Memphis The Pug
Full Name: Ralph Memphis Tennessee Blues
So, our little pug, adopted from folks who had to leave the country has a displaced hip and needs hip surgery to reduce his pain.
Memphis is a delightful, if clumsy dog who gets excited about pretty much everything. He has charmed everyone he has met. He loves to run, play, bark at passing anything and likes to make talking noises. He is incredibly snuggly.
Apparently what happens with some dogs is that the hip never completes its formation so as they age, their pain increases. This condition is common in pugs, and Memphis was over-weight earlier in his life, which accelerated the degradation. He is at the point where he limps every morning, stumbles down stairs, falls when running around corners — but is a trooper and just has not lost his enthusiasm. At all.
Unfortunately the surgery is expensive. We are using pain medications to help him in the mean-time while we try to raise the budget for surgery.
To have surgery, and pay for recovery and therapy is approximately $3500.
We simply don’t have the funds. We will be raising money as quickly as possible through extra work, Mary-Kay sales, Art sales and whatever we can do.
In the surgery, they will remove the top part of his bone so that it sits along-side his hip and doesn’t rub against the socket. After surgery, he will need physical therapy to build up the muscles around the joint. Small dogs do very well with this surgery; so long as Memphis’ weight is under control, he should do very well. We have already explored alternative care; physical therapy, drug therapies, dog-acupuncture, glucosamine, and more. Every single professional suggests the surgery for Memphis; his joint is just too far gone for anything else. As you can see from his x-ray, his hip has gotten to the point where pretty much, the bone is rubbing on the bone with every movement, so we feel some urgency to to help him out and give him the surgery that will alleviate his pain.
We know that many of our friends love Memphis, so we wanted to create an opportunity to help out. This isn’t a life-threatening condition, just a chronically painful one.
There is a donate button at the side of this web site and at the bottom of this post. Every little bit can help us grow the fund necessary to ease Memphis’ pain.