Seppel's FHO rehab

I got a really nice e-mail from someone who was concerned that I might be doing too much with Seppel too soon, and I realized that I should probably explain what we are doing right now 11 days out.


Here is a break down of the exercises we do daily:

AM:
- 15min slow walk.
- ROM exercise
- 15mins Ice

Lunch:
- 15 min slow walk
- Sits to Stands - 10 reps
- ROM Exercise
- 15mins ice or heat.

PM:
- 15 min slow walk
- Mattress walk - 10 reps.
- ROM Exercise
- 15mins Ice


Then we have some exercise that is variable depending on the day. If there are stairs available, I will slowly walk him up and then back down the stairs.

We are loosely following the Top Dog Health FHO Guide

I was strongly advised by two veterinarians - one I trust, and one who is Seppel's surgeon to get him moving as much as possible, and using the leg as much as possible. I have read several reports of the TDH FHO guide being very successful for people, but I also cannot ignore what my veterinarians are telling me.

I try to watch Seppel closely to determine how much exercise he can and cannot do. The pictures I posted a few posts down on Monday I was allowing Sepp to do more than he probably should have been doing. We are only 11 days out and it's critical that he doesn't do a lot of running or jumping because he could actually injure his good leg. We really don't need him getting a blown knee that's for sure!

SO in short, I try to monitor my dog - if he's looking painful, or slowing down we may not do all of the exercises listed above. The above list is just a general guideline as to how our days are going thus far. I might also not do those exercises one after the other, we may go for a walk, I may ice him, and a few hours later we do the sits to stands - it really depends on how he is feeling. I pretty much do 15mins of ice after each physical activity. I've introduced a little bit of heat, but I feel like he benefits more from the ice in terms of the pain.

In other news I tried to reduce his tramadol. I gave it to him AM, Lunch, and PM[about 5-6pm] only yesterday, and in the middle of the night he was whining. Our instructions for now have been to give the tramadol 4x a day, but I thought the tramadol was making him a bit more reactive. I thought we would taper down to 3x a day, then maybe 2x a day, but clearly, he needs the medication. He hasn't cried since he was on the "big drugs". I gave him a tramadol and he was able to finally quit crying and go to sleep.

Poor guy.

I hope this better explains what we are doing as of right now. He's still not putting a ton of weight on the bad leg, but he is using it 90% of the time. When we do the ROM exercise he has decent range of motion so I'm pretty happy with where we are at so far.