TClare wrote: ↑Thu Feb 25, 2021 12:02 am
Does anyone know of any cases where the dog has gained pain sensitivity after 5 days and gone onto recover and lead a relatively normal life? Thanks in advance to anyone who takes the time to respond... really appreciated. Cheers Teree
There have been a lot of miniature schnauzers here with FCE, often in the neck affecting all 4 legs, so in that sense you are lucky.
The statistics are overwhelmingly in your favor for recovery.
https://veterinaryrecord.bmj.com/content/181/11/293 wrote:
Two hundred and one dogs were included. Outcome data were obtained via medical records and telephone questionnaires. MRIs were blindly reviewed by three board-certified observers, obtaining substantial to almost perfect interobserver agreement on diagnoses (κ=0.635–0.828). Presumptive ANNPE and FCEM were diagnosed in 157 and 44 dogs , respectively. Ambulatory function was regained in 99 per cent of cases, with persistent motor deficits in 83.6 per cent and 92.5 per cent of dogs with presumptive ANNPE and FCEM, respectively. The presumptive diagnosis was not associated with motor function recovery, recovery times or urinary continence. Faecal incontinence was five times more likely in dogs with presumptive ANNPE (23 per cent) compared with presumptive FCEM (7.5 per cent).
The way I read these statistics, 99% of the dogs in the study regained the ability to walk. 92.5% of the FCE dogs had some residual symptoms in their walking, to where if you watched them walking and running you might be able to tell they had an injury once. But dogs don't care and they go on to lead normal lives. They just carry on enjoying life.
Deep pain sensation can return days, weeks, or months after an injury. When my dog was paralyzed from an accident, they did not find any deep pain sensation until 149 days after the injury (that's almost 5 months.) I would be surprised if it takes your dog anywhere near that long, but it is an example of how healing from spinal injury can be very slow, but it is still going on in the background even though the dog might look much the same, so we just have to give it time.
FCE dogs benefit from aggressive physical therapy. If you have professional PT available and can afford it, and can do it safely, that would be a good option. They may have hydrotherapy (a swimming pool or underwater treadmill) available, and they will do exercises with your dog and give you instructions of exercises to do at home. Hopefully you will start to see improvement. Improvement tends to be gradual, a little bit at a time by baby steps. If you don't see any change right away, just remember that healing from spinal cord injury can be slow, but healing and improvement continues for a long, long time (months and years).
If you can't get into professional PT, I would be doing some exercises at home. Bicycle the legs through the full range of motion a couple of times a day. Massage the legs and feet and toes as often as you can. Do it even if you think it isn't helping (because we can't
see what is going on with the nerves). Stimulate the feet. Her body needs to remap the pathway from her brain to her toes, and the more you massage the feet the more you give it to work with. With her lying down, press up on the bottoms of her feet and see if she will push back (resistance exercise). Even if she cannot bear weight or doesn't have good balance, put her in a standing position with all 4 feet on the ground. It is good for her to just be in that position with her pads contacting the ground. Do not be surprised if she flips her paws under (it's called knuckling), this is normal and will probably go on for a while, just fix her feet for her. Since you are working with a small dog, hopefully you will be able to work with her several times a day. Keep doing the exercises even if you see no change, and just know that they are helping in the background where you can't see it.
I think you are going to want to learn to express her bladder. It is a lot of trouble to have to take her to the vet every day, and really they recommend emptying the bladder 3x a day (every 8 hours). The vet should show you how to do it.
Here are some videos with demos of expressing the bladder. (Scroll to the end of the article.)
viewtopic.php?f=5&t=16027
I would ask the vet if his staff says she is easy or difficult to express. Some dogs have loose urinary sphincters and will empty their bladder without too much squeezing. Other dogs have very tight urinary sphincters which makes it harder to empty the bladder. If the vet staff says it takes quite a bit of pressure, then ask him/her to put your dog on medication to make her easier to express.
If you are having any issues with Number Two, here is an article that may help with that.
viewtopic.php?f=5&t=18586