My patients, My life

     In my new practice I meet new folks every day.  What a great pleasure it is to feel so welcome  in a new community over 600 miles from the place I knew as home for most of my life. I meet people from all walks in life; retired folks near the beach, school teachers, foresters, craftsmen for all sorts of disciplines, medical professionals and you name it.  So many nice people, all very eager to share local facts and lore with me.  According to my staff of two, this is why I stay behind in my appointment schedule.  No worries, to me it is just part of what I do.  And it’s very enjoyable.

     Last week I spent a considerable amount of time with another new acquaintance and, as you can probably guess, it is covered in fur or feathers.  “Hootie” is a male Great Horned Owl and is the first of his kind I have ever formally met. He found his way to the clinic because of a fracture in his wing.  Most of the owls are injured or killed flying low across the highways at night.  They appear out of the darkness and are hit before a motorist can even recognize the impending collision.

     “Hootie” didn’t complete his last trip across the Scenic Coastal Biway. A car swatted him from the air but he was rescued quickly and transported to a veterinarian near the scene who taped up his wing and notified Chris at FWMA.  She arranged for the forty mile transport and called to tell me what she knew about the case.  After his arrival she  initiated supportive  therapy to stabilize his condition and get him strong enough for surgical repair of his wing. 

     The following morning Hootie came a calling.  I have to admit, this bird is downright gorgeous. Aside from his bummed wing, there didn’t appear to be a feather out of place. And, it absolutely amazes me how these big birds with all those strong pointy things on their feet and that sharp beak will just melt in you hand if you talk to them gently and scratch their head.  They relax and close their eyes and I am sure they would moan if they could. It is impossible for me to admire this creature and not want to do everything we can to give him back his life and freedom.

     Kathy and I radiographed his wing without any objection from Hootie.  He stood on top of his carrier and watched nonchalantly as I viewed his x-ray and made plans to attempt to repair his fractured radius and ulna. I

Hootie's Fractured Radius and Ulna

elected to put an external fixator on the bone.  An external fixator allows us to stabilize a fracture by inserting two or more small stainless steel pins transversly through the bone on each side of the fracture. We then align the fracture site and connect these pins with a bar to hold everything firmly while the fracture heals.  It sounds a bit complex but a picture will make it easier to understand my description.

     “Hootie” was anesthesized and his surgery went as well as I could have hoped for. The largest bone of the two in that part of the wing is the ulna. We normally try to repair the ulna and in so doing align the smaller radius so that it may heal properly as well.  After all of the pins and connecting bar are in place we will normally take radiographs to check for alignment of the bone and if necessary adjust the appliance before we tighten it all and recover the patient. This inter-operative radiograph shows the ulna in very good alignment and the radius is not quite end to end.  To correct this we simply feel the ends of the misaligned bones through the skin and gently manipulate them into place.  After that we cut the  pins off even with the bar so that they don’t stick out and when we were satisfied that all was well we woke up “Hootie”.

The External Fixator is Visable on Hootie's Wing

     “Hootie” is about one week post op as I write this.  He is making nice progress with his wing.  His appetite is great, no sign of infection and, of course, he is still beautiful.  In about two weeks we will x-ray his wing to evaluate his progress and I will give you an update. He won’t be the last Great Horned Owl that I meet but he will always be remembered as the first.  I hope some day soon I can post up his release video for you to enjoy.

"Real Tree" camo pattern!