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chelsey | 4 years ago
Addisons Disease???

My 4 year old Lab has been sick since Thursday. She wouldn’t eat, threw up bile, has diarrhea and just wasn’t herself, I took her to her vet Friday afternoon unfortunately they were closing, they gave her some fluid and medicine to calm her stomach, and sent us home with some medicine and a canned food.. They said if she wasn’t improving in 24 hours to take her to the emergency room for a full work up Unfortunately, we had to take her in on Sunday, after some test and after 3 day they told us she is finally eating a small amount and her stool is thicker and not bloody anymore. Her protein is low they did a ultrasound of her stomach and said everything looked normal but her adrenal glands are small so they are now testing her for Addisons disease. I tried to do some research but cant figure much out, does anyone have any information or has had a pet with Addisons disease? Is it common for a 4 year old healthy dog to start showing symptoms?
I just want my baby home!!! thank you!

1 Response

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  1. Krista Magnifico

    Hello,
    It sounds like you are getting a thorough work up and moving in the direction of some answers.
    I have treated quite a few Addisonians and once diagnosed and started on treatment most do very well. If you have any questions or concerns ask for an internal medicine referral and go from there. Good luck. I hope she is feeling better soon.

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Najiha | 4 years ago
My Cat Has An Aural Haematoma Cause By Head Shaking (no Earmites And No Infection) But …

My cat has an aural haematoma caused by head shaking (no earmites and no infection) but i am really worried about both options of either leaving it alone or having it surgically removed as both have risks of disfiguring his ear.
Which option will be better cosmetically for him?
Thank you

4 Responses

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  1. Sarah

    In my experience (with one of our dogs) it went away after the body had time to reabsorb it. Took some time, but we decided on a “wait and see”. I recall during that discussion with the vet that many times after draining with surgery, they do return. After it was reabsorbed, the ear was back to normal. Hope this was helpful.????????

    1. Najiha Post author

      It was helpful! Thank you! Was the haematoma on your dog big (filled the hole ear) or like medium sized like mine?

  2. Krista Magnifico

    Hello,
    Cats are much harder than dogs. In my opinion. The pinna tissue is much more fragile and they almost always wrinkle and deform. I have found the after appearance to be much worse if you don’t surgically remove the fluid. I usually do a large S shaped incision on the inside flap and sew it to the outside flap. It takes times and you have to be precise of the war will be to heavy and it will shrink, wrinkle and collapse leaving a cosmetically unpleasing ear. The other important point to discuss is that if you don’t treat it correctly the first time the ear is significantly more predisposed right problems down the road because the ear canal is occluded.

    1. Najiha Post author

      Thank you for the response, so in you opinion it’s best to just proceed with the surgery? Is there any chance that the ear can still stand up normally after the surgery?

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Maggie | 4 years ago
2 Year Old Neutered Male, Indoor Only. Was Taken To The Vets And Had Crystals Removed Form …

2 year old neutered male, indoor only. Was taken to the vets and had crystals removed form his bladder. His kidneys appeared to be a little elevated and was put on amoxycilin, prazosin and meloxidyl. Prazosin for 7 days, amoxycillin for 7 days and meloxidyl for 14 days.

He was absolutely fantastic for about 7 – 10 days. When he was ill previously he was very distant (usually extremely affectionate), hiding under sofa, lethargic, not eating or drinking, struggling to pee and mewing. This time when he was ill he has actually still been affectionate and following the owner everywhere, a little slow and seems sad, but mainly noticed that he kept trying to pee – even outside his litter tray. Took him back to the vets and they recommend euthanasia so went to another vet. They gave him an epidural to relieve his bladder and put him on Hypovase for anti spasm relief, gabapentin for pain and buprenorphine also alprazolam for anti spasm.
All the above happened in the last few weeks
He’s back in the vets again this morning with another blockage and because he keeps removing the cathather they want to remove the urine via needle!!
Any help would be appreciated.

3 Responses

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  1. Sarah

    Hi there-
    The experience that I had with my blocked cat (years ago) was time consuming. He did undergo surgery to remove the blockage. Then sent home after urinating on his own. We had to keep him confined as he needed to rest and recuperate, plus he was leaking for a while and clean up was easier in less space. He needed Rx food for the remainder of his days. His recovery took a few weeks, but he did live quite a long time after that experience. Our vet had also advised us to change the type of litter we used as some apparently can cause stones/crystals. I know that they did some sort of ultrasound on his bladder at the time to help assess the situation. Perhaps to see the number of crystals and if they could pass? Not 100% sure…. regardless, I would check with the vet about diet, litter, recovery and expectations as to whether they feel all the stones have passed or if further surgery is needed. Please keep us posted ????

  2. Krista Magnifico

    Hello,
    Most of the cases is see happen like this. It takes weeks, months for the urethra to heal and the bladder to regain full function. I strongly suggest a canned urinary prescription diet and medication options to include a steroid. I also recommend discussing a PU surgery before recommending euthanasia.

    1. Maggie Post author

      Thanks Krista. He’s back to the vets again today to have his bladder evacuated and the same yesterday and the vets wants to do the same until Friday via needle. He been on the urinary food but won’t even do a droplet of urine. The vet is recommending euthanasia Friday because of his suffering….. at a loss!

