# 15 months old, Persistent limp, nothing on X-Ray



## Prism Goldens (May 27, 2011)

What the vet is calling growing pains is panosteitis. It's pretty common when they are growing and unfortunately you are discovering how persistent it can be. 
If you look back at the front limb radiographs, and it is pano, there will be some whitish streaks on the most inflamed part of the bone... but you can also just grasp the front limb and squeeze and see that the dog is bothered there. 

There is anecdotal evidence for duralactin supplements but in the one case I had, it did nothing for her... I also tried on reasonable anecdotal evidence adding yogurt and cod liver oil daily but my girl had a persistent case. The only thing that kept her from limping was crate resting her. 
IF you do not see the whitish streaks on radiograph indicating inflammation, and your dog does not react to the grasp test, it is something else. 
You may want to the ortho in that case.


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## Maggie'sVoice (Apr 4, 2018)

Did they CT the feet? There was a user on here who had an issue with there dogs feet, the seminoid bones I believe, and it took a while to diagnose if I'm not mistaken.


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## tikiandme (May 16, 2010)

I had a dog with pano. It seemed to flare up when he was fed more than his regular allotment. When I cut his food back a little and kept treats to a minimum, the pain stopped. I don't know if this was coincidental. You could try feeding him less for a few days and see it that helps. My boy would start limping if he had more than 1.4 cu twice a day.


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## Cathy's Gunner (Dec 4, 2008)

My sisters Golden did the same thing around that same age. It had x-ray's and the vet said nothing was wrong. My sister was playing ball with her all winter in the basement and she was running and jumping on a cement floor. I told her I thought that was what was causing it. She decided to take her to a specialist and they said she needed surgery. They said both front legs had issues that needed corrected. This was two years ago spring. They were headed for the lake for the summer and decided to hold off on the surgery till fall. The dog swam all summer and chased her balls on the lawn in front of the cottage. Limp went away. Never had the surgery and is fine now.


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## Megora (Jun 7, 2010)

My only thing is he seems a little old for pano which usually shows up between 5 months and 12 months.... 

I mean it could be? But my past boy who had pano (and bilateral elbow dysplasia) has the pano go away by the time he was 15-18 months old. 

The only thing I can strongly recommend is if you have a very good rehab/sports medicine vs near you - definitely go that route. 

My 7 year old had an injury or two back when he was about 3 years old. The one (pulled butt muscle) _knock on wood_ hasn't come back again. The other (muscle high up in his shoulder to neck area) did unfortunately happen again very recently.

Symptoms of this injury was him not putting weight on that leg initially which wore off to a limp when moving at a trot outside, unwilling to bend/stretch to eat from his bowl on the floor (so him walking away from his food unless I held the food at his face level for him). 

Treatment plan for him was first - no pain meds because if you think about it this way - pain is the bodies way of discouraging an animal from overextending himself when he has an injury. I would have given him pain meds if he was unable to settle or be comfortable at rest and/or unable to walk across a room with severe pain inhibiting him. A dog with an injury should never be on pain meds at the same time as resuming activities or being allowed of leash - he needs to be restricted to being on leash. 

On my own, I iced and massaged the injured area - that I evaluated on my own. If you take your dog outside and let him walk around, etc and then bring him inside. Go over him with your bare hands and gently feel for where there is more heat than anywhere else. And then you can gently manipulate that area, compare to the other side, etc.... With Bertie, he had heat and swelling on his left and neck. Massaging that area with ice, typically had him clearly tensing up. I did not over manipulate his leg/shoulder because he was so sore. 

In Bertie's case, I took him to the rehab/sports/chiro vet who a lot of us trust to get our dogs back on track after injuries. She did a chiropractic adjustment first and then a physical examination - both of which confirmed where the injury and extent of the injury was. As I expected it was high up in his shoulders and neck on the one side. What I didn't expect was it went down his left leg to behind his wrist. 

He got a laser treatment that same day - targeting the muscle in his leg, shoulder, and neck. It basically is supposed to promote healing while reducing inflammation and pain. 

