Pet of the Month! Gracie!

Gracie’s Story

Gracie is a 9 1/2 year old domestic short hair. Gracie is lovely cat who suffered a nasty accident when a door closed on her leg breaking every bone in her foot (metatarsus). The break was further complicated with one bone pushing through the skin allowing infection to take hold before we attempted to repair anything.

To save the leg, we elected to put several plates in the foot. In addition to this, we needed to manage the wound to try and prevent infection taking hold in the implants. Sadly, the foot got infected with a bacteria resistant to many antibiotics, but growing bacteria allowed us to identify the correct antibiotic to use. With the wound getting infected, one of the plates broke through the skin.

To give the best chance of healing, this plate has had to be removed to help heal the leg further. At the time of describing the events, Gracie is doing well following her latest surgery. Only time will tell if we have done enough to finish the healing.

Throughout all of this, Gracie has been amazing. She has been so tolerant of the bandage changes, the cleaning of the wound and taking her medication. Not once has she hissed or tried to resist the care given, which is remarkable! Gracie’s owners have been so dedicated, bringing her in every few days for bandage changes, all focused on saving her leg, committing to the repeat medication and tests needed to heal the wounds.

We asked Gracie’s owners a bit more about her. Here’s what they told us…

After a tough start in life (as a kitten she’d been found in a bin bag in a local park before being taken to a rescue centre) she quickly settled down to a better life with us and our 3 other rescue cats where, being highly intelligent, she eventually learned to finally trust humans.

She’s never been a lap cat, giving only as much fuss as she needs(!) but she does like to sit and be stroked whilst watching football on the tv!

Her other favourite pastimes though appear to be eating and sleeping. She loves to see a full food bowl with her name on it and being ever helpful, she likes to clean up the leftovers of the other cats’ bowls too if she can.

She’s not a climber, to the point that she had us install her own special tunnel under the garden fence which she willingly shares with a couple of local “strays” and a hedgehog.

Following her unfortunate accident, she suffered a severe compound fracture to one of her rear legs, needing intensive reconstructive surgery requiring 3 metal plates to be inserted just to hold her ankle together! This has been followed by 3 visits per week for bandage changes, xrays, swabs and lab reports and complete cage rest at home for the last 10 weeks.

She obviously misses the 4 hour naps between meals in the garden under her favourite bush but she is adapting and has learned that the medication alarm usually means more food or treats to go with the tablets.

She still has a long way to go to hopefully save her leg but throughout she has never complained, meowed or hissed in anger or frustration once.

This has been largely due to the absolutely excellent care she has received at James Horner Vets which is greatly appreciated by all. We also greatly appreciate the purchase of the Silver Subscription too which has been a tremendous help.