In The News

Molly, a 10-year-old Peekapoo came in for an evaluation of Intervertebral Disk Disease. She was unable to walk and was paralyzed in the hind end with no pain perception Consultation with surgical specialists gave her a 5 percent chance of recovery with surgery.
When she came to us, Molly was paralyzed, anxious and had no sensation of pain in her hind legs. Due to the location of where the disk was pushing on her spinal cord, she was also unable to urinate on her own or wag her tail. The owner was taught how to express her bladder manually.

Spinal cord injuries are common and need prompt attention. When a disk hits the spinal cord, it causes compression to prevent the nervous system from giving a signal to the rest of the body to function. Depending on where the lesion is, it usually affects everything going down the spinal cord past the injury. This can include pain, partial paralysis, or complete paralysis.

With the owner’s consent, we started treating Molly right away using Electro-acupuncture Chinese herbs and Nutraceuticals. We explained to the owner that she needed 3-6treatments to see if the nervous system would respond to that modality. Apositive response would include ability to wag her tail, lifting limbs andstarting to walk. We also taught the owner how to stimulate and massage hermusculoskeletal system at home to give her support. We recommended environmental changes to help Molly during this transition.
When electro-acupuncture was started, Molly felt the electro current as it was slowly being increased to get a positive response. At her next visit one week later, she was doing better, rigidity in both legs had decreased and she was much more able to relax and have a second electro-acupuncture treatment. The owner had to continue to empty her bladder to help her urinate. We also added Bicom bioresonance to help the spinal cord unblock.

Chinese Herbs are a medicine to start slowly at low doses and carefully to primarily prevent gastrointestinal upset and diarrhea. We started her on BU YANG HUAN WU very slowly. This combination of herbs tonifys Qi, nourishes blood, moves blood,and soothes acupuncture channels.
Molly continued to improve over the next few months and today, can play and run. She occasionally has difficulty with her bladder and emptying her bowels, but the owner says Molly is consistently getting better and each week there is more improvement. We wish her continued good health.

Jax, a 12-year-old yellow lab mix, was seen for a bleeding tumor on his left rear foot. The owner had been nursing Jax for several weeks, bandaging the tumor to control hemorrhage. Without the bandagehis foot would bleed, and the owner would find significant amounts of blood on the floor. She brought Jax in for a second opinion as the previous veterinarian had advised against surgery.

When I examined Jax, in addition to the 10cm, (3inch), purplish tumor on the top of his left rear foot, he also had a large fatty tumor dangling from the left side of his chest. The lipoma was nearly the size of a melon. Despite his tumors, his energy and vital force seemed strong to me. He was overweight but otherwise seemed healthy. We obtained a blood sample which we ran in the office so that we could decide if he was healthy enough for surgery. His blood work was particularly good, the owner was OK with the estimate, so we took Jax to surgery.

Yes, his surgery was challenging as the tumor was highly invasive and difficult to remove, being very friable and would bled profusely withhandling. We controlled the bleeding with a tourniquet and monitored him carefully with the care and attention of two surgical technicians. He remained stable on the electronic surgical monitor, and we continued his IV fluids through surgery. As part of my surgery protocol as a holistic veterinarian, I had injected acupuncture points with vitamin B12 and homeopathic prior to anesthesia to help him through the procedure.

I also administered homeopathicTraumeel through the IV catheter. I removed the large lipoma and placed a drain on the side of his chest wall because of the large space between the layers of tissue. He recovered well from anesthesia and was transferred to the postoperative recovery room. Jax went home that afternoon on antibiotics and an
anti-inflammatory medication, and we rechecked him in 48 hours to change the bandage. The wound was treated topically with a Silver and Honey wound ointment and then rebandaged. The owner was quite good at bandaging and was able to continue this nursing care at home. We added a Chinese herbal formula to his home regime, as I was concerned that the tumor on the foot could recur.
The biopsy confirmed a vascular sarcoma. This is a cancer or the wall of the blood vessel and explained the tendency to hemorrhage.  The sequence of photos shows the tumor before surgery and the healing over the next 4 weeks.