[hasahorse]

Any of my fellow Corgi owners ever have one with a torn ACL? Mine is apparently an anomoly. My vet and I were discussing the issue this morning after her xrays, and apparently, this just doesn't happen in little dogs too often.

Other than surgery, does anyone know of other options? From what I understand, the surgery to fix this is invasive and involves breaking a bone, inserting a plate, etc., which works on big dogs, but not dogs with short legs.

I am curious to hear of other experiences and options.

[wishnwell]

Oh no! I have a Corgi but thankfully healthy and no issues to date...I do have a Springer Spaniel that tore his ACL years ago ( both actually ) and though I don't recall the exact surgical details the recover is so important to heal correctly. It takes quite a long time before they are "normal" again.
I am not aware of other options other than surgery. Good Luck!!

[SquishTheBunny]

My recommendation would be to go to a boarded orthopedic surgeon and get radiographs.

If the tibial angles are normal, there's certainly a decent chance that conservative treatment may be all thats needed to heal your dog.

Often we find traumatic cases (ie. not a chronic strain on the cruciate ligament) will heal decently with conservative tx.

Its the young bouncy dogs with horrible knee conformation that are ones that require corrective surgery.

The obese dogs fit into the middle of that spectrum.

Suprisingly, of the small dogs out there, its the Corgi's that do injure their cruciates. Last month alone, there were 3 that came in for cruciate rupture appointments. Two of them had surgery (one a lateral suture - no break in the bone, and one a TPLO due to severe disformity of the knee). They were both great dogs and trotted off day after surgery like nothing ever happened The other one I believe opted for conservative management, but comes in through our rehab specialist for proper strenghtening exercises.

Lots of options for you...listening to anecdotal stories from board members is great, but the best thing you can do for your dog is to sit down and talk to someone who deals with these injuries on a daily basis. No one will force you to make one decision over another, but at least they will be able to answer all the questions you can think of!

And a TPLO sure does work on small dogs, the reason its often not performed is that its often not necessary

[hasahorse]

Thanks for the interesting insight! After discussing it with our vet, we are going to go with the lateral suture procedure. I think we will end up doing it over the Christmas - New Years holiday break, if we can, as Mr. Hasahorse is taking vacation that week.