Meet Savanah. It was Sunday May 1st, 2022 on a lovely sunny afternoon when Savanah decided to stuff herself through a 2”X4” grid in the paige wire fence. I had to dislodge her from the opening and a few days later discovered that she now had a floppy right ear and seem to be limping on her left leg. She would take 3 or 4 good steps and then collapse onto her left knee. I would later find out this is actually referred to as “knuckling over”.

I called my vet and he feels this is likely radial nerve damage which is going to take a very long time to treat and she may not fully recover. We started with Savanah with (5) days of Dexamethasone injections but there was not much else to do except wait for mother nature to do her thing.

Meet Carrie Smith, my previous employer, who is now a canine physiotherapist (4) days a week and (1) human day at the Kemptville Physiotherapy clinic in Kemptville, ON. She actually founded the business on some 25+ years ago with(2) legged clients and then expanded her interests into the (4) legged canine world.

I emailed Carrie with a video of Savanah along with this article about acupuncture on a juvenile pygmy goat (https://curacore.org/vet/2018/01/11/30997-2/)

asking if she might be up for a challenge? Her answer immediately was YES!!!!!!!!!!!.

I was always fascinated when I worked for Carrie and crippled old dog would walk past me at the reception desk heading in for a treatment(20) minutes later walked passed me away heading for the exit door at warp speed and looking like quite limber!!! There has to be something about acupuncture and dogs since they would not lie about how they were feeling!

Carrie has treated Savanah once a week for (8) weeks so far. Her treatments consist of (12) minutes of acupuncture followed by some manual stretching of her neck and shoulder area and superficial fascia. Carrie also loaned me her portable laser wand so I would treat her twice daily for (2) minutes on each of the acupuncture spots.

We are seeing improvement so decided to add some sort of support to her shoulder and elbow out of vet wrap. My only concern is that Savanah or her mother Cool Whip may decide to eat it for “breakfast” since goats like to chew!

I decided to try this canine neoprene brace from Amazon.ca. This was easier to reapply but we still needed to somehow support her knee as the bursal was taking quite a “beating” and swelling since she is now more mobile (and harder to catch I might add!).

Could we give her more support in that knee area? You bet! Another prototype is added again made out of vet wrap and good old all purpose duct tape! This fashionable combo is giving her the extra support she needs to make sharp turns and run away! Savanah wore this for 1 week and I then decided to make something that would attach to her other brace that would be quicker to put on and take off.

This next prototype is made from men’s neoprene jacket, a pair of ladies XL underwear (2) metal spiral “stays” from a dry cleaner in the U.S.A and some velcro. Total cost of this was is about $7.

We are now experimenting with the final brace which is actually a custom dog brace for a client of Carrie’s beloved best buddy. This terrific brace is well padded and prevents Savanah from bending her knee completely and giving the joint a rest. She is handling the new brace like a pro!

We are so pleased with Savanah’s progress to date. She still exhibits some knuckling if t rying to escape with speed but for the most part she has made significant progress on the road to recovery and extremely grateful to Carrie Smith for taking on this challenge!