The first time he ever injured this area, he had 3 laser treatments done a week apart. 

This time he just needed the chiropractic adjustment and the single laser treatment 2 weeks ago. The laser treatment did frazz things initially the 1-2 days after. I saw more limping and soreness from him - but after that he was his normal very sound self. With him, he has big open trot when he's outside when going out with his sons. And he'd come flying back as soon as he was done. He's also been instigating play with and/or chasing his sons like normal outside. Eating, etc... he's able to eat from his bowl on the floor without any fuss. 

He went back for a recheck the other day. Got a followup chiro adjustment (which I expected), but there was no need for further laser treatments because there was no soreness or swelling found during the exam. And she could see he was bouncing around the room. 

I'm still keeping him rested another 1-3 weeks to ensure he's healed completely - so no walks, no jumping (I do obedience with him so he normally jumps 24" (which is over his shoulder height)). He's a powerful jumper and normally flies over the jumps without any reservations, but I've been keeping his feet on the ground the last 3 weeks and we are going to aim for a month of rest before resuming jumps and regular walks. 

Other people I know have used hydrotherapy when healing the same type of injuries and rebuilding a dog's strength so the muscle isn't just healed, but strengthened as well. 

These are things to consider if the elbows and shoulder did not show any signs of dysplasia or OCD - which are the first things you worry about with a limping young dog if pano doesn't necessarily make sense.


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## Maggie'sVoice (Apr 4, 2018)

I agree with Kate. Pano is a growing pain type thing. The growth plates close around 12-14 months so it is odd to me that he would be suffering from this at his age. It's grtom growing to fast and as a pup gets older the grow slower and slower. At 8 week to 12 weeks they grow something like 200-300% growth rate and at 6 months is much slower, less than 15% I believe so by 12 months their growth is at a crawl. Hard to imagine pano over 12 months of age.


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## Prism Goldens (May 27, 2011)

It is old for pano but my bitch who had it did suffer from it for what I thought was an exceedingly long time -well into her second year. Like Kate's dog, she had ED. She also had normal elbows per OFA but a CT later showed she had FCP version of ED... so even though she was OFA Excellent/normal I spayed her, enrolled her in a stem cell study, which appeared to work for her- and placed her. That's the only one I have ever had w pano and I do think it is connected to ED somehow, as I know of a couple of dogs who had pano for a longer time than is usual and they also had ED.


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## Shimmy (Jan 21, 2019)

Thank you everyone for your responses
We made the call to not wait anymore. I just called the clinic where the ortho specialist works - same chain so they have all his records and x-rays. They're having the ortho surgeon look at them tomorrow and his medical history and they'll give us a call if he believes he can help/wants to examine him. Otherwise, they'll organise a referral for testing at one of the super-clinics for CT/further investigation.

I'm desperately hoping he spots signs of Pano where his regular vet didn't, because at least then we can monitor is pain and wait for him to grow out of it. 

I'll let you know what they say!!


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## Shimmy (Jan 21, 2019)

So heard from the ortho vet - the x-rays taken don't give a clear enough picture to diagnose/rule anything out.

We need to get a CT scan, so I'll be booking him in for some time in the next fortnight.

At this point, whatever remedy - surgery, physio, chiro, meds - it doesn't matter at this point, I just want to know what's wrong. But having said that, I would rather avoid surgery if we can, as his symptoms are quite mild bar a few exceptional circumstances and walks fine 95% of the time - I just hate not letting him run/be social as he always over-does it. Nothing in half measures, this pup, geez. I'm definitely not opposed to the Chiro path, as I've routinely seen one just about all my life. Didn't even know they had canine chiros!! There's even one 5 mins up the road from us. Who knew.....

I'll post updates when I know more. Thank you for your support!!!


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## OscarsDad (Dec 20, 2017)

We have been using Chiropractic for Oscar's lumbar disc issues with very good results.


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## jeffscott947 (Jun 9, 2019)

Shimmy said:


> So heard from the ortho vet - the x-rays taken don't give a clear enough picture to diagnose/rule anything out.
> 
> We need to get a CT scan, so I'll be booking him in for some time in the next fortnight.
> 
> ...


