Oh, that's pretty shocking to look at.
Poor Jake.
Jake walks a little bit like a sort of silverback.
Walks through the jungle.
Elbows out and wrists close together.
He clearly is a very abnormally put together dog.
It's just shocking.
Feel like crying my eyes out for him.
Jake, do you want some lunch?
In Sussex,
retired nurse Beth is hoping Scott can help her beloved boy Jake.
You hungry boy?
Beth adopted the Shih Tzu cross six years ago as a rescue from the RSPCA.
My first impression of Jake was
I thought he was gorgeous and I wanted to have him immediately.
Come on, eat up darling.
There's a good boy, eat it.
The only thing I know about Jake's past is that he was inbred,
but his legs were not too bad at that stage.
Jake's bowed legs are a defect that he's had since birth.
But recently, Beth has noticed him struggling more and more.
His legs were bent, but
he did not seem to be in a lot of pain
when we first got him, because he was walking a long way.
I could walk the best part of a mile with him.
Come on then.
And nowadays just walking up the road.
Seems to really wear him out.
Let's get home,
Goodboy.
Jake isn't managing very well at all
when he comes off the setty at night.
He almost stumbles off nine times out of ten.
I pick him up and put him down, and he's very wobbly on his legs.
He's such a playful little dog.
It just breaks my heart to see him like that.
I wrote to Scott in the hope that he can actually help
sort Jake's legs out and get him out of pain for me.
Jake is booked in with Scott tomorrow.
I just want him mended, and I'm sure Scott can help
get that sorted for me.
Having watched the show,
I wondered if you could give me some advice and how to get my dog out of pain.
You can see from the photos his front legs are very crooked, gee.
Wow. See that sort of
heart shape going on in between his...
Totally bent inwards, aren’t they?
Yeah.
At his practice, Scott is waiting for the arrival of Beth and little bow legged Jake.
Please, can you help me?
- Of course we can. - Absolutely.
Look forward to seeing him coming in, and we'll see what we can do
about this poor boys legs.
Come on.
Hello there.
- Hello. - How are you?
Welcome to Richmond.
- Good to see you. - Thank you very much.
Nice seeing you.
Yes. Hello.
And you must be Jake.
Hello champ.
Hello, you've got a beautiful face.
I'm not a big fan of those legs, though.
Jake walks a little bit like a sort of silverback.
Walks through the jungle.
Elbows out and wrists close together.
He clearly is a very abnormally put together dog.
Over the last six months.
It has got a lot worse.
And is one leg worse than the other, in your opinion?
- I think the right leg is the worst. - Okay.
But they're both very bad as you can obviously see from the way he walks.
I just want to have a little feel.
He will not like that.
You don't like your legs being played with, is that right?
He does not like his legs being touched at all.
Just checking all of his joints, here Beth.
And I think I'm pretty sure that it's going to be discomfort in his elbows.
Yeah, there’s lots of kind of clicking and grinding going on,
and he's just unimpressed about me playing with it, aren’t you champ?
Hey? Even though you're very affable boy.
Okay.
And you know what?
This is a happy, friendly, personable dog.
So that's not a life for him to lead, is it?
No I mean, when I first got him, we were going out three, four times a day,
and now to get him out once a week is, really must I.
He's clearly got some issues, which is why you're here with me.
Yes.
We’re going to sort you out.
Okay, good boy.
Downstairs at his Richmond practice,
Scott and nurse Jess are anaesthetising Jake so they can X-ray his legs.
Alright, so, do you want to take him through, Jess?
- There you go. - Come on mate.
Giving Jake a sedation allows me not only to have him
still for X-rays, but just to examine him a little bit better.
He really has the most awkward shape for limbs.
And the best way to see those better is with an X-ray.
X-ray.
Oh, that's pretty shocking to look at.
Poor Jake.
Not looking good.
Hello.
- Hello. - Here’s your boy.
- Oh. - Do you want to sit with mummy?
He looks very sleepy boy.
I love Jake so much. He's my companion.
Love him loads.
Best thing that happened to me.
I just want him out of pain.
Do you want to have a look at some of the pictures?
Yes, please.
Prepare for this.
This is your dog's leg and just shows how much he's been suffering.
That is terrible.
He’s just showing a brave boy he's been all these years, hey?
I never realised it was that bad.
Jake has a condition known as anti brachial growth deformity.
This condition can manifest in lots of different ways.
But for this boy, because both limbs are the same, my guess
is that at some point, the growth plate, which is the part of the bone
which allows bones to elongate, has fused on just one of the bones.
The other bone in the forelimb continues to grow.
And so that leads to a sort of banana shaped limb.
- And also... - Oh, that is really bad.
Beth we need to remind ourselves that you didn't breed this dog.
And you just rescued him.
Yeah.
- So he's lucky he’s with you. - Yes.
