ethamolin 5%

Hi john b,

I'm sorry mate but I'm not going to be able to provide much in the way of the type of advice you are looking for in relation to strengthening the area where the split under the toe is occurring by injecting a sclerosing agent into that area.

Main reason being is that I have seen a very well known and capable Vet do this to a number of greyhounds with little success, and have also seen this tried by various trainers over the years again with an extremely poor success rate. In one instance I noted that the efforts of the trainer resulted in a large lump of scar tissue under the toe that caused discomfort to the dog from that time on.

The real problem is that the split in the tissue under the upper part of the toe is not caused by sand, but by the toe flexor tendon having been damaged. It then behaves like a bowstring and cuts the tissue from the inside out.

Laying down scar tissue in the skin above the tendon to make it more difficult for that to cut the skin is not always going to work under those circumstances, due to the skin under the foot being stretched tight over that area as the dogs foot takes the running pressure, and also because in most instances the toes are being flexed backwards further than normal.

The reason that the toes are being flexed backwards is because the calf muscles that are supposed to contract the toes during the appropriate part of the dogs stride, which should then curl the toes so that the tips of the toes and the nails dig into the ground, are no longer doing their job.
The end result being that the the skin under each toe is then pressed onto the sand instead of the toe pads and nails.

This also causes the toe tendons to become overstretched increasing the likelihood of a split under the toe just in front of the main foot pad. It is also more inclined to occur to the second toe in from the inside of the foot because with many greyhounds the inside toe on the foot is often quite short and the second toe is often the longest toe. It therefore take more strain than the other toes on the foot.

Solutions?

That is a real dilemma because the method of injecting a sclerosing agent has from what I have seen a poor success rate.

The late Alex Hauler who I considered one of the most astute and innovative of all the specialised greyhound Veterinarians I have known, experimented with several options and decided that removing the webbing between the two central toes was the only sure way of negating the problem as this removed the tension from the skin around the toes thus stopping it from being cut due to tendon pressure.

Drastic? Yes I know but it actually worked quite well except it the meant having to run the greyhound with a soft elastic band around the front half of the two main toes just behind the toe pads as a support for the toes because the webbing was no longer there to do that job.

The other option is a long term one, and that is to get the calf muscles back working as they should by massaging those muscles with a stimulating liniment such as Iodised oil, and using a muscle contractor or TENS on the appropriate muscle section to stimulate toe flexion to strengthen those muscles.
In addition to that it is also necessary to massage the tendons at the back of the hock as well as under the toes.

While I would certainly recommend this as ultimately the best long term solution particularly for young dogs, unfortunately it is likely to take three or four weeks of treatments before any results are likely to be achieved.

If however you wish to try the injection method, firstly you need to be absolutely sure that the skin has healed fully to avoid the sclerosing agent from breaking through the skin and causing further problems.
Then inject 1/20th of a ml at 5mm centres along both sides of the healed split from 5mm out from the centre of the healed split injecting towards the split. All of this is best done using a 1 ml or a 1/2 ml insulin syringe.

The idea being that the major part of the injection spreads out in the area of the weakness, with some of the substance filtering back through to where the needle penetrated the skin and so provide a type of webbing effect.

Allow ten days before running the greyhound and placing the area under stress again.

Cheers,
Tom