A Shih-Tzu presents with acute blepharospasm and a mucopurulent discharge. Fluorescein staining confirms a superficial corneal ulcer. Antibiotics are dispensed. At the two-week recheck, the ulcer looks exactly the same. Another course of antibiotics. At week four, still no improvement. The owner is frustrated. You’re treating the ulcer — but not the wound environment that’s […]
Oral tumors in the caudal oral cavity present one of the more demanding surgical scenarios in small animal practice. The tumor is often large before the owner notices it, the anatomy is unforgiving, and the preferred treatment — wide excision with clear margins — regularly produces defects that are difficult to close without significant morbidity. […]
It’s day 18. The wound is clean, it’s moist, it’s covered. And it looks exactly the same as it did at day 10. No new granulation islands. No edge contraction. The exudate has shifted from serous to something slightly cloudier. The tissue around the margin is pale instead of the pink-red you’d expect in an […]
Your patient is a 6-year-old Labrador with a recurrent perineal hernia. The first repair used polypropylene mesh — the standard choice, reasonable cost, familiar technique. Now you’re back in the same field, same defect, and the question isn’t just how to fix it again. It’s whether the material you choose this time will produce a […]
A 5-year-old French Bulldog presents with a two-day history of squinting and epiphora. On slit-lamp exam, you estimate the ulcer at 50 to 60 percent stromal depth — deeper than you’d like, but not yet a descemetocele. There’s no obvious melting, no positive fluorescein pooling in a central dimple, no iris visible. The question in […]
A client returns for a two-week post-op recheck after a routine mass removal on their dog’s flank. The incision is clean, the dog is comfortable, and healing is progressing normally. Then the client asks the question you’ll hear again and again: “Is the scar going to look like this forever?” The honest answer is more […]
A dog presents after being struck by a vehicle. The skin over the distal limb has separated completely from the underlying tissue — a circumferential degloving injury exposing tendons and fascia across several centimeters. The tissue is contaminated, the margins are irregular, and the owner is asking what comes next. Degloving injuries are among the […]
A 4-year-old English Bulldog presents with a two-day history of squinting and ocular discharge. On slit-lamp exam, the ulcer is larger than you expected — and the corneal stroma has a soft, gelatinous appearance at the margin. You’re looking at a melting corneal ulcer. The clock is now running. Keratomalacia, or corneal melting, isn’t just […]
A 6-year-old mixed-breed dog presents three weeks post-degloving injury. The wound is clean. Granulation tissue started, then stalled. You’ve cycled through wet-to-dry bandages, silver dressings, and a course of systemic antibiotics. The tissue looks flat. No measurable progress. The owner is frustrated and asking what comes next. This is the chronic wound scenario that sends […]
A 4-year-old Labrador Retriever presents for a routine wellness exam. On abdominal palpation, you notice a soft, reducible swelling in the inguinal region. The diagnosis is straightforward: inguinal hernia. The harder question is what to use for repair. For decades, veterinary surgeons reached for polypropylene mesh as the default solution for soft tissue defects and […]
