The other day one of my colleagues called me to say happy birthday (I will not tell you how old I am though). She told me a story about a recent CPD she attended, it was rather more like clinical club then CPD. They have incited a vet to give them a talk about the diagnosis and treatment of Patellar luxation in the dog. During the talk, one of the vets (the older in the group), raised his hand and said that he does not understand what is the fuss about this condition. For all his years in practice he just removed the patellae and all his dogs did fine. He also added that he never understood what the patella was actually for. What struck me was not that someone uses a treatment that I can not comprehend and never heard of (I may be ignorant and this might be acceptable, at least was in the old days), but the fact that no one could give him an explanation about the patella, which is a sesamoid bone, therefore the explanation goes with this definition.

My question is, am I alone? and I would be very interested to understand how the hell one can just remove the patella without causing a permanent damage to the patellar ligament, the quadriceps and the whole mechanism?