Tuesday 7th March 2023

Remy recovers from bilateral hip surgery with Paws in Motion team (FHO/ femoral head and neck excision)

So cute! We love his post-surgery bald butt at the start of the video! Watch as he slowly gets fluffy towards the end!)

Introducing the amazing Remy! & his mangosteen toes <3

Remy the milky white Samoyed was adopted when he was 2 years old. In the past several years with his pet pawrents, they have seen lameness and shaking in the back legs especially after walks.

Remy had a CT scan with his specialist vet, to find out how bad his hips were and what could be done to help. The scan showed that he had severe hip dysplasia (loose hip joints), something he was born with, which progresses to osteoarthritis. In Remy, both his hips were luxated - they slipped outside the joint, and the bones had already undergone a lot of remodeling and bony changes to try to fix the problem, but they unfortunately make things more painful for Remy.

Remy’s CT scan of his hips (ball and socket joint) which shows his femoral heads (blue arrows) outside the joint (luxated) and bony changes at the acetabulum or hip socket (pink arrows).

Due to the severity of changes, a surgery called a femoral head and neck excision (FHNE) was done, to remove the bone rubbing on bone. First to the left back leg, and 2 weeks later the same procedure was done in the right back leg.

When we first met Remy, he was willing to put weight on both back legs, but it was wobbly, and he tend to use his left back leg more. There was a lot of muscle loss, weakness and soreness after surgery, as well as reduced range of motion to both back legs, because he had not been able to use them well for so long.

We treated Remy weekly with therapeutic laser, deep and targeted to the tissues to help with pain and to accelerate healing. His pawrents also helped him several times every day with an Assisi Loop (Pulsed electromagnetic field therapy), massage & thermotherapy (warm packs) to reduce soreness and improve blood flow, and NMES (neuromuscular stimulation) to help build muscles quickly.

We designed an exercise program for Remy, for his owners to do with him at home. We review and change his exercises every week, to keep him progressing and he is certainly getting stronger! Watch his little video to see Remy working hard to improve function and mobility for the back legs (and growing his furry butt back)! Well done Remy!!