Hi,

I'm glad that your poodle is doing so well. Bone plates are a great way to fix a fracture in a lot of cases. The bone plate allows the bone ends to stay aligned and prevent rotational or other forces from acting on the bone while healing. There are a few schools of thought regarding removal of the plate. Most veterinary surgeons will tell you to leave the plate alone unless it is causing trouble. Potential complications include screw migration, bone infection, skin infections and disuse osteopenia (bone weakening if the affected bone is not subjected to the normal forces of walking, etc). I would have the plate radiographed (xrayed) and if there are no lesions on the xrays around the screw holes and things look well healed, I'd leave it alone. I wouldn't worry about it unless the dog becomes lame, has a skin infection in the area or it looks red, hot or swollen. There is no reason absent these signs to remove the plate.

I hope this is helpful. Please let me know if you have more questions.