Helping Your Dog Recover from TPLO Repair Surgery
What exercises can you do for your dog's post-TPLO surgical leg?
These are some exercises that you can do for your post-TPLO surgical leg. We're going to want to work on the range of motion. The first one you can do is forward and backward. Stretch it forward and back. The next one's going to be our side-to-side motion. So it's going to be the up and the down, just a little bit. Side to side. Then we're going to move the foot up in the natural flex, up and down. And then our figure-eight motion. So you're going to go up and around, down and around, up and around, down and around.
Can I use an ice pack on my dog for post-surgical care?
You can use an ice pack or a moist heat', but you never want to put anything cold directly on the skin. You always want to have something in between, like a towel. Your incision mark is going to be right along the stifle, which is the knee.
Ten minutes prior to performing the exercise, apply a commercial moist heat product. Although you can use heating bottles or heating pads, moist heat has been shown to work more efficiently to penetrate the affected tissue better then dry heat. If you can't easily find one, you can improvise by wetting a washcloth with warm water. Be careful though that the heat you are applying is just right to the touch and will not cause burns.
You can follow the sessions with 5-10 minutes of ice packs. You can lay the ice pack just right directly on it. You can also rest it between your dog's legs if that's easier while they are laying on their side.
Use these methods as needed. The ice packs and moist heat can be discontinued when your dog is using their leg more consistently.
If you have questions, we would love to answer them for you. Please give us a call at the office at (801) 269-1213, or you can email us at [email protected]. Our staff would love to talk with you!
Don't forget to follow us on social media Facebook, Instagram.