Cleo the chihuahua by Dr Anne Fawcett

Meet Cleo the Chihuahua who had fractured all her front paw bones and see how Sydney Animal Hospitals successfully treated her condition. Read on now.

A couple of years ago we operated on Cleo, a tiny nine-week-old chihuahua, who was brought into our Inner West vet hospital in Sydney with a severe limp in her right foreleg.

Upon a closer examination we discovered that Cleo had swelling from the carpus (wrist) down and we suspected she had injured her paw by jumping off a bed. We advised X-rays to be taken.

It turns out that Cleo had fractured all her metacarpal (front paw) bones – the long bones in the X-ray. We applied a cast to Cleo’s right foreleg from the elbow down to stabilise the paw, to allow healing.

Cleo healed up very well and has full use of her right foreleg.