I have been writing about a cat called Maisie for the last two weeks - Maisie suffered horrible back leg injuries resulting in the amputation of one back leg and slow wound healing on the remaining leg. I had been explaining how long it took for her skin wounds to heal as there was so much tissue loss. At last, nearly six weeks after the original accident, Maisie has stopped having to come back for dressing changes and as far as I am aware she is doing well. Recovery from this sort of major trauma can be slow and, purely practically speaking, expensive. Bandages have to be kept dry, clean and in place – this is not always easy – which is why we were so lucky that Maisie was a good, amenable patient.

There are a lot of situations where a good natured patient makes our job much easier.

At our surgery there are two of us vets that use acupuncture to treat our patients when indicated. Acupuncture can be useful in cases of lameness, back pain, hip pain and much more.

Cats and dogs actually tolerate acupuncture surprisingly well (the needles are much thinner than the usual injection needles that we use).

Once the needles are in place they generally have to stay in situ for five to ten minutes which can be a challenge for the more fidgety patients.

Luckily acupuncture will often make patients a little sleepy which is helpful when trying to get them to sit still. I would say that over the years only a handful of patients have not tolerated acupuncture at all whereas I have seen a significant number tolerate it well and be markedly improved by the treatment.