Good for you and your dog. Hopefully you will get a proper diagnosis now and proceed to get your dog the professional care that is deserved.
Best wishes for a speedy recovery!


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## Seanjohn (Jul 9, 2018)

Cathy's Gunner said:


> My sisters Golden did the same thing around that same age. It had x-ray's and the vet said nothing was wrong. My sister was playing ball with her all winter in the basement and she was running and jumping on a cement floor. I told her I thought that was what was causing it. She decided to take her to a specialist and they said she needed surgery. They said both front legs had issues that needed corrected. This was two years ago spring. They were headed for the lake for the summer and decided to hold off on the surgery till fall. The dog swam all summer and chased her balls on the lawn in front of the cottage. Limp went away. Never had the surgery and is fine now.


Could of been the cement floor


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## Shimmy (Jan 21, 2019)

Just had the CT scan - it's OCD. Blatantly obvious OCD. I could see it before he even pointed it out and I know nothing about anything.

Going to book him in for surgery in the next 7 days. Honestly of all the joint issues it could have been, like dysplasia, I am quite grateful that this is the diagnosis. From what I've researched the prognosis is excellent with appropriate rehab.

Side note I know this surgery is normally done on young puppies. Our boy is (now) 16 months. Is there any issues with his age? Will it affect his prognosis?


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## puddles everywhere (May 13, 2016)

Shimmy said:


> Just had the CT scan - it's OCD. Blatantly obvious OCD. I could see it before he even pointed it out and I know nothing about anything.
> 
> Going to book him in for surgery in the next 7 days. Honestly of all the joint issues it could have been, like dysplasia, I am quite grateful that this is the diagnosis. From what I've researched the prognosis is excellent with appropriate rehab.
> 
> Side note I know this surgery is normally done on young puppies. Our boy is (now) 16 months. Is there any issues with his age? Will it affect his prognosis?


Sorry for the news but glad they have a diagnosis. See if this helps to answer some of your questions. Keeping him contained during rehab will be your biggest challenge. 








Osteochondritis Dissecans (OCD) in Dogs | VCA Animal Hospital


Osteochondritis dissecans is an inflammatory condition that occurs when diseased cartilage separates from the underlying bone. It most commonly affects the shoulder joint but the elbow, hip, or knee (stifle) may also be involved. This is a developmental disease that occurs in rapidly growing...




vcahospitals.com


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## gdgli (Aug 24, 2011)

What brought this on?


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## Megora (Jun 7, 2010)

OCD is technically one of the types of elbow dysplasia.... unless this was found in your dog's shoulder? 

My boy with elbow dysplasia had OCD - we opted not to do surgery (because among else, his limping cleared up by the time he was 15 months old and a specialist discouraged us from going the surgery route), but quite honestly I've thought about it a few times and suspect that we should have done his worst elbow. The description one of our vets had was walking with stones in your shoe - and our dog learned to live with that.


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## Prism Goldens (May 27, 2011)

Even if it was the shoulder affected, it would be shoulder dysplasia. If elbow dysplasia, these are the types: fragmented coronoid process (FCP),ununited anconeal process (UAP), and osteochondritis dissecans (OCD).
I'm so sorry.


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## Shimmy (Jan 21, 2019)

Sorry! I should have been far more specific!
Shoulder OCD. Couldn't see anything of note in the elbow. Certainly nothing that needed surgery, just monitoring as he got older.

When I referenced dysplasia - I was referencing elbow specifically (again, my knowledge is limited here) as it's a trickier area to treat and the prognosis isn't as good in elbow OCD as shoulder. 

Apologies. ****** by assumption and limited knowledge. Safe to say, I'm happy enough now we finally know what's wrong, and the treatment has seen great success!

Silver lining of covid 19 (if there even is one...) is that my husband and I are working from home for the foreseeable future, so we can look after him 24/7 as he recovers from surgery. The hardest part of all this will be keeping him quiet for a few months as he heals....he's such an active boy.


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