Max is a sweet little female, 1 year old domestic short hair cat who was brought to our clinic walking on three legs only. Upon examination, the Veterinarian discovered that Max’s right hind leg was out of place in the hock joint. During the full examination, Max purred and smooched and allowed the veterinarian to complete a full and thorough examination with no fuss at all! Max’s owners were understandably distraught with the whole situation, as it was suspected that Max had been hit by a car.

X-rays were taken of Max’s hind leg as well as her front right leg as there also looked to be some swelling there; upon interpretation of the x-rays by our veterinarians, it was confirmed that Max had a dislocated hock joint in her right hind leg (which means that the ligaments had been completely torn), as well as a fracture of her Radius is her right front leg. Options were discussed with the owners about possible courses of action; either we sent Max to a specialist orthopaedic surgeon or the other option was to perform surgery at our clinic, in which case we intended to amputate her hind leg and place a pin in her front leg.

Once all options were considered, it was decided that we would perform surgery on Max at our clinic the following morning.

The next day, Max’s surgery went just as we intended and we were able to amputate the hind leg as well as place a stable pin in the Radius of her front leg. Max recovered well from the anaesthetic later that day and by the evening was happily tucking into some delicious dinner.

Max stayed in our clinic for a number of days before we were happy that she was ready to be sent home; during this time Max won over the hearts of all our clinic staff, due to her chilled out, happy-go-lucky, loving personality. During Max’s stay, every time someone walked past Max’s cage, she would call out and smooch all over the cage door until you eventually gave in and devoted your full attention to her for pats and smooches. Throughout this whole ordeal (which one can imagine would be very painful and stressful), Max purred, smooched, talked (cat language), and graciously allowed us to do our job with no fuss at all on her part; the only fuss Max ever made was for attention!

Max is now happily at home with her loving parents who are so very happy she is doing so well and we are so pleased Max was able to be given a second chance at life.