Assistive Technology For A Pet With Severe Disabilities? by Joan Curtiss, Advocate

One day, we took our beloved cat, Ash, to the vet for surgery and he ended up with severe disabilities. The vet was cutting off the top part of his leg because the bone had died. Ash was in pain and his leg and muscles were wasting away. The vet had warned me that it might be cancer, and the entire leg might have to come off.

Something went wrong with Ash in or after the surgery. Maybe it was a reaction to the medications or anesthesia, maybe it was a stroke, but Ash was not waking up, was spiking high fevers, couldn't walk, see, or hear. He survived.... barely... remaining in intensive care on intravenous meds, food and water for a few weeks. I visited daily, pressing my lips to the top of his soft furry head and whispering loving words of encouragement.

Trying to prepare for the disability, I went on-line and looked up pet disability information. I found several sites with makeshift wheelchairs for dogs, cats, and even rabbits whose back legs were paralyzed. I also found an assistive device, the Walkabout, for animals who are having trouble standing and walking, a fleece lined velcro coat with straps for the pet owner to hold up so that an animal can be assisted with standing and bearing weight, a variation on the prone standers and walkers I have seen for children and adults with disabilities.

They let me carry him from the cage to an empty room where I stroked him and massaged him. I put him in the Walkabout standing device but he just limply hung there. My son suggested we let him try to get up on his own and despite the awkward slipping on the linoleum, he stood up on his own and took a few steps before collapsing.

Eventually we were able to take him home. We modified the litter box by cutting one opening as low as we could with a kitchen steak knife. We bought Luv's diapers size 2 and cut a hole for Ash's tail. We purchased a kid gate to keep Ash protected from our other animals and to secure him in one part of the house so he didn't fall down the basement stairs. We bought a hamster bottle and put it on the side of his cage so he could lick water and he wouldn't drown in his water dish. Ash wasn't interested in the hamster bottle or the dish and was getting dehydrated, so we found a small nursing bottle and put water and sometimes kitty milk without lactose in it, which he lapped down. As Ash's walking ability progressed, he began slipping on the wood floors much like Bambi in the Disney movie, so we pulled up the hall carpeting and placed it from his cage to the living room carpet so that he could grip better on his path from his bed to the front sun room, his favorite roost.

Ash is still blind, however, some of his hearing has come back. He no longer wears the kitty diapers and has figured out where his litter box is (give or take a few inches). The surgery on Ash's femur was successful, not cancerous, removing only 2 inches at the top of his leg because of an old fracture. He slips and slides when he walks around the house, but it's only been a few weeks and he is back to grooming himself, purring, and generally being a cat and part of our family. People ask me why I don't "put him down", but I see that he has great moments of contentment and satisfaction and that we can modify some things to make his life more livable.

For Ash Kitty, just like for many of us in the human world with disabilities, some accommodations are pretty much common sense and don't always have to involve high tech solutions to be effective in making life more comfortable. Sometimes we can overcome disability barriers to keep our pets at home. They are part of our family and community who improve the quality of our lives by bringing us love and joy.