Scout is a nearly 14 year old, spayed female Cocker Spaniel that has been a long time patient of Pismo Beach Vet. She came in for an ear infection and had some mild redness in her left eye. On closer inspection, we realized that she actually had luxation of her lens in that eye. Lens luxation is when the lens, which is normally anchored in the center of the eye behind the pupil, moves out of position. This is a very serious condition that can rapidly result in increased pressure in the eye, called glaucoma.
Sure enough, we checked Scout’s eye pressure and found it to be extremely high in the left eye. Unfortunately, when this happens, it rapidly becomes very painful. We recommended that Scout have her left eye removed.
As you might imagine, this came as quite a shock to Scout’s owners. It is an extremely difficult decision but we always council owners that pets do really well with one or both eyes removed. In fact, when that eye is a source of severe pain, many of them feel much better after the operation than before. Dogs and cats have such finely tuned senses of hearing and smell, that loss of all or a part of their vision is often not even noticed right away by their owners.
Scouts parents elected to have the surgery and we are happy to report that Scout is doing great! She went home the same day as the surgery and by the time she had her stitches out two weeks later, you would never know that anything had happened We think that her missing eye only adds to her charm and character!
