I brought in a rescue/foster 18m/o Border Collie 4 weeks ago who was unable to sit after 3 days of coming into my house. He came to me tick free but had hundreds of Northern California coastal ticks covering him when he came to the shelter. He also came into rescue with pneumonia so we were unable to get an x-ray to confirm our initial suspicions of being hit by a car. 3 weeks later we gave him an x-ray during his neuter and he showed signs of osteoarthritis and osteoporosis, we initially thought maybe malnutrition, poor blood flow, auto-immune or congenital, we never had a known Lyme’s disease dog come through our rescue, so Lyme’s didn’t come to mind until I posted my previous question about osteoarthritis and osteoporosis in young dogs. We are now treating Hops with Doxy for Lyme’s based off of symptoms and history. Prior to starting formal treatment within a week of coming into my house he was able to sit, jump and run we were treating his pneumonia with Baytril. Within the past few days we had 2 10-12 week old puppies with “100′s of ticks” covering them, we are treating those guys with Doxy as a precaution.

Now to my question, has anyone here ever had a dog who had Lyme’s disease/ Infectious Arthritis? Did your dog make a full recovery (joint tissue repaired over time) or was the damage just frozen in place once treated. Will this effect quality of life later on?
Centrum Silver Multivitamins 1/2 were started within a day of entering rescue. Joint supplements were started the day we saw the x-ray and I assume will need them for life, other suggestions I will be giving to the adopters is a good grain/corn free diet, weight maintenance program, therapeutic swimming and informal therapeutic massages to increase circulation.

When the vet saw the x-ray Vet she said there is a less than 50% chance joint damage might recover… but that was before the infectious arthritis dx.
Profile for Hops: http://bcr.w2c.net/gallery/hops.php