Rocky Mountain Great Dane Rescue, Inc.

He is physically a mess and can barely walk, but he is just about as sweet as can be! He has huge, open sores on 3 of his feet as well as on his hocks, making it extremely painful for him to walk or lie down. The lesions all appear to be highly infected and the result of some major skin problem, probably allergy related. To add to his problems, Ali had TPLO surgery at 2 years old and has bad knees and weak hips. Due to the tremendous pain he is experiencing, he hasn’t had much of an appetite and has withered away to only 90 lbs with very little muscle!

Ali is clearly a very special boy who needs our help and we are anxious to get him on the road to recovery immediately! Dr. Winton has agreed to foster him because he clearly will need nursing care that the average foster home is not qualified to provide. We are so grateful for her help!

Ali is really making wonderful progress in just the short time we have had him!

We have transitioned him over to Canidae and he is responding well. We are feeding him 4 times a day and he is eating well and gaining weight.

He is on some strong powered antibiotics and all of his open sores are bandaged with daily bandage changes. He is also getting hydrotherapy 4 days a week to help increase the circulation to his wounds and help the healing process. There is healthy tissue creeping in from the edges on the pad ulcers, so the combination is definitely working. The hock lesions are not looking real happy yet, but they are very chronic, and it will take time and TLC to get them better.

After consulting with an allergy specialist, we jointly agreed that it would be best to wait to biopsy until we see what the antibiotics and bandaging does for him over a month or so.

We are pretty worried about both his knees. The one he had surgery on is pretty much fused, but we feel that we can keep him comfortable with pain management and he probably would not be a surgery candidate at this stage anyway. He seems to be responding well to the anti-inflammatory and pain meds he is on currently.

He is actually running around and playing in the backyard with the other dogs. He is feeling so much better! We never thought we'd see this much progress this quickly.

Obviously the next step is determining the cause, which will be the hard part, but we are committed to seeing him through, no matter how long it takes! His foster mom, Dr. Winton, loves him to death and is committed to his care.

November 4, 2007

Ali's foster mom has been very devoted to his nursing care and daily medication routine and has continued to treat him with a combination of antibiotics, pain meds, hydrotherapy to the wounds, and daily bandage changes. We have seen definite improvement since his arrival into rescue and he is quite the trooper with his daily routine! All of the Danes in his foster home have "hockey names" as their nicknames and Ali's has become "Gordie".

Dr. Winton was finally able to biopsy one of his wounds although the biopsy results were not very helpful. The biopsies revealed a nonspecific hyperplastic hyperderatotic pleocellular dermatitis reaction with fibrosis. Changes are not etiologically specific but they are potential sequelae to chronic superficial irritation or trauma with secondary superficial pyoderma. The test for fungi and acid fast bacteria were negative, so we ruled those out, and there was no evidence of immune mediated disease. That was very good news because those are hard to manage and almost never really get well. Basically, there was no causative agent identified and the pathologist suggested we have a consult with a dermatologist next.

The consultation with the dermatologist was also somewhat open ended. He remarked that it was a very interesting and unusual case, but again offered no explanation for the causitive agent.

Ali went to see Dr. Strauss at VRCC yesterday (the doctor who he saw originally when he was with his former family) and the doctor almost started crying! He honestly did not believe that he would see him alive again after his last visit. When he last saw him his pads were necrotic, septic, and he only weighed about 90 lbs. He now weighs 126 lbs and looks great, and his pads are getting healthy tissue. He feels that it is most likely an allergy even though one of his feet doesn't seem to be affected.

The plan for treatment is to get him started on Clomicalm and Prednisone for 3 weeks. The Clomicalm is to disrupt the OCD component of him chewing and licking at the sores. The Prednisone is to address the itching and swelling aspect. Dr. Winton will report back to Dr. Strauss after the initial 3 week period and he will give us further instructions.

Ali may never be completely healed or able to live without bandages and there is a possibility that he will require nursing care such as he is receiving at Dr. Winton's house for the rest of his life, but the goal is to continue to search for the root of the problem and get him to a point where he can wear booties instead of constant bandage changes as our next big step. Dr. Winton says he has a place with her forever if needed, but we are just taking it one step at a time right now!

December 10, 2007

Ali has been a very challenging case, but his goofy, fun-loving personality makes all the hard work worthwhile. His feet get better, but never well. He can't go without bandages and now he's having problems from being bandaged all the time. His foster mom attempted booties a few weeks back and unfortunately it didn't go very well and he went to town on one of his feet while his foster mom was in the shower. We are going to try the booties again, but only under direct supervision. We are hoping it will relieve some of the pressure from the bandages and allow a little air to get to his toes.

He's gained more weight due to the Prednisone, and he looks great. We haven't really seen any change on the Prednisone, so we've started tapering it and will probably take him off of it completely in another week or so. Dr. Winton decided that it is not worth the side effects if it isn't making a difference. He is still on the Gabapentin and Clomipramine though, and we pulse antibiotics as needed. His pads actually look pretty good, but as soon as the bandages are off, he goes straight for them, and would chew them to the bone, so we just have to keep on keepin' on!

January 7, 2007

Ali is doing really well! His feet are looking pretty good, but we have come to accept the reality of his situation with his feet. He will always have to be bandaged when unattended, but he seems to really do well with booties on as long as someone is there to supervise him. It gives him the opportunity to air out his sores and has helped them to heal better and avoid infection. He is used to the routine now with his medications and bandage changes and seems to really enjoy his life at the Winton household! Gordy makes us all laugh constantly and talks all the time. He often sings to us if he is gated in a different room to express his discontentment and still gets the Dane zoomies when he goes outside to play. As you can see in the photo below, Ali is still very much a pup at heart!

January 27, 2008

It is with a very heavy heart that I write to tell everyone that we had to say goodbye to sweet Ali yesterday morning. As everyone knows, he has been battling some chronic skin problems and requiring daily nursing care to bandage his feet. He also was an old man with severe arthritis and very bad knees. To add to his problems, Dr. Winton woke up to find him extremely lethargic and piles of watery throw up throughout the house. She observed him closely to find that he was trying to drink a lot of water, but it was coming right back up, and he was also acting very sick and uncomfortable overall so she rushed him to the hospital.

The x-rays confirmed our suspicions and he was in severe distress due to bloat. She put a tube down his throat to try and relieve some pressure and it was straight blood which means that quite a bit of damage had already been done. We consulted with another veterinarian for an objective opinion since Dr. Winton was obviously emotionally invested and, due to Gordie's age, his many other medical conditions, and his current condition, he was not a great surgical candidate, which we all knew deep down. We had to make the difficult decision to follow the doctor's advice and put an end to his suffering and put aside our own feelings of not wanting to let him go. Both Dr. Winton and I were there with him when he crossed the rainbow bridge telling him how much we love him! He went peacefully and is now happily playing in doggie heaven with all the other Danes who have gone before him.

Gordie Ali was a very special Dane who touched all those who knew him. He had a great big bark which he wasn't afraid to use to tell the other dogs when they were getting out of hand or to protect his home. He also had a great big heart with plenty of love to go around and 145 lbs of Dane leans to share with all! Gordie had so much personality and spunk for an old man and he made us all laugh and smile on a daily basis. Dr. Winton was incredibly devoted to his care and rehabilitation and gave him the most incredible last 6 months of his life! We are so grateful to her for her dedication to his medical needs and mostly for her willingness to love him unconditionally and open her heart and home to a special needs Dane. His presence will be sorely missed and we are so happy that we had an opportunity to know and be touched by his special spirit.