Right Knee - Days 5 - 7

Days 5-7 : Right Knee

Day 5
August 23:
We took off the bandage around his ankle. The wound looked pretty good and the oozing had stopped.

Murphy did the first of his Physical Therapy walks today. We are supposed to do between 5-10 minutes of slow deliberate walking two times a day. He only lasted about 6 minutes each time, and slept for a long time afterwards.

He got a special treat tonight. We brought his new "Puppy Couch" downstairs for him to lie on. We put it directly outside his kennel so that it would serve as a barrier. He happily stretched out and enjoyed being close to us again. We also discovered that he has pretty good motion of his knee, he has no problem rolling over on his back and spreading both legs so that we can scratch his belly!

Day 6
August 24:
We had a bit of a set back during the night. Although Rob and I have pretty much been watching Murphy around the clock, however he managed to do some licking around midnight. Rob caught it almost right away, so Murphy spent the majority of the night with his Elizabethan collar on.

I did his Physical Therapy walk with him around 10:45 am, and when we were done I noticed that he had some ooze that had dripped all the way down his leg. Apparently this was in the area he had been licking around midnight.

I cleaned and bandaged the area when we came in, however I was concerned because there was a little bit of blood in the liquid as well. I called the Nurse around 11:30 am and was told to do warm compresses for 15 minutes all throughout the day. We scheduled an appointment for 9:00 am Friday morning for the Dr. to take a look at the area since it has been a week since his surgery.

We decided to put Physical Therapy on hold until we get the oozing under control.

Day 7
August 25:
When we woke up this morning the oozing had stopped and we felt confident enough that we cancelled his Dr appointment. The wound looked normal again, no strange colors or anything that may signal an infection. We decided to leave the bandage on the area for another day, since two was the magic number for us before.

I pretty much spend the majority of my days with Murphy in the laundry room, while Rob is at school. It has been pretty comfortable, Rob brought down our small TV and hooked up the cable as well. Murphy is a dog that will settle into a routine in a very short time, and his healing process is no different. He is normally sound asleep between the hours of 3 o'clock and 4 o'clock, so I have been using that time to go upstairs and clean, cook, etc.However today he pulled a fast one on me!. Somewhere between 3 o'clock and me picking up Rob at 4:30, he managed to not only lick his bandage off, but ALL parts of EACH wound. Now there are other areas that are oozing :(!

We tried to bandage the areas, but it is just too large to cover!! Rob and I cleaned it up the best we could, and now Murphy has been sentenced to wear his Elizabethan collar ALL the time until he gets his stitches out. No puppy couch for him at the moment, we have to limit his movement so that the areas clot again. He looks so pathetic in his collar, but the Dr. stressed that there are a lot of germs on a dogs tongue so we can't take the chance of his areas getting infected.

Physical Therapy is still on hold.