The cause of this particular condition, unfortunately, is genetic.
This is not a dog that's come from good stock.
His parents, at least one of them, would have had these same angular deformities
which would have led to that dog having discomfort in middle age.
But instead of going, you know what? That's not a great dog to breed from.
They bred it anyway.
And now Jake's here with the same problem, and that's just ignorant.
I’m absolutely
gobsmacked at how he’s stood the pain,
He’s a very brave little dog.
These joints have been through a lot of deterioration for a long time,
and unfortunately, right now it's just got too much for him.
And so he's gone from being extremely brave
and coping to not coping.
It's just shocking.
I feel like crying my eyes out for him.
The key here is to get
the best advice we possibly can get you.
And that's going to a specialist,
because you can see that this is a fairly special case.
I'm going to send him to my mate, Michael Hamilton, who's a specialist
orthopedic surgeon,
who will hopefully get to grips with Jake and try and make his problem
a little better.
We don't need to do any more walking.
So should we have a little cuddle and walk out with Mummy?
Should we? Hey, good boy.
I feel that now I’ve seen Scott that, we're going to be getting somewhere
and hopefully Jake will be out of pain relatively soon.
Come on then, you big baby. Hey?
He’s a good boy.
It’s okay.
Near Marlow in Buckinghamshire,
Beth and Jake have arrived for their appointment with orthopedic
specialist Michael Hamilton.
Hello, Beth. How are you?
- I’m Michael, Nice to meet you. - Hello Michael.
- Nice meeting you. - Hello, Jake.
- This is Jake. - Right then.
- So come on then. - Come on in my little friend, here we go.
Come on darling.
Since I saw Scott, Jake has deteriorated quite a lot.
His walking is really bad, so
I just need something done for him now.
It's interesting because he's got his feet straight,
but it looks like his elbow are pointing out to the sides.
- Yes. - Right then little man
let me have a little feel of you, are you friendly enough?
Watching Jake move around, he's got the very,
very typical type of deformity that we see in these little dogs.
If you just hold his head just there for me.
Okay.
As he's grown, one of the bones is preventing the other bone
growing straight.
And they have these very, very, very twisted legs.
So I'm trying to hold his elbow here straight like this,
but with his elbows straight, his foot is probably 90 degrees rotated.
Now, when he walks, he wants to put his foot flat on the floor.
His elbow sticks out almost at 90 degrees.
I mean, that is quite the bendy leg you have there, his left hand side.
Now that foot is flat on the floor.
The elbow is twisted out, but it's not.
He's managing on the left hand side, isn't he?
Yes.
So the good news is a little bit of reassurance for you,
Beth, is he's not painful at all on his wrist.
I think his major problem is just the fact that when he walks,
it just is buckleing over on him.
You know, it's more what we would call
a mechanical lameness rather than an actual painful thing.
Okay.
So I think we should try and straighten his front right leg.
Yeah.
I think the left hand side might actually be okay, to be honest with you.
And the whole thing that we're aiming for here
is to have an elbow that's lined up with the paw.
Yes, we've got some good news for Beth, in
there are some options to try and straighten this leg,
but I won't celebrate until he’s,
until he’s all fixed because it's complicated surgery.
And if we do that, he's going to be able to walk on it
- and hopefully we'll get a good outcome for you. - Thank goodness.
Michael doesn't
reckon that Jake's in much pain at all and he'll be able to operate.
So I'm really, really happy about that.
It's the best news ever.
Bye, darling.
You be good.
You’re going to come with me, straight this leg.
Let’s do it.
Right then little man.
Count backwards from ten.
Tell me about your weekend.
At his clinic near Marlow, orthopedic specialist Michael Hamilton
is trying to straighten six year old Shih Tzu cross Jake's bowed right leg.
The whole point of today's OP is to make sure when Jake tries to walk,
his paw lands flat on the floor.
Right.
Have we go plate benders and pliers?
The plan is to actually cut the bones of his forearm
and put them into position where his foot is flat on the floor
and then stabilise him like that.
And hopefully he can then walk.
Assisting Michael, are nurses, Louise and Kim.
Right.
So if my calculations are correct, we're going to make our cut about
25 millimeters above his wrist joint.
So I gotta get in there.
These are really, really complicated procedures because it's
not just a simple twist or a simple bend.
So we're going to cut the bones.
We can plan it for as long as we like,
and decide where to make the cuts and at what angles and all the rest.
But once you've made your cuts, you then pretty much
just gotta try and eyeball it in theater and just get it right.
Now what we're going to do is cut the radius.
Now, the radius is the bone that's causing all the problem.
And we actually make the cut parallel with this top
part of the bone.
Creating, in effect, a ball and socket joint here.
And then we can manipulate the bottom half,
360 degrees to straighten as best we can.
Easier said than done,
because this is actually quite a small section of bone down here, so.
