Lennon on the mend - again!

Poor Lennon really has had time of it.


As an on-going complication from Lennon's accident, a small fragment of bone lodged in one of his toes, stopping it from healing properly.

Vet Tim fished out the bone and he is once again on the mend.

Here's Imogen giving him a quick cuddle behind the scenes at Larkmead Didcot.

Izzie doing well

Izzie came in for a check up of her heart on Monday. 

You might remember her, she is the cat who came in to see us at Larkmead Didcot  collapsed with heart failure earlier this year. 

A few months down the line, she is doing very well at home and taking her many heart tablets very well.

Doesn't she look lovely?

Lennon on the mend after the removal of his dew claw

Didcot Head Receptionist Imogen's dog Lennon has had a tough time.


Although his broken toe is now fixed, he developed an ulcer under his malformed dew claw which we then had to amputate.

We're glad to say he is now on the mend.

Update on Izzie

Izzie is doing very well. She has been at home for a week now and she is breathing much more comfortably at home.
We have changed her medication slightly as she is drinking a lot with the diuretics.

We will see her again in a month and let you know how she is doing.

Follow the progress of Louis the goats' broken leg - Part Four - Louis gets a kiss from Emma

Figure 1. Larkmead Vets does not endorse the activity of kissing goats.

This is Louis getting very well looked after by Practice Assistant Emma whilst sporting a very trendy covering to his Robert Jones dressing. 

Follow the progress of Louis the goat's broken leg - Part Three. Alex has to improvise

Alex had to improvise a little and decided less-is-more and just placed a single screw across the fractured bone ends. 

After this the leg had to be immobilised in a big bandage, called a Robert Jones dressing. This Xray was taken six-weeks after surgery and shows the bones starting to heal, hooray!

Follow the progress of Louis the goat's broken leg - Part Two. Louis goes under the anaesthetic.

This is Louis receiving oxygen by mask to help him through his anaesthetic. 

Goats provide several challenges compared to dogs and cats. 

The most difficult aspect was that they do not tolerate being kept on their back for prolonged periods, which would have been the positioned used for a dog having surgery for the same type of fracture. 

This meant it was difficult to apply the same type of repair that we would have put onto a dog or cats broken forelimb. 

Follow the progress of Louis the goat's broken leg - Part One

Part One

Louis the goat, who lives at Beale Park, was brought into Larkmead Vets at Cholsey to see Alun because he suffered a sudden and obvious issue with his front leg!

Louis’ keepers don’t know how he managed it but somehow he managed to break his front leg – a fracture through his radius and ulna, ouch!

Alun strapped the leg up to keep Louis comfortable and the next day he was taken to our Didcot practice for one of Larkmead's Orthopaedic Surgeons to assess the damage and find a way to allow it to heal. 

Izzie gets treated for congestive heart failure

This is Izzie.  She is a 3 year old Ragdoll Cross.  

She was a very poorly girl when she came in to see vet Sarah on Friday morning as she was struggling to breathe.  We were very concerned about her as her brother had died suddenly last year showing similar signs. 

We quickly found that Izzie was suffering from congestive heart failure (a build-up of fluid on her chest) and started treating her immediately.  She was put in an oxygen chamber and given diuretic medications into her blood stream to help remove the fluid from her chest.

We stabilised Izzy over the weekend and by Monday she was well enough to undergo an xray, ecg, blood pressure test and heart scan.

This is Izzxie's scan which shows the thickened wall of her heart.

Update on Lennon's Broken Toe

Lennon came in on Sunday to have his dressing replaced before his walking holiday in Lulworth Cove.

 Unfortunately we  don't think he will be doing much walking at the moment!

Lennon's Broken Toe

Didcot receptionist Imogen's dog Lennon has been very accident prone this year.

You may remember when he had a thorn in his eye.  Now he has broken his toe whilst walking in the park.


We took an X-ray which confirmed that the toe was broken.

We then placed a supportive dressing on his leg which he'll have to keep on for 2-4 weeks.


We'll keep you updated on his progress.

Meet Enoch "Nucky" Thompson

Mr. Enoch "Nucky" Thompson is a 2 year old Carolina corn snake with a timid nature. 

Nucky is fed once a week and his cage only needs cleaning every 2-3 weeks as long as his shedding is taken out straight away. 

He is handled most days for anywhere between 10 minutes and half an hour depending on how boisterous he is on that day! 

An interesting story about Nucky is that when he was younger and being fed, his owner accidentally dropped his food on his face. This  means that he is now sometimes scared of his food! 

Nucky has never bitten anyone and his owner states that she firmly believe she is more harmless than a hamster as well as being much cuter. 

