Brief of Walking Aid:
Elmo is a miniature smooth haired black and tan Dachshund, and is completely disabled in all four legs. He has been since 18 months of age. He is now nine. Elmo has various problems (please see Elmo's History below) but the key factors to designing an Elmo 'walking assistant' are that he also has two discs about to slip in his back, and has recently and miraculously survived a twisted gut. He therefore cannot have any acute pressure directed upon his stomach. We have contacted various companies that make carts for dogs with hind leg problems, such as hip dysplasia, and back paralysis, yet none could suggest help for little Elmo. With Elmo's previous problems, we have not been able to attempt any form of device to assist his mobility. He does wiggle his way around, slowly as a snake would.
Yet, now after his incredible recovery from surgery, we are able to gently lift him by hand, and he will gently move his legs, and without interventional force, Elmo projects himself forward. We propose that a sling type device would support his weight, suspended from a frame structure, Elmo could move forward under his own strength.
Although Elmo is an entirely happy Dachshund, we feel it our duty to give him the opportunity to at least attempt to regain some more substantial mobility. We shall be putting more sketches up, but would appreciate any ideas, or any similar stories from people with dogs, or any animal that could assist with design.
Elmo's History:
Hello. We are Elmo's family.
Elmo's story is quite unusual.
He has a variety of problems. To try and get a healthy, well bred Dachshund to avoid eye and back problems etc (I'm sure you know all of this!), we went through a UK Kennel Club registered breeder. We soon learnt that this makes little difference.
Elmo, as Daxies do, chose us. He was perfect and didn't experience any separation anxiety after we took him home from his litter, at eight weeks old.
However, seconds after having his first puppy shots he fell very quiet. The vet told us this was normal for smaller dogs. Later that night he fell deliriously ill, with high fevers. We nursed him through the night. The response from the vet was that some pups do react slightly to the mild viruses present in the vaccine. The same happened with his booster a few weeks later. We then knew he was a sensitive wee hound.
After all of this, on a walk in the forest, Elmo jumped into some nettles. Being so low, his whole "under carriage" was stung. As soon as we could, we bathed him, and applied cream. He seemed comfortable, and his skin was not too badly irritated. A couple of hours later he began to hyperventilate. We called the vet who instantly injected him with an antihistamine. This very fortunately worked without complication.
We had various tests done, which revealed that Elmo was highly allergic. He was even diagnosed as allergic to himself, which causes various skin conditions. We have to bathe him three times a week with prescribed shampoo. Other reactions sometimes cause one of his ears to swell up, or an eye. It is very odd indeed, but completely painless and harmless in the long term. We cannot yet find why this happens.
Through trial and error we have discovered that he can only now eat organic chicken legs (not any other part of the chicken for some reason) and drink bottled mineral water 'Highland Spring' (from organic land). He can only play with a certain type of plastic toy, and eat out of metallic bowls or his mouth swells and he looks like a duck.
Until the age of around 18 months, Elmo was a fully mobile and an active young mini Dachs. We tried to keep him from bounding around too much to protect his long back, which you always fear first for our breed, don't you? He loved to swim, and enjoyed a healthy amount of non strenuous exercise twice a day. Slowly, his gait began to get slower, and more awkward. We took him to a different vet whilst we were away for a few weeks. He examined his front legs and asked the question,
"Has this dog ever had a broken leg?"
I was shocked to be asked this. I would know if anything like that had ever happened, and I surely would have noticed this when we got him at 8 weeks.
We took him back to our own vet for a second opinion and x-rays. The diagnosis was that his ligaments were over stretched, or originally overly long to support his leg bones in his two front legs. This, we were told, was due to over breeding, or even worse, inter-breeding between litter mates. We asked for confirmation from the Royal Veterinary College. They concluded it was due to 'poor breeding' and his ligaments were to blame. They gave the option of surgery of fitting Elmo with metal plates in his legs, which would prevent the joints from moving naturally, but would support him. They also stated this would be more painful for him than the condition. So, we allowed nature to take its course. We contacted various companies to make him a Daxie wheelchair, but they all designed chairs for dogs with the more common hind leg disabilities, due to paralysis or hip dysplasia. We developed, and built our own but Elmo took little interest, even with food and training. We are therefore proposing a new design.
