Dealing with devastating pet injuries!

I've been through my share of injuries, even one of them was life threatening. Having an injury or illness sure isn't fun, but there are lots of folks out there doing amazingly, wonderful things to help us pups recover, get back to our great lives, and live a longer and happier life.

This fella to the left? That's Tripp. After alerting his family to a fire in the house, Tripp, a three-legged dog, received the Golden Retriever Club of America’s G.R.A.C.E. award, given to rescued goldens with significant and exceptional accomplishments.

Here's a great story we found on MSNBC.com:

Dealing with devastating pet injuries.

Spared euthanasia, animals can overcome adversity surprisingly well

By Kim Campbell Thornton
MSNBC contributor

A man followed a trail of blood that led beneath his house. There he found a cat, skinny and full of fleas, that had been shot in the leg. He took the stray to a veterinarian, where the initial decision was to euthanize the animal.

“I had just given him a tranquilizer and when I sat by his cage, talking to him, he started purring and licking my hand, so I asked the doctor if he could try to save him instead,” says veterinary technician Randi Golub, of Eugene, Ore. “He had to have one of his legs amputated because it had been shattered by the gunshot.”

Golub cared for the cat as he slowly regained health and eventually adopted him. Now three years later, Cassidy climbs to the top of his cat tree with as much agility as Golub’s four-legged cats.

Historically, most animals like Cassidy were euthanized without much of a second thought, under the rationalization that their lives wouldn't be worth living minus a leg or an eye. Today, while there are no hard statistics on how many pets undergo surgeries such as amputation or removal of an eye instead of euthanasia, veterinarians say there's more discussion about and use of other options.

Part of the reason is that modern advances in rehabilitation techniques, pain management and cancer therapy have contributed to the successful treatment of dogs and cats with devastating injuries and other disfiguring diseases and conditions.

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