Surgery Day

So today was the big day, and so far the news is positive. After staying overnight at the clinic and being hooked up with the IV, Chester went in for surgery today to remove his two outside toes on his hind leg. X-rays taken before his surgery showed that his organs are still in the right place from his first surgery, so that is good. There is a bit of scarring on his lungs, but that is not unexpected as part of his lung tissue was removed last time. X-rays on his foot also showed that his bones were not affected by the necrosis, so that is also good news. During today's surgery Chester's blood pressure was a little low but it stayed above 60, which is decent but not great. In his first surgery it had dropped to 30, which obviously had some serious consequences. The surgeon said she could have removed just one bone from each affected toe, but since there was not very much skin tissue left around the second bone in order for it to heal properly, she elected to remove the second bone from each affected toe as well. His two middle toes remain intact and his middle metatarsal pad was shaved a bit to remove the dead tissue and allow for new healthy tissue to grow back over the pad. They are continuing to monitor him at Cat's Only to ensure his blood pressure is stabilized and he will be released either tonight or tomorrow morning. We're not out of the woods yet, but he made it over this first hurdle. Thank you to everyone who helped make this possible! More to come later.