Little Ciri was found on the streets of Portugal. The organization named her Lille Håb (Little Hope).
She had a broken leg, infected and injured eyes and had lost most of her fur.
She spent 3 months at a vet clinic getting her broken leg operated and, her eyes and skin condition treated.
Her leg was healing, her eyes got better and her fur started growing back.
The organization said that the leg was healing well and should be fine, eyes had responded well to treatment and would be normal, except for a scar in one eye (she can not see through the scar but can see around it), and the fur was growing back. When we asked if they thought she could not get health insurance when arriving to Denmark they said that they saw no reason why not. We asked repeatedly about her health and if there were any more issues but were not informed of more issues.
Then we decided to adopt her and we got approved.
We looked very much forward to getting little Ciri home and waited 2 months before she arrived.
When she arrived we discovered the most wonderful, amazing, gentle and brave dog we have ever met. Such a character and after more than 24 hours travel the first thing she did when she got home was to roll on her back and wanted to play.
She is such a funny goofy character, knows exactly what she wants and is very vocal about what she wants or doesn’t want, which we think is great because then it is very easy to see where her limits are and respect them. She is amazed by reflection, many times choosing to watch our reflection in the glass kitchen door rather than at ourselves, so funny and cute!
She love to play and will always throw herself on her back while playing, just adorable
Everything seemed great but then…further inspection showed that her leg that was supposed to be healed was completely fused together so no joints can bend. She also had a massive overbite which we were not told about (made feeding difficult for her, she could not eat rice from a bowl). But we were not worried because maybe the leg just needs some rehabilitation before it would start to move again and by putting the food on a flat plate it was easier for her to feed.
We had asked the organization about Ciris condition and they just said the leg was healing so we assumed the leg would get better but wanted to be sure so we asked the vet that the organization was using and she responded: ,,About her leg: Can I send you de X rays on Monday?” and ,,She was not using it. She is a lazy girl and so small that actually she does all her normal life not so well that she doesn’t use it.”
So we asked if we should leave her leg for now or start doing something to help it get better if it was just stiff and the vet responds: ,,I would give 3 weeks so that she feels home and then start some exercise”.
Ciri got 4 days to recover from the trip before she was taken to the vet for inspection here in Denmark so we could get her health insurance for her. We brought pictures of the X-rays from Portugal to show the vet. The results of the inspection were shocking.
Her eyes were not healed and still needed medicine, and she has scars on both eyes not just one.
Her broken leg was not healed correctly, why the leg has fused together is unknown and the vet, who is an orthopedic surgeon, said it was clear that something had gone wrong there.
He also said that the screws used in the metal plate holding the bone together were way too big for her and needed to be replaced with screws of the correct size.
The leg also has almost non existent thigh muscles so the vet could hardly see how she could even build up a muscle there ever again.
The other leg (the "good" leg) suffers from 3rd degree patella, which means the kneecap is completely loose and out of place and this requires surgery.
Her skin is extremely itchy for unknown reasons (no parasites found), possibly allergy.
Her heart sounds very abnormal and the vet was worried about it and wanted their specialist to take a look at it.
No insurance company was going to insure her in this condition.
The vet said that he could not asess her condition of these x-rays, he needed to take new ones and make a proper detailed inspection of her at the same time.
It would cost upwards of 4500dkk to simply do the research needed to estimate which surgeries she will need and how much they will cost. New x-rays and looking at the condition of the heart, legs and eyes.
We reached out to the organization and wanted to know why they did not disclose her condition (which was found out in a 1,5 hour long vet visit) and if they would participate in any way in the cost.
The organization responded that they had too many dogs to take care of so they only cared for the most obvious injuries and treatments needed (so don't even feel the kneecaps for patella or listen to the heart). They said that what they could suggest was that we could fly her back to Portugal and perform the operations there where they are cheaper.
We counted on getting health insurance for Ciri. And only 4 days after she arrived we faced a hefty bill and more operations were most likely needed.
At this point we did not know what to do. We decided to discuss this with dog owners from Iceland (where one of us grew up). We did not know what to do, if we should give Ciri back to the organization before we would bond more with her, if we should pay for the fare to Portugal and her operations there or what we should do.
After the discussion we realized that if we would give Ciri back to the organization then they would very likely just send her off to be adopted by someone else not mentioning anything about her true condition (like happened to us) and Ciri would maybe not get the treatments and operations she needed. Or they would maybe deem her too expensive to use more resources on and simply put her down. So that was not a good option for anyone.
If we would ship her to Portugal and let her have her treatments and operations there then a) She would have to live in a vet clinic again instead of the home she finally got and b) the operations might be done wrong again and she might have to have her operations in Denmark again regardless.
That is not a solution for Ciri, that is torture.
Ciri should have her treatments and operations done the right way, getting service from very good doctors at Bygholm Dyrehospital and the chance to recover at home in between.
We let Ciri settle in and gain some strength, saved up some money and then did all of the testing in the beginning of February 2020. (should have been in January but the vet was sick and the appointment was postponed).
The results were shocking, again!
The vet said that the good news is that we were not going to operate on Ciri!
The bad news is, that the reason for not operating is that her condition is so bad that a surgery can not fix it.
We were kind of glad that Ciri didn’t have to go through more operations but then the vet explained the rest of her condition.
When her leg was fastened together with the metal plate, the screws were put on the outside of the growth area of the leg, this resulted in the leg bone (thigh) could not grow (so it is some cm too short), so the bone in the lower part of the leg compensated and grew unusually long, making both legs end up similar in length!
The right hip joint is a complete mess and can not move at all.
But because Ciris thigh bone is so short that the knee joint is actually so high up (by the abdomen) that she can use it to move the leg back and forth creating the illusion that the hip joint is moving and the leg is fused together.
So of course we can not bend the leg where we expect a knee joint to be if there is no joint there. The only joint visible in her leg is actually what we would call the ankle and it doesn’t really bend.
The screws used are way too long and can cause her pain in the future (we could actually feel the screws before she built up muscle) and then they will need replacement.
So there is no fixing her leg, it will be disabled for the rest of her life.
On the other leg, the “good” leg Ciri has a 3rd degree patella (kneecap out of place and stuck there) and because the tendons that hold the kneecap are so twisted that there is no way of fixing the patella with surgery, they can not get the kneecap back in place. This can be very painful condition for the dog and is usually operated on. The leg is also bowing outwards. (And when Ciri walks she drags her leg on the ground a bit, grinding down her claws until they are almost gone).
But the good news is that from the time Ciri arrived she has grown to be much healthier and stronger, she has built up some fat and a lot of muscles and her heart now sounds normal, the abnormal sounds in the beginning were then probably because she was anemic!
She has also grown to be bigger and is now 2,7 kg.
But he added that in this condition, if she was a big dog they would want to put her down right away. But because Ciri is so tiny and light she can pull this off, at least for now. We will have to make sure she does not put on too much weight, stays slim and then reassess her condition in a year. We don’t know if...or more likely when her condition will cause her pain.
Because some dogs can be masters in hiding when they are in pain we tried having her on pain medication every day but didn’t see a difference in her behavior so for now we think that she is not in pain, but will keep observing her.
When we adopted we did not expect to get a disabled dog but we love Ciri very much, she is awesome and perfect the way that she is and she is home now and will stay with us as long as her health allows her to.
