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 MEET
SOME OF OUR PATIENTS: “Dave"
Dave is a “flat cat” (he lives in a flat). Unfortunately his
introduction to the outdoor world didn't involve using the stairs.
One minute he was quietly watching the world go by on the balcony;
the next he was shaking paws with the ground. Luckily his owner,
who saw the drama unfold, very carefully wrapped him in a blanket
and rushed him to the clinic. Unlike in human medicine where
the patient is best left undisturbed until paramedics can attend,
a cat is best taken to the surgery where all the emergency treatment
and drugs are at hand.
Amazingly, although Dave had fallen a considerable height,
he was conscious and even able to stand, albeit shakily, on
3 of his 4 legs. An immediate examination revealed that his
right foreleg appeared to be paralysed; the vet couldn’t feel
any obvious fractures to the bones although there was a lot
of swelling under the leg. However, the primary concern was
to treat him for shock and make sure that he hadn’t suffered
any severe internal injuries. He was placed on a fluid drip
and given drugs to support his system. As soon as we were happy
he was stable, he was given a sedative and x-rays. We needed
to establish whether he had fractured any bones, but more importantly,
whether he had severe internal bleeding. Very rarely will a
broken bone endanger an animal's life; treatment to fix it can
safely be delayed but internal injuries can quickly kill. The
worry was that he would have bleeding into his chest (a common
problem after suffering blunt trauma such as being hit by a
car or hitting a pavement at great velocity). If the bleeding
into the chest cavity was bad enough, Dave could literally drown
in his own blood.
The chest film revealed a small amount of bleeding at the front
end of his chest, but not a worrying amount. As the internal
organs come to a sudden stop they are thrown against other structures,
and some, like the bladder, can rupture. Fortunately, all Dave's
major abdominal organs appeared intact. The next step was to
check out his skeletal system for fractures. The fact that his
right foreleg appeared paralysed meant that the nerves were
involved - we needed to establish whether a bone had broken
& severed the nerves. If this was the case, then we would ultimately
have no choice but to amputate the leg.
The x-ray revealed that there was indeed a fracture to Dave’s
scapula (shoulder blade). An x-ray doesn’t show up nerves and
so we couldn’t see if the main nerve supplying the front leg
was damaged beyond repair. Our hope was that it had suffered
severe bruising and once all the swelling started to go down,
the leg would start to work again.
A very common injury in this type of accident is a split in
the roof of the mouth (the hard palate). A cat will try and
land on it’s feet when falling, but the speed is so great in
this type of fall that when the feet touch the ground, the velocity
forces the chin to hit the ground at almost the same time. This
causes a split to occur in the hard palate from the front of
the mouth to the back and/or a fracture in the lower jaw. A
quick look in his mouth showed that he had been lucky and everything
was intact. The next step was to x-ray his spine. We discovered
that Dave had actually managed to fracture one of his vertebrae
at the base of his spine.
 
ABOVE: x-rays showing the fractured
vertebra
Luckily for him the fracture wasn’t involving his spinal cord
so the risk of paralysis was slight. However, he would need
strict rest for a while until the bone started to heal. Once
we were happy Dave had been thoroughly checked, he was allowed
to recover in a nice warm kennel. Both fractures were such that
cage rest, time and lots of TLC would be sufficient to heal
them. All he would need were antibiotics to prevent infection
and analgesics (painkillers) to make him comfortable while he
healed. However, there was still a small concern about the nerve
function of his leg and that the nerves to his bladder hadn’t
been affected by his spinal fracture.
Over the course of the next three days, Dave made a remarkable
recovery; within 2 days he was using all 4 legs and going to
the toilet normally. We realised that the nerve weakness in
his front leg was due to the bruising in the area rather than
anything more serious to the nerve itself. His very relieved
owner was able to take him home 4 days after the accident with
a course of painkillers. A few days later, Dave was seen for
a checkup. He was doing remarkably well - obviously very stiff
and sore but walking well and very bright.
 A
month on from the accident Dave is virtually back to normal
but any more attempts at feline flight are being severely discouraged!
Addendum: Dave visited us recently for the "snip" operation.
He's progressing really well as you can see in the photograph.
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