Yeah, okay.
So let's just keep that straight on there.
All the time.
We're checking that his elbow and the paw are moving in the same plain
because when he wakes up, he's going to want to put his elbow like that.
And if his paw doesn't go like that, he's not going to be able to walk.
I think that looks.
Pretty good.
So you can do all the planning in the world.
But at the end of the day,
really, it's kind of what does it look like on the table?
So I think we're good to try and stick a plate on there now.
A metal plate is used to hold the bones
in their new realigned position.
We've got two screws in the bottom.
We only got one screw in the top because this is the last chance
we've got to do any, like, fine adjustments.
So we've just got to just triple check that We're happy with that.
I think that looks quite good.
A second plate will give added stability.
That will do, right.
On the table,
that looks good.
So the elbow and the wrist are in alignment, that paw should land flat
So we just need to check it looks good on the X-rays now.
We’re looking at the pre and post X-rays here.
So this X-ray on the left hand side, we have a straight on elbow
with a sideways paw.
That means that between the elbow and the paw, there's a twist at the very least.
And the X-ray on the right hand side is post-surgery.
So we now have a straight elbow and we've got a straight on paw.
So hopefully now he’ll be able to walk.
Come on little man.
Jake will sleep off the anaesthetic before going home with Beth later tomorrow.
Happy.
So far, so good.
Come on Jake, let's go.
Good boy.
Keep going.
A day after surgery, Jake is ready to go home.
Alright Jake there’s
somebody in here to see you. Look. Here we go.
Owner Beth has been anxiously waiting to see how the surgery has gone.
Come on in.
- Come on in. - Jake.
Jake. Come on Jakey.
Show your mum what your new leg looks like.
- Hello. - Oh, there you go.
- Oh, beautiful. - I’ll pop him up for you.
There you go.
Hello, darling.
Oh, you gorgeous boy.
Yes, you look so much better.
I'm so pleased to see you.
I'm very happy to see Jake walk in.
Although you look half drunk he was walking
so much better.
And I think he's much happier about it all now.
Mike was incredible.
He's a little bit dopey because he's just recently had some more painkillers.
But very pleased, the X-rays look good.
Paw look straight.
I mean, he's got a good attitude.
He's keen to use that leg, so.
Wow. That is incredible.
- He’s standing up. - Just looks so different.
Stand him up like that.
Gosh.
It's kind of though it's still got a little bit of a bow that way,
which is fine.
We've taken about probably, 30 degrees off on the front bend, if you like.
Probably like about 90 degrees off on the twist, but so far, so good.
As I say he's quite dopey still.
It's clear to see what Jake means to Beth.
I mean, you could just see her face light up as he kind of wondered in.
With his nice straight leg.
You look so much better.
Yeah.
Just makes me feel great.
I mean, that's kind of why we do it, so.
Yeah, really, really happy.
Right. So I'm going to hand off to Louise.
She going to give you a hand down to the car with him.
And I'll see you guys in 6 to 8 weeks, thereabouts.
- There you go Louise. - Thank you very much.
My pleasure. You take care. Thanks.
You ready to go home?
Come on then.
There’s a good boy.
Beautiful sunshine today.
Five weeks after his operation, little Jake is enjoying a walk in the park
with his owner Beth.
Good boy.
Surgery on his badly deformed right leg
means it's now working a lot better, and Jake can lead an active life once again.
It was certainly the last chance for Jake,
going to Scott’s and things are a lot better and Jake's bouncing around.
He obviously wants to play and he's loving life again.
- Hi. - Hello, Beth.
- Hello Scott. - How are you, gorgeous? You alright?
Nice seeing you.
Oh, thanks for the cuddle.
Hello, little man. Hello, buddy.
How are you?
Look at you.
With your two legs on the ground.
My, he looks fantastic.
His leg looks far straighter.
And how do you feel?
He's gone on since the surgery.
He's walking so much flatter on his paw now.
Where he was really struggling.
But he's so much happier.
You can see it in his face. He's much happier.
Yeah, you really can.
Although he's having a lovely relaxing time.
I'm quite keen to see this bionic leg in motion.
Hey, come on. Come on, let's go.
Yeah.
Good boy. Well done.
Yes, He's a good puppy.
- Yeah. - Come on.
Wow. Beth, Little spring lamb
we've got.
- He could not do that before. - It's incredible.
Why the puppy? Jake come on, come on.
Good boy, good boy. That is great.
Look at that.
Jake seems to be very comfortable, and he's really got a spring in his step.
It's extraordinary
Good boy, good boy. Well done.
Never seen him run like that before.
It's fabulous. I'm over the moon.
Good boy.
Jake, come see me.
And writing to Scott was absolutely the best thing I’ve ever did.
And I'm so grateful to him for getting us this far.
That's a good boy.