Jackson is a five and a half year old cross breed dog, who has been with his mum since he was 2 days old. On Christmas Day 2011 he was brought to Southern Cross Veterinary Clinic because he had been hit by a car. We x-rayed him and found that he had fractured both the radius and ulna in his front leg. His leg was to be placed in a cast until the fractures had healed, with the cast being checked weekly.
On the 20th January 2012 Jackson came in for his cast to be checked, but unfortunately the cast had gotten wet. We decided to remove it and check to make sure the foot was ok. To our dismay the foot had gone rotten. It was so bad that our first thought was that we would have to amputate his leg. However, we decided to give him the benefit of the doubt over the weekend to see if we could save the leg. We changed the dressing daily over the weekend, and each day we could see an improvement with the foot. So we decided to go ahead and try to save the leg by doing dressing changes every day.
We finally managed to remove the dressing on 21st February 2012. After 1 month of dressing changes every 2-3 days Jackson was able just to wear a sock to keep the wound clean and dry. Jackson was signed off from his check ups on the 16th March 2012. Jackson was a very nervous dog when he came to us on Christmas Day, but with all the love and attention from all the members of staff he is so much better when visiting the practice.
Because we gave the foot the benefit of daily dressing changes he is now back to himself, walking and running kilometers along the beach with his mum and has the use of all four legs.
The Story of Jackson
