? Does this incision site look okay?

My civvie recently had surgery for a pyometra, which I posted about the other day. I've finally gotten a good look at her incision and now I'm questioning whether it's healing okay or not. Surgery was Saturday afternoon. I'm most concerned about the last stitch, and it looks a tiny bit tinged yellow, so although I havent seen any drainage, I'm concerned there may have been some.

You guys have all been amazingly supportive through all of this, thank you

http://imgur.com/a/YAyMfaP

 

It looks good to me, but understand I am not a vet. Only a human cna, You can expect a certain amount of drainage. Does it have a bad smell?? is the site overly warm.. mind the fact that cats temp runs higher than ours. I see no overt redness nor swelling so as a whole to me it is looking good and should heal well.

 

Looks good to me too, no redness, no swelling

 

I also agree that it looks fine.

 

I wish I could see your picture, but I can't. Oh doh! Here it is. Looks great--no swelling, redness, discharge. Her belly doesn't look as if it's tender; it looks nice and floppy. Eating/drinking OK? If eating not back to normal yet, is it improving? How about walking? Caution, just a retired human MD here! Is kitty's activity level OK/gradually improving? All the best love to U both

 

http://imgur.com/a/iM0kduO

What do you think of it now, got this picture today. Her skin surrounding looks a little more red, and when I took that picture she was licking the surrounding skin, but not the incision itself. I plan on putting the cone on tonight though because I think that's where we will be headed soon.

 

http://imgur.com/a/iM0kduO

What do you guys think of it now, got this picture today. Her skin surrounding looks a little more red, and when I took that picture she was licking the surrounding skin, but not the incision itself. I plan on putting the cone on tonight though because I think that's where we will be headed soon.

 

Hi Chloe the Human, I just now saw your other post about Chloe the Cat, poor girl! I am glad that the surgery went well.

With the same disclaimer that I am not a vet nor any kind of medical professional, it still looks ok to me for what I can see in the photos, although the pics are a little dark.

However, *IF* the cone doesn't stress her out too much, that might help put your mind at ease and certainly can't hurt her healing. When our civvie Molly was spayed as a kitten, she had a very rare reaction to the actual sutures, and it looked WAY angrier than this, she actually had to go back in to surgery after 3 days to have them redone. It was bright red at every point where the suture went in, bright pink and splotches on the skin all around the incision itself, and all of the bright pink skin actually felt hot to the touch. You could feel Chloe the Cat really carefully and see how it feels. But if you aren't getting discharge, it doesn't feel hot, the skin itself looks pretty normal and there isn't a lot of discharge or swelling, I think you are ok.

But I'd suggest running it by your vet in the morning, that is a perfectly reasonable after-care question for them. If you don't already have their email address, maybe just call their front desk and see if you can email/text the photos to the vet to look at, and then ask them to get back with you to see if they have any concerns and want you to bring her in?

Hopes for continued healing for Chloe the Cat, and for peace of mind for you

 

Thank you Sandi! I did actually try to send her vet a picture, but for some reason I wasn't able to email a picture, it keeps failing. I did however describe it to her by saying "It's not perfect, it's a little red, a little swollen, her surrounding skin is red at times but that comes and goes, and a small amount of scabbing is starting to appear" and they basically said what you did, as long as there's no discharge, it's not extremely swollen or hot, it should be okay.

Chloe is doing much better today so it's making me feel more confident about her healing. She's been getting back into her old routine and we're having to stop her from trying to jump around. I tried coning her...it didn't go well. When I finally did get it on, she managed to turn it into a skirt and that made me nervous because of her scar so I just decided to leave it off unless she gets bad about it. So far she will just try licking the surrounding skin a bit, but I'm always around to stop her.

Poor Molly had to have surgery twice?! Oh man, that's a bummer. That's exactly what I fear happening with Chloe, I just wish she knew that's why I'm forcing antibiotics down her throat and annoying her when she tries to clean herself lol.

 

Excellent. That all sounds like good news to me. (Except having to pill, I know that sucks).

Molly was a cone escape artist as well, we ended up having to put a baby onesie on her instead because she was actually pulling out the stitches (the first set, before we knew she was actually having a reaction...poor baby was trying to tell us something )

So as long as you are watching her and she isn’t pulling on the stitches, she should be fine. Plus you’ve got almost a full week of healing so far, so she is well on her way.

Head bumps to Chloe and hugs to you