Nurse Lou's Summer Comes into Larkmead Cholsey, Wallingford with a sore eye

Summer belongs to Lou one of our vet nurses at the Larkmead Cholsey/Wallingford branch. 

Her eye became very sore after she ran through some bushes whilst out on a walk. 

Lou brought her into Cholsey to see Vet Susie who put some fluorescein dye in her eye to look for any damage to the corneal surface. The dye stains up bright green if there is damage and you can see in the picture that Summer has quite a big corneal ulcer. 

Susie then used local anaesthetic to check Summer’s eye further to make sure no foreign body was in the eye. Nothing was found.

 Summer was put on eye drops to soothe and help heal her eye and also some pain relief tablets as corneal ulcers are very painful. She is feeling much better now.

Olive visited the practice last week to be spayed. Here is her story!

Olive is a 5-month old female tabby cat who belongs to Larkmead Didcot vet Emma. She visited the practice last week to be spayed. Here is Olive's story!

First of all she was given a pre-med injection which contained sedatives and pain relief to prepare her for her anaesthetic and to make her operation more comfortable.

She was then allowed to rest in her kennel for a short time while the injection took effect, before an intravenous injection of anaesthetic was used to induce anaesthesia. A rubber tube was then passed down her windpipe to deliver anaesthetic gas for the duration of her operation.

Olive was then microchipped so that if she ever goes missing Emma can be traced as her owner.

A patch of fur was then clipped from Olive's side, and she was moved to the operating theatre where her skin was cleaned in preparation for surgery.

While vet Sarah performed the delicate surgery through a small incision in Olive's side, nurse Sophie monitored the anaesthetic closely by taking readings such as heart rate and respiratory rate.

A short time after her operation, Olive was back on her feet and recovering well! She is seen here wearing a prescription flea collar which has been left long so that it can be adjusted as she grows.

Olive was fitted with a pet t-shirt for her recovery at home so that she could not lick or chew her stitches for the 10 days after surgery. She was a little bit sleepy for the first few days but soon bounced back!

We will bring you a photo of Olive fully recovered soon.

Saffy is making great progress at hydrotherapy

Saffy is making great progress since starting hydrotherapy.   I am continuing to treat her twice a week for now but aim to reduce her treatment to once weekly within the next week or two.


Saffy is now able to stand square and tall both on dry land and in the water. When in the water she is more stable in a standing position and no longer knuckles her hind feet. 

Her hind limb strength has shown vast improvement and they are now equal in their range of motion and strength. She appears brighter in herself and more alert, taking an interest in her surroundings and making more effort to move around.

Thank you for referring Saffy to us for hydrotherapy.

best wishes

Emma
Vale Canine Hydrotherapy

Saffy starts her Hydrotherapy

Saffy started her first course of Hydrotherapy this week.

She did really well and kicked her legs very strongly. 

Of course she has made more friends already!

Saffy is being very brave

Saffy has been very brave and is doing very well.  She has gone home now and is undertaking a course of hydrotherapy for her back legs.  We'll keep you updated on her progress.

Saffy is making a good recovery

Saffy doing her best to use her legs.  She is still making a good recovery. A few weeks ago she couldn't even stand.

She is now going to try hydrotherapy.


See Saffy in action on the Larkmead YouTube channel.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=WypccrqkFpw

Saffy is making good progress

This is Saffy. She is a 7 year old German Shepherd. 

Saffy  came into the Didcot surgery just under 3 weeks ago. She was unable to stand on her back legs. She had some special imaging performed which showed she had a collapsed disc in her spine. Vet Tim operated on her immediately. 

Since then she has been having intensive physiotherapy and has slowly been making good process. She is now able to stand for short periods,but she still needs help getting about. We will keep you informed on her progress.

So far Tim has done 6 spinal operations this year. All have recovered well so far.

Luna's Limb

This is Luna, a 9-month old cat, recovering from surgery at our Didcot practice. She was brought in by her owner after she was found in the garden unable to use her back legs. It is not known whether Luna was hit by a car, attacked by a dog, or had a nasty fall. Vet Rebecca examined Luna and found that her left knee was unstable. Luna was given pain relief and IV fluids to stabilise her. She was then sedated so that Emma could take x-rays of the damaged leg. 

The x-ray showed that Luna had fractured her femur just above the knee, and the bone fragment was displaced.

This copy of the x-ray has been marked to show the line of the fracture in blue, with the red lines indicating the normal outline of the femur. 

Vet Tim Hutchinson repaired Luna's fracture using wires to hold the very small piece of bone in place. The post-op x-rays show how well her leg has come together.

 Luna is now resting at home and we look forward to monitoring her recovery!

www.larkmead.co.uk