His hind legs have since developed the same condition. So, we now have an "Elmo bag". It is a Daxie shaped canvas sling which we carry by handle when we take him for walks. We let him sniff around on the grass and play with other dogs, which always seem to treat him gently. Even the most hyper of hounds seem to understand and calm themselves around him. You would look at Elmo, and not believe he was disabled if his legs were not visible. It is almost as though he does not realise. I suppose this is the beauty of the gradual development of his disability. He is now nine, and still looks and acts like a puppy. We think now he has a bone disease of some sort, as his tail is bent at a 90 degree angle in three places. It does not hurt him at all, and it wags just as well as ever, but now in three places. He was also diagnosed with a collapsing trachea, which gives him the bark of a seal. He does in fact move, sound and look like a seal pup, especially after a bath.
Two years ago, at the age of seven, Elmo, who was never castrated due to the major risk of putting him under aesthetic due to his hyper allergies, experienced two massively swollen testicles. Our faithful veterinarian feared it could be cancerous and carried out various tests to prove otherwise. We were soon told that it was a torsion of his 'tubes', and the blood supply had been compromised causing massive bruising and swelling. There was no option but to operate. We were told the chance of Elmo surviving the aesthetic of a usually routine operation was small. However, left untouched, he would soon die of septicaemia.
A blessing- Elmo pulled through the surgery. The vets had used various antihistamines to counteract his hyper allergies against the anaesthesia, but this in itself had cause massive allergic reactions including swelling of the nasal passages. His recovery was slow, but thankfully uneventful.
And now this. On Wednesday morning 30th Jan 2008 3:268am, Elmo showed signs of discomfort, was gagging, and began to bloat around his abdomen. Sometimes, due to his list of allergies, he experiences strange symptoms- and so we tried to calm him and let it pass, but to no avail.
We took him to the vets expecting to hear that he had colic or a similar condition, to be told emergency surgery needed to take place. His stomach had twisted under the weight of the gas in his gut.
As fore mentioned, surgery on Elmo is very dangerous as his server allergic reactions do not allow anything to be injected into his body. This surgery on a normal dog has a 50/50% chance of survival. Elmo was given less than a 20% chance of pulling through. We were devastated.
Elmo managed to survive the surgery, that had in the short term, saved his life. Yet he was going into shock, which could cause complications. The toxins that had been trapped could have caused heart problems- and because of the pressure of the bloat of his stomach against his veins, vital organs were not getting the blood supply they needed.
We were amazingly lucky and told the torsion was serve, but had only happened recently, i.e. within the last couple of hours, after the vomiting had occurred. He was transferred to another vet for that night. He remained stable. Elmo was then transferred by the second vet to the Royal Veterinary College, an intensive care surgery and probably the best in Europe, when he showed no sign of improvement. (This is the hospital that gave the final opinion of his ligament failure in his younger years through seeing only his x-rays.) Soon after, thinking it was less stressful, we took him home, where he remains. He has perked up, and has a stomach tube through which we feed him antibiotics and painkillers. We cannot inject these directly into the bloodstream due to the allergies.
Elmo, is not a usual dog and incredibly dependant on his humans. This next week is critical. We beg that he will pull through without infection. On Wednesday 13th February, he will have his stomach tube removed, which we hope will not require another anaesthesia. It is not required usually, but depends on the amount of scar tissue developed around the wound.
Elmo is the most inspirational little creature. He does not just cope with his problems, he truly thrives and enjoys every moment of life. I have taken on action with the breeder, who has been investigated, and we have been told, shut down. I truly hope so, but you can never be sure can you? They are such wonderful animals, but such a sensitive breed that due to popularity is being over and poorly bred. I wish there was more we could do.
Thank you for letting us share our story with you.
Elmo's family.