Little Lillian back on her paws after being hit by car

When little Lillian was hit by a car, not only did she come painfully close to losing her life – she also found herself in need of a new home.

The 10-year-old miniature pinscher was lucky to survive the accident and was brought into our Victoria animal hospital in London with a badly injured leg.

It turned out she had dislocated her elbow in the trauma so our vets pushed it back into the joint, but it continued to repeatedly slip out.

Surgery was the only way to mend things, and screws were used to fix her bones together in the operation carried out by orthopaedic vet Nigel Smith.

He said: "She had dislocated her elbow, we had tried on more than one occasion to put it back in its place but it wouldn’t stay. What I had to do was build an internal stabiliser across her elbow to keep it in place. The bones were fitting into the socket, but there was too much play around the bones to allow them to stay put.

"We put two screws on either side of the elbow - one in the upper arm and another in the top bit of the lower arm and, around the screws, we placed a nylon suture to then hold the elbow in place."

Nigel added: "She was pretty amazing, for such a little dog she did very well."

At this stage, all Lillian was probably dreaming of was getting back home and being showered with TLC while she recovered from her horrific ordeal.

But this adorable girl was about to be dealt yet another blow.

Given up

While she was on the operating table, Lillian’s owners decided to leave her with Blue Cross as they could no longer keep her - it transpired they had been trying to give the poor lady up for some time.

But never would this sparky soul let a run of bad luck like that get her down – no sooner had she come round from surgery, than her lovable spirit was winning the hearts of our hospital team.

After getting well on the road to recovery, she travelled to our rehoming centre in Northiam, East Sussex, in what would hopefully be her first step towards a happier life and a forever home.

Little trooper

At first, she couldn’t bear any weight on her poorly leg. But, thanks to her determination and the patient efforts of our Northiam team, Lillian was soon back on all four paws.

Animal Welfare Assistant Caroline Oram said: “She’s doing really well. We’ve been taking her on a few little walks throughout the day as part of her rehabilitation.”

The diminutive dog has now had her stitches out and it won’t be long before she’s ready to go to a new family.

In the meantime, she has become a popular fixture in the centre’s reception area, and likes to curl up in a tiny cat bed between cuddles and playtime with our team.

“It’s amazing she survived,” said Caroline. “She loves people, and everyone that has met her falls in love with her.  She’s a little trooper, she’s adorable.”

Let's hope Lillian will find the happy ending she deserves soon.