Puppy Surprise at a Plantation Vet
It started out as a very normal Saturday morning in Plantation at Central Broward Animal Hospital. Lisa and Erin arrived bright and early and started leashing dogs to take them for a walk in the backyard. The moment they stepped outside though, everything changed. A flash of movement in the corner of her eye and a dog’s interest in something under the tub piqued Erin’s curiosity. She bent down to get a look and got quite a surprise—a small, approximately 8 week old mixed breed puppy cowering in the corner. Erin coaxed him out, took him inside and got him some food, which he gobbled down immediately. As she was getting him settled, she noticed something seriously wrong with his left eye. When I arrived, I examined him thoroughly. His left eye was twice the size of the right and he had a severe, deep ulcer on the surface of the cornea. He could not see out of that eye and the eye was painful. In spite of all of that, he was a sweet, happy, playful puppy. I started treating his eye with eye drops and antibiotic ointments in an attempt to save it. By Monday, there was no change in the eye.
As his vet, I needed to make a difficult decision—do I continue treating his eye and hope it gets better or do I remove it completely? The doctors discussed the case as a group. Even if we were able to heal the ulcer, would the eye be functional and could he live a normal life with one eye twice the normal size? We determined that if we saved the eye, he would always have problems. His eyelids could not cover the eye completely when they closed and he would end up with recurrent corneal ulcers, probably for the rest of his life. The best option was to remove the eye entirely. Enucleation, or removal of the eye, is not a frequently performed surgery. It is a measure of last resort, reserved for cases where the eye cannot be saved or, if it is saved, will lead to chronic, intractable pain. The sooner we removed his eye, the better off he would be. I performed the surgery on Tuesday. Along with removing the diseased eye, he was also neutered. The surgery was a resounding success. By Tuesday night, he was back to bouncing around, playing, and acting like nothing had happened. Since then, he has been coping very well with only one eye. He is incredibly playful and rambunctious. I don’t even think he knows it is gone (he couldn’t see out of it when it was there anyway).
We hope to find him a loving home in the Plantation or Ft. Lauderdale area. So please, if you or anyone you know are looking for a bundle of joy with four paws and a tail, come by to meet him. I know you will fall in love.
Thora Powers, DVM
Veterinarian
