CAMARILLO : Dog on Wheels Gets New Lease on Life

Friends advised Naomi Balfour to put her miniature dachshund to sleep after the dog suffered a ruptured disc that paralyzed its hind legs 15 months ago.

But Balfour, a 73-year-old resident of the Leisure Village retirement community in Camarillo, couldn’t bring herself to follow their suggestion.

“She’s so happy and healthy otherwise,” Balfour said of the dog, called Charlie Girl. “How could I have put her to sleep just because her legs don’t work?”

After surgery failed to cure the paralysis, Balfour’s son, Jeff Hoffman, devised a way to help the 5-year-old dog move freely.

Hoffman, an auto mechanic at a Ventura dealership, welded aluminum rods into a frame with a semicircular top that arches over the animal’s backside like a misplaced halo.

A nylon camera strap harnesses the animal’s chest to the metal frame, while two casters attached to the bottom of the rods give the carriage mobility.

For added comfort, Balfour tied an old mink collar to the frame to support the dog’s stomach.

When Charlie Girl is in her carriage, she can play fetch, chase rabbits and keep up with Balfour’s other pet, a cairn terrier called Angus.

Off the carriage, the dachshund moves slowly, dragging her hind legs behind her.

Hoffman said he got the idea for the carriage from a magazine picture of a similar contraption.

Some of Balfour’s elderly neighbors said they are amused and inspired by the sight of the dog on wheels.

“I thought it was great,” said Bob Atz, 69, who has been on crutches all his life because of a spinal cord injury he suffered as an infant.

“It’s making the best of a bad situation,” Atz said. “That’s important.”