work he took a good look at the situation. He put her out and the X-rays showed two of her bones one one toe were eaten away tne the third was okay and while under all three toe bones were removed. I brought her in in the morning and she was home in the afternoon. She did fine. I was told is was osteosarcoma. We did not have another problem, however. A year later she was unable to walk (you can see my more detailed comment under senior pets) but so far it is two years later I don't think the toe problem is related directly to her back end weakness and disability. When she stopped walking we opted not to do the diagnostics b/c of her age and b/c of the cost. She is still with us because we are so attentive to her and because she is a strong dog in the healthy respect.

[itasara]

I am adding a post note to my previous note. As I said my dog was about 11 her one toe was removed. She is now 13½. Pretty much toward the end of her life. She did well until she lost the use of her back legs 1 ½ years ago about a year past the surgery. It has not been easy taking care of her but she was well regardless. Now we think about whether it is time to put her down. She is not sick but she needs us to help her pee and she poops usually on the paper inside. It is a huge time commitment. If we did not love her so much, believe me she would still not be here. She is not sick and not senile but does get agitated at times. If she needed surgury today I probably would not do it. The average life span for a lab is 12-14. Some live later but under the circumstances I doubt she would be able to tolerate surgery.

[CarolC]

It is very hard when they get to this age and it's a big dog. A year and a half is a long time for caregiving, I am glad it is not you alone. It bothers me a little to see in your other post where some of your kids say you should keep going but I don't see where they are offering to help. I can't give you the answer. What was right for me might not be right for you, and I'm not sure there was a good answer for my dog. I cared for him until the end, but like your dog he could not walk and had problems with bowel and bladder control. He was in a male doggie diaper for 3 years. He had to use a wheelchair and I couldn't get him in it without the use of an engine hoist. (I made an instructional article on creating a dog hoist out of an engine hoist if you want to see it, but since there are two of you, you may not need it.) My dog also barked at night after he went down, and I couldn't get any sleep. I would check him and everything seemed fine. At the time I had never heard this tip, but Bobbie says some dogs will do better at night if you get an electric fan and put it on them. I wish I had known about that.

http://handicappedpet.net/helppets/view ... fan#p91874

When my first old dog went down, and again there was nobody but me to care for him, I found that it helped me keep going if I would give myself a "Mother's Day Out" from time to time. That meant I would take him to the vet early to be bathed and pick him up near closing. It gave me all day to do errands without having to be home to turn him, etc. It gave me a little breather. If people think that sounds ridiculous or like a cop out, they don't know the deep exhaustion, physical and emotional, that can go with caring for a down dog at end of life.

I will say, I don't know if this applies to you because different people are different and you may be younger than I was when I cared for my golden retriever. But one way to put it is, I was not the same person physically at the end of his care, that I was at the beginning. I managed to do the daily lifting carefully with proper body mechanics and I managed to never blow a disk in my back. But there are gradual changes that occur in your back when you do long term lifting. So partly this may not just be your emotions feeling drained, which anyone would, but it may also be physical. It is hard to actually tap into what you are feeling physically, if you are like me you screen it out and keep going. I had to do physical therapy after my dog passed and am still not the same.

I can't help you, but I can feel for you. I was in that situation. Near the end my dog got to where the vet said he was "gaga" and I didn't believe it. I didn't believe it because at times he was normal. There was a good thread on this board about dogs getting "sundowners". It did not really come up with any solutions, but at least if you read it, you will know others have experienced the same thing (as you mentioned agitation). Here it is.

http://handicappedpet.net/helppets/view ... sundowners

I think you may also relate to this post very well. I believe FurmomInNewMexico (Carol) and goldenz2 (Jeanne) both put their senior dogs down.

http://handicappedpet.net/helppets/view ... rks#p65044

rookiemum (Pam) made it to the end with no regrets, she is my example of how I wish I could be.

http://handicappedpet.net/helppets/view ... 225#p84733

I made it to the end with regrets, I will never stop wishing I could have done better for my dog. I gave it 100% and my other pets went without the attention I wanted to give to them, but he would have benefitted from even more.

So that represents 3 different outcomes.

Each of us has to look inside and find our own way. Right now, I wish you could have a regular "Mother's day out". Maybe your Christmas present from the kids could be dogsitting the family dog a couple of times a week. I don't know if they are in town with you or scattered.

If you have time for one more link, here is an article about caregiver stress.

http://www.specialneedspets.org/caregvrs.htm

Whatever you decided, people here will support you. It might be more important to get your family members all on the same page, you are in the middle. If only the ones who think it is unkind would see the happiness there still is. If only the ones who think you should keep going could see the work that is involved. I wish you well.

[itasara]

Thanks so much for your replies. I may try the fan but she is quiet for a moment so I don't want to disturb her. It's better is she thinks we went out, so eventually she'll settle down, I hope. I do keep music running on the TV all night for her. We have been seriously considering putting her down this week... I'm worried too if we wait too long something may really happen that will be terrible for her in the end. Today, she was fine all day.. quiet for the most part. sleeping on and off, ate okay. But 8:30pm.. Bingo... couldn't settle her down. Gave her a melatonin and a tramadol. She was okay for a short while and started in again. She did poop which I think was part of her restlessness, and my husb. got her out to pee and I fed her extra treated and food, and yet still unhappy. I gave her a another melatonin and 2 tramadol hoping to settle her down. She was still barking and unhappy and about an hour later so I turned off all the lights, left the music on the TV and just left. She finally seems to have settled down. Could be the drugs kicked in or she just wore herself out. Yes, it does take a toll on me. It wasn't so bad until this past couple months. Winter is always harder. I didn't think she would make it this long... she is very healthy. Also she won't eat dog food so feeding her is somewhat of a challange- human food is what she likes. If she were really very sick I'd feel differently. My vet says that we should also think about her state and if she is struggling, putting her down might be the kinder solution. She might be right at this point but i'm still not sure. I'm still considering it for this week,maybe next week, but taking each day at a time. The night times are what takes the most out of us. During the day I sit with her most of the time-getting little else done. She does have her days and nights mixed up. I'm a night person myself so I'm in the same boat, but listening to her sound so unhappy at night is not good. I saw the engine lift idea online and saw one at Harbor Freight and I really thought it was terrific, but at this point in time I don't think it is worth the expense. We looked into wheelchairs and tried one on Craig's list-an older model- but We didn't feel it would work with her. I'm grateful she can still use her front legs to help us walk her out. Thanks for your support. I really appreciate it.

[CarolC]

Oh, yes...you can just be desperate for sleep. Here was something I posted when my golden retriever was barking at night.

You do need to get your sleep for your sanity, and also because your risk of injuring your back will go up if your muscles are not properly rested. I had a situation with a an elderly dog who barked at night, and I ended up moving to a different bedroom. I found if I slept in the bedroom on the other side of the central air closet and left the a/c running non-stop on fan all night, the roaring sound from the central air closet kind of blocked out the sound of the barking and I could sleep. You could also try plain old earplugs from the drug store. You don't have to get the uncomfortable kind, they make them now where they are little foam things that you roll between your fingers to make them small and then they puff up after you insert them. They're cheap. I don't think you should feel apologetic about trying something like that, you need your sleep.

and then this whole post (including the checklist) will probably sound familiar

viewtopic.php?f=30&t=12104&p=62895&hili ... ark#p62895

Situations like this are the reason why this message board has so many sleep-related smilies.


............

I wish I had an answer. They ended up putting my dog on a sedative when he was admitted to the hospital.