Leg splint for small dogs

DISCLAIMER: That is not an approved medical product. But it helped a lot in the individual healing process of my yorki puppy. Saved us a very expensive surgery. Use it in your own responsibility!

My Yorkshire Terrier puppy had a broken front paw. All four middle paw bones were broken in a very straight and clean way.

Our vet improvised a brace, but our puppy managed to pull it off in no time.

So we came up with that design. We integrated some features to make the brace versatile:
- flat part to walk on
- reinforced sides
- Openings where velcro strips can be attached
- a slot on the top to attach a fixation, that the brace does not slip off the leg
- riffles to make the wrapping stay better

In the beginning the puppy was about 1kg and after 7 weeks of being in the cast the puppy had about 1.7kg... her leg grew quite a bit in that time. So I kept scaling the print every couple weeks up in the slicer (CURA).

I brought a selection of prints in various sizes to the vet to get it professionally put on. The vet was amazed how well that worked. The puppy was supposed to be held still for several weeks in a box, but that is almost impossible. With that splint the puppy could even walk with it (even though she should not).

The vet used medical cotton around the leg (also between the toes), then the brace, then wrapped it in stretchy medical wrap (also around her body that it does not slip).

Our puppy's paw healed perfectly!

DISCLAIMER: That is not an approved medical product. But it helped a lot in the individual healing process of my yorki puppy. Saved us a very expensive surgery. Use it in your own responsibility!

I printed in PLA.

Layer height does not matter that much, in order to make it less rough (less rubbing), I printed from 0.1 to 0.25mm height.

Infill is I used 20%...

You will need supports. Make sure the supports are on the outside of the splint.