Delci's Story - A Tale of a Tail

What does a cat do without its tail? To some cats, their tail is their pride and joy, something to groom every hair into place, wrap around peoples legs and touch everything as they saunter by. The tail of a cat also serves an important purpose for balance as they swish it delicately back and forth. Of course a cat with a "wagging" tail is one to steer clear of because it means they are ready to pounce or becoming very upset! A cats tail can also be the last body part to be grabbed or caught as a feline narrowly escapes, leaving one of its 9 Lives behind. Therefore injuries such as bite wounds or lacerations to the tail and back ends of cats are common indicating that the cat was running from its attacker.

Delci is a cat that had a beautiful tail. She loved to be outside and hunt, bringing home headless presents to her family and leaving them by the door. One evening her owner noticed some blood on the porch and assumed it was from Delci's latest victim. When Delci was nowhere to be found at dinner time the family was worried. They found her hiding and bleeding from her tail, having difficulty walking and not herself at all. Delci was rushed to WSU on emergency to be treated for trauma of unknown origin. She was x-rayed and given fluids and pain medications for shock. Her tail had sustained a severe degloving injury. She did not have any fractures and responded well to her initial treatments.

Degloving is a description used for traumatic injuries in which the skin is peeled off of underlying tissues. Imagine removing a tight glove (the skin) from your hand leaving behind everything underneath. This type of injury commonly occurs on the legs and tail where there is not much padding (fat or subcutaneous tissue) beneath the skin and loss of the skin exposes underlying tendons, muscles, bones and joints. Many times these vital soft tissues are also damaged from the inciting trauma. Animals hit by cars sustain these injuries when the tail or limb is rolled under a tire. Lacerations can deglove if the skin is caught and torn or peeled back as by wire or rope. The challenge in treating a degloving wound is that there is typically limited skin available to close the wound and the areas without skin can be extensive.

The tail degloving that Delci had sustained had removed all skin and soft tissue off her tail, leaving only her exposed tail bones or caudal vertebrae. The only option for such a severe degloving was amputation of her tail. The remaining tissues were becoming necrotic or dying and would soon start to make Delci sick. What was left of her tail was wrapped and she was transferred to our clinic for surgery.

Delci was not a very happy patient when she arrived. She growled and did not want to be touched especially on the back. We did not blame her!
After she was anesthetized we unwrapped the tail (see picture) and knew amputation was the only choice. The injury extended all the way to her tailhead leaving little skin to close. The exposed bones of the tail were discolored from exposure and infection was present in the dying tissue. Surgery involved separating her tail vertebrae between damaged and healthy tissue to remove her tail forever. She was left with only 2 caudal vertebrae; a "stump" of a tail. In order to close the defect left after all the injured tissue was taken, skin was stretched down from the top of her back. Small sutures were placed under the stretched skin to hold it in its new position (called walking sutures), a drain was placed for fluid to escape as the wound healed and the skin came together perfectly over her new short tail.
Delcis recovery was uneventful except for adjustment to life in an E-collar. For an active hunting cat this was a great insult! The collar was imperative though as cats will groom sutures and drains out very quickly. She adapted to indoor life for 2 weeks of healing and did very well. When her sutures were removed she was sticking her stump in the air and prancing as if that beautiful plume was still following her. Her family had not noticed any change in her ability to jump or balance. She had healed completely, or so it seemed…
About a month after the tail amputation, Delci's owners noticed a hard lump on her abdomen. She was active and eating well with no signs of pain or discomfort. Her stumpy tail was growing lovely patches of black and white fur. Palpation of her abdomen revealed a smooth round swelling about the size of a large egg. Could she have developed a hernia, and abscess or a seroma? Because of the history of rear end trauma and the swelling appearing so round and smooth, a hernia had to be ruled out first. This was done by ultrasound and aspiration of the mass. The mass was well contained in the subcutaneous tissue of her belly and contained a clear to yellowish fluid with no cells or pus. Her bladder was happily visible within her abdomen and contained normal dark yellow urine. The mass filled up quickly after being drained and the decision was made to take her to surgery.
Exploration of the area of the mass revealed damaged fat and subcutaneous tissue that had become walled off in the healing process and was collecting normal tissue fluid. The large pocket was resected and taken out and a smaller pocket nearby was opened and a drain placed through. So poor Delci once again was sutured with a drain and an e-collar and put on 2 weeks of indoor restrictions. Her family gave her plenty of TLC and also once again, she healed beautifully by the time the drain and sutures were removed. She went back to her normal active cat life and her owners were cautiously optimistic that this was the last of her vet bills!!!
Cats are given those proverbial 9 Lives for a reason. How many does Delci have left? Losing a tail, and then some, probably counts for at least two!