Sweet little Max was surrendered to RAGOM approximately 7 weeks ago. I’d like to say that I’ve been keeping him to myself until now just because he’s so darn cute and sweet, but unfortunately that isn’t the case.

Don’t get me wrong, he is darn cute and sweet, but the poor little guy has been through too much in his short, little life. But thanks to RAGOM we are trying to help him the best way possible. 

So here’s Max’s story, the condensed version:

Max was originally adopted from a breeder in South Dakota by a young man who loved and cared for him. As a young man and his new puppy will do, they had fun together. Unfortunately though, while the were having fun Max got hit by a 4-wheeler. And as dogs do sometimes, they hide their pain very well.

It was about a week later that his owner took Max to the vet, found out that he had a broken leg, and surgery was recommended. This young man couldn’t afford the surgery so RAGOM was called in, and thanks to our wonderful volunteers Max made the long journey to Minnesota.

When Max arrived, he was scheduled for his surgery. Max had both a proximal and a distal femur fracture, meaning that both the top portion of the femur by the hip joint and the bottom portion by the knee joint were broken. The decision was made to do an FHO surgery by the hip and put pins in by the knee.

The FHO is a femoral head osteotomy, where the top part of femur, or ball part of the hip joint, is cut off. Scar tissue then fills in the joint space over time. The lower part of the bone by the knee joint had two pins put in place to help set the bone.

Max was also neutered while he was under anesthesia. Poor guy, a triple whammy. He was then sent home to his foster family with lots of restrictions.

Over the course of the next couple weeks Max spent his time laying low and trying to heal. When he went back to the vet for a follow up a few weeks later, it was discovered that the pins were starting to come out.

The decision was made that since the fracture seemed to be healing well, and if we waited to much longer they could come out more and poke through the skin, that Max would be better off having them out that day, so back to surgery he went. 

Again Max went home with restrictions to lay low and be treated like a king. Well, no, the vet didn’t say that, but that’s what we did. Lots of snuggling and treats were the routine.

Max seemed to enjoy his recovery until he had a reaction to his sutures, which caused us to make an unscheduled vet visit, trying to figure out why his leg was so swollen AGAIN.The sutures came out a little earlier than scheduled but that worked out OK.
 
So this week, Max went in for an update on his vaccines, and a follow up X-ray. While we were hoping for good news so Max could start looking for his forever home, we didn’t get it. The hip portion where the FHO was done looked good, but the femur (thigh bone) isn’t growing properly and Max has arthritis in the knee joint, too.

The current plan is kind of wait and see. We started him on different pain medication twice daily and are hoping he will start using that leg more. Right now he only uses that leg to touch his leg down and rarely bears weight on it. Hopefully, if we can ensure that he is comfortable, he will use the leg more.

In the mean time we will consult with another orthopedic surgeon to see what Max’s options are. Please keep Max in your thoughts and prayers—he sure could use some. 

So other than medical stuff, this is what we know:

Max is a Golden mix, or at least that’s what the paperwork says. I’m guessing he has a lot of yellow lab in his background, which makes him a real cutie pie. He also gets along with everyone: kids, cats, and dogs.

Max loves to play with our youngest female Golden, and is also very submissive to our old, grumpy male Golden.

Max is kennel trained, and a work in progress with the potty training. He’s very good about using the puppy pads for his business but hasn’t made connection of asking to go outside when he needs to.

Max has many nicknames, including Max-a-minion (my favorite), Minnie Max, Maxie Man, and Max-a-million. But he answers to Max just as well!