Laurie's Blogs.

Hi Laurie,

I saw a soft-coated wheaten terrier yesterday that had an incident of non weight bearing lameness in a front limb. He is an agility dog and really well conditioned. Treatment has gone well. Yesterday he seemed at first fully weight bearing. After inspecting more closely and on the Stance Analyzer he was not fully weight bearing on his RF. Anyway, finally I figured out that his first rib was very painful on palpation and I guess I did a little bit of a mobilization at the same time. He was quite tender on both sides.
I was thinking because it was both sides that were tender, that there might be a degenerative disc issue. What would be your thoughts on a case like this, with both sides tender compared to one side only?
It would be great to hear your thought on this one!
Cheers,
A.

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Hi A.,

So... there is always a chance when you have bilateral rib issues / pain, that you have a disc problem.  If the pain on the ribs is exaggerated AND you find pain with either side glide of C7 or transverse pressures on T1 then you think about the potential of a disc lesion.  If you can assess whether there is a position difference (or rib 1) from side to side... then it could be straight forward rib… or rather two rib dysfunctions (one on each side).

If I think it could be a disc... then I would try just a grade 2 or 3 mob on the rib... and C7 + T1.  If you can make the tenderness go away... then you didn't have a disc.  If the tenderness remains or seems to flare up a little - then you think disc and proceed to do neck traction in combination with your rib & spine mobs (but now just at a grade 1 or 2 level).

Bottom line is that you don't know.  You have to learn more by actually treating it as one or the other.

Cheers,

Laurie