Update - baby chick dislocated hip - PICS

[janjan1]

last year I had a chick that got stepped on by one of my horses. It broke the knee joint. I splinted the leg as best I could and he hobbled around with it after a period of getting use to it. But I had to secure the top parts of both legs together to keep that bum leg from going to the side rather than in a natural gait. I found that by doing that, it kept the bum leg in a natural stance. Perhaps you could try that. I now have a grown hen with a broken leg. It is broken clean thru but it is broken below the kinee and above the foot. Much better at splinting. She is healing in a nice roomy cage with a good view of all the daily activity.
Jan

 

[katiek]

Sounds like it's worth a shot. Thanks so much!!

 

[katiek]

Okay, so I splinted the leg with a bent Q-tip so it is in a bent position. This helps the knee from popping out, but it seems there is a problem with the hip.

The hip is red and seems to be dislocated.

Poor baby, what do I do?

 

[janjan1]

Well I don't have much of an answer for that, other than keep the leg splinted, in line with the other one so the broken thigh/leg/hip joint doesn't swing wildly to the side. If it is thrown to the side it may ofset the forward movement making any walking ackward & unsteady. Unbalanced it may not be able to ambulate at all. BUT as with anything young, they want to MOVE. So just splint and hope for the best. After all the young adapt to anything. You often see crippled chicks who do make it as adults and thrive dispite a broken limb or other injuries.
Jan

 

[jywel417]

Hello

I am fairly new to chickens but have worked at a vet for years. I recently was given a buff orpington chick that came from the hatchery with a bum leg. She would just hold the leg straight out to the side fully extended and sleep with the leg sticking out to the side. We could pop the hip back into place but her hip socket is so shallow the leg would pop right back out. Here is a link to my post/inquiry that show what her leg was doing

https://www.backyardchickens.com/forum/viewtopic.php?id=156128

We treated it like spraddles since we dont have anything to loose and figured it was worth a shot. If you think there is something wrong with the hip then there isn't a whole lot that splinting will help and trying to wrap the leg in place against the body could just be tricky. There is a good page on BYC somewhere that has lots of pics for treating legs with spraddles and here is the other page I came across first:

http://www.poultryhelp.com/spraddle.html

Even though only one of my chicks legs was affected we still treated it like spraddles but can already tell a difference and we just wrapped her leg this morning. Good luck and keep us posted !!!!

 

[camillusb]

thank you for your pics and reply on the spraddle legs!! I recently had chicks last week and I believe one has this for 2 days...and not quite sure on what to do or what is best!!