Mom's Clinic

Today seems like a good time to catch everyone up on all the various medical issues hanging over us. Several of you commented that my hand must be better because I'm stitching again. You are a very observant group. Yes, I am feeling much better. The week before Christmas I had a steroid injection in the base of my thumb. Then I had to continue to wear my brace for a week and do virtually nothing with my left hand. During that time I didn't think the injection was working because I still had a lot of pain and limited movement in my thumb.

On Christmas Eve I removed the brace, but I was very nervous about using the hand. The doctor had told me to try it out, so the day after Christmas I started stitching and there was no pain. Today I'm still pain free and have almost full movement. There is one position that sends out a little tweak, so I avoid that. I haven't tried knitting yet, I'm chicken, but I think I'll give it a try this weekend.

I know this isn't a permanent fix, but for now it's working and that's a good thing.

Next on the injured list is Mr Noah. As you know, we've been having a terrible time getting Noah's eye to produce tears on it's own. We've tried various ointments and drops with some good results and some bad ones. Here's where we are now.

Noah  finished his tetracycline two weeks ago. He was getting dexamethasone drops in the eye. Things were going pretty well. The eye was open and just a little pink. I thought we were finally making progress.  Wednesday morning last week his eye was red and goopy. I called the vet and we decided to watch it for a couple days. It kept getting worse and on Sunday evening it was so full of pus that I couldn't see the eye. I started crying but had to get control because he was picking up on my worries.

Monday morning we were at the clinic bright and early. Dr B tested Noah's eye pressure and it was normal. Then he tested his eye moisture level and it was too low. He cleaned his eye, removing all the pus and put in a dilute solution of the drops for dry eye. Noah had a severe reaction to the full strength drops so we needed to know if he could tolerate the lower dose. He had an immediate reaction this time too. His eye got very red and started getting goopy.

Dr B kept Noah for the day to observe his reaction. He gave him drops every two hours and watched to see how the eye reacted. When I picked him up, he had good news and bad news. The bad news is that Noah isn't making enough of his own tears and he can't tolerate the drops to help him make tears.

The good news is that he is making some tears on his own and there is another product that shoud help him, if he can tolerate it. We started Noah on the canine version of Restasis. We're using it twice a day and he's tolerating it well. His eye is clear and sparkling and just slightly pink, so I think we might finally be onto something that will help him. Wish us luck.

Finally, Miss Morgan. Our little old lady dog has arthritis in her hips, back legs and left wrist. I know the wrist hurts a lot because she is always shifting her weight to try and find a comfortable position. Her back legs are extra weak because she tore both cruciate ligaments a couple years ago.

Normally Morgan loves the snow, but this year it's been very hard for her to walk in the hard crusty snow and she falls a lot. I spoke with Dr B about her situation and we devised a plan to help her and the others who have a bit of arthritis, Tess, Bailey and Fudge.

All my dogs take fish oil daily. We're increasing the amount of fish oil on the kids who have joint pain. We also decided to add tumeric to their diet so today they each started taking a tumeric capsule. We'll increase the days they get sardines with their dinner. In the future, after the diet changes have had a chance to work, Morgan may start having Adequan injections in her hips.

So there we are. That's how we're treating our various aches and pains. Some nice Spring weather may help us all, too. I know Morgan would like to nap in the warm sunshine.