Sweet Luke has made some progress but is still very, very sick. His leg is the least of our worries right now. Luke has lots of intestinal issues and came in with constant runny diarrhea. His intestinal problems have to be our top priority, or he will not survive. Dogs like Luke will eat anything to survive. His liver does not indicate he ate something poisonous, but we cannot rule that out.
Yesterday was the first day he was stable enough for Internal Medicine to scope him and get biopsies of his intestine and bowel. The initial report came back that he had an inflamed bowel. We need more information before we can come up with a diagnosis. His intestine and colon showed thickening of the wall of each. His biopsies should tell us or at least give us an indication of the cause and what we can do about it.
Luke has been in starvation mode for quite a long time. An animal's body adapts to this condition in a lot of different ways to survive. Right now, his body is still in survival mode which is why he still has to have lots of small meals to prevent Re-Feeding Syndrome. The other major issue he has is his Heart. Even though he is Heartworm Positive, the heart issues he has are because he was starved. His electrolytes have been out of balance, and his heart and lungs have been compromised because of this.
Luke had a full Cardiology work-up with our fabulous Cardiologist, Dr. Sophy Jesty yesterday. Dr. Jesty had to approve him to be sedated for his scoping yesterday which she did. She believes once we get Luke's body composition back into a normal range a lot of his heart issues will go away. In the meantime, she has put him on Heart Medications to assist his body while he is recovering. We have started him on doxycycline so he can be treated for his heartworm disease once he has fully recovered. The good news is the heartworms are not the cause of his heart issues.
Everyone is focusing on Luke's foot and his lower limb. He has a nasty infection in his leg that we are treating. The good news is it does not appear to have gone into the bone further up his leg. We have spoken to several surgeons about a prosthetic. The problem is he ate too much of his lower limb, and a prosthetic would not be comfortable for him to use. I am still talking to different companies before the leg is removed. If Luke develops a bone infection, the leg will have to be removed immediately.
Luke's personality is still one of being scared and fearful. Hospitals make animals anxious with all of the strange lights, sounds, and smells. It appears this sweet Gentle Giant has not had much in the form of loving contact with Humans. As I said earlier, he needs out of the hospital so he can heal his broken Spirit. He would still be considered a hospital patient but one that comes and goes. Right now, he is too sick for that to happen.
Luke has a long road of medical ahead of him, and we have to have funds to stay on top of this. Please, continue Donating and Sharing with your friends so we can give him every possible chance to survive. We have thirty-two dogs all in need of Medical Care. We solely depend on Donations to save these beautiful pups. Thanks for caring about Luke and giving him the Gift of Life. Your Support is greatly appreciated.
