Lucky lucky with plastic surgery
In a case of canine cosmetic surgery, a dog named Lucky has lived up to her name, thanks to
Deerfield Beach, Fla., animal ophthalmologist Susan Carastro.
Lucky is a 9-1/2 year old – that’s 66-1/2 to you and me – golden retriever who was recently diagnosed with glaucoma. The impaired eye had to go, though, and rather than leave the poor girl with a mostly empty socket, the doctor surgically implanted a silicone ball.
The South Florida Sun-Sentinel’s Sallie James reported the story and informed that such plastic surgery operations for animals are becoming much more common. Carastro is one of 260 animal eye specialists in the country, and “Veterinarians at her practice implanted 25 prosthetic eyes in 2006, mostly in dogs.”
Southfield, Mich.-based Jardon Eye Prosthetics Inc. (really) ships out some fifteen to twenty animal eyes daily across the United States and overseas, according to the story. A Jardonian is quoted as saying, “It’s big business. It’s very surprising. A lot of people don’t realize accidents happen to animals, or they get cancer … We send them out for horses, cows, cats and dogs and make them as small as 10 mm, maybe for a guinea pig or bird.”
Lucky’s procedure cost about $300.
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