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Cornel | 4 years ago
Hello! I’ll Show The Vet The Video As Well, But That Won’t Be For …

Hello!

I’ll show the vet the video as well, but that won’t be for some time now. Until then, could you take a look at it and let me know if this looks like FHS? Should I try to get an earlier time to check with the vet?

Here’s the video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RkdWxhOc1FI

More details:
New member of the community and new cat owner here, we’ve got Haku 2 months ago. She is 2 and a half years old, neutered.

Ever since we have her, she had constant mini-episodes, consisting mostly in vigorously shaking her head multiple times in a row, trying to clean her ears, and trying to run and hide from the shaking. I define a ‘mini episode’ as around 10-20 seconds of shaking during the span of 1-2 minutes.

First we attributed it to the ear mites and the fleas she had. However, the ear mites and the fleas had been treated, and the episodes do still happen, albeit at a lower rate, once or twice a week.

She also has a bit of a hard time passing stools (she only goes potty once every 2 days), so on our last vet visit they prescribed some Royal Canin GI Fiber kibble.

After 2 days of combining the prescribed kibble with her usual food, she had this episode shown in the video, which was more severe than what she usually has (it might have lasted for a good 5 minutes, with another 5-10 minutes of less shaking afterwards). As seen in the video, she also has twitches all over her body and she tries to clean herself all over.
I feel like the episode was also triggered by stress, as we brushed her teeth beforehand.

One day later (today, the 25th Oct), she also started an episode while playing. We immediately stopped to let her calm down and by the time I got the camera up, the episode stopped as well.

We thought the more severe episode could have happened partly because of the Royal Canin Fiber, as she currently is on a lower carbohydrates diet. We stopped giving her the RC kibble today, I thought I’d discuss it further with the vet.

From what I gathered with the limited data I have, these episodes could be triggered either by stress or by ‘being too excited’, as in ‘im ready to pounce and play!’. So basically strong emotions. Is this something that can happen with FHS?

I will keep a closer eye on her and try to get the camera if she ever gets another episode. I will update this post if I have any updates.

Thanks for reading through this!

1 Response

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  1. Krista Magnifico

    Hello,
    I would be very interested to hear about what your vet thinks this might be? Have you consulted them?
    This is not a platform to diagnose. It is a platform to help educate and inspire. Along with sharing experiences and assistance. We are happy to help adjunct the information and care your vet provides. If needed a neurologist might also provide invaluable insight.

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Elliott | 4 years ago
Hello Doctors My 11 Year Old Chihuahua His Name Is Cannavaro Was Diagnosed With A Disc IVDD …

Hello doctors my 11 year old chihuahua his name is Cannavaro was diagnosed with a disc IVDD disease I was giving him Carprofen for pain for a couple of months then switched to CBD oil due to avoid damaging his organs but he’s been in pain more often is sad and hard to see him with pain due to an slipped disc can’t afford an expensive surgery and don’t know if he could recover without a surgery please help help help! Thank you

1 Response

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  1. Krista Magnifico

    Hello,
    I’m sorry to hear about your dog. I have a lot of information on my blog and YouTube channel. My best recommendation is to stay in very close contact with your vet. In cases like these I usually recommend a steroid over an nsaid. And I also offer multiple other pain medications like a muscle relaxer and gabapentin. The first few weeks require almost full time care. And a lot of help from your vet. The pain (in my opinion) in almost all cases can be managed. But it is a rough few days at first.

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CARY | 4 years ago
Hi, We Are In Dire Need Of A Second Opinion As Our German Shepherd Is In …

Hi, We are in dire need of a second opinion as our German Shepherd is in Emergency now and we are waiting for the neurologist to call us back again. About 6 days ago our pup jumped out of the car and yelped. She seemed to start walking a little weird and we kept our eye on her. The next day she started having weakness in her back legs and swaying a little. A couple days later it was a little harder for her to get up from sitting. The vet thought she had pain from her stomach as she had diarrhea and she did blood work and an xray of her abdomen and middle of spine. Because when the vet watched her walk and did pain tests and mobility, she seems fine with no pain. By the 4th day she started to really have a hard time getting up and she had a little dragging in the back feet. 5th day, she had a hard time time squatting to go to the bathroom and was losing balance. Her front left leg started to show weakness and we took her straight to emergency.

The neurologist still has not done an MRI because she said that our pup was just laying there like a log and not being supper responsive. Which makes her think it could be a brain issue. I am waiting for er phone call now but I will be asking her to just do the MRI of the spine and the brain to have a better understanding. Our dog was fully responsive when we took her to emergency 12 hours ago so I am wondering if she is completely sad because we have never left her anywhere.

Please help! This is urgent.

Thank you.

5 Responses

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  1. Sarah

    I’m so sorry about your dog! I have to ask- I am assuming your car was not moving when the dog jumped out? And are you and your vet sure that her situation right now is actually related to that incident? I’m just trying to clarify- sorry. I am hoping that you get some more definitive answers today from your vet.

    1. CARY Post author

      Hi Sarah, No, the car wasn’t moving. She yelped a couple times coming down the sofa also, She is still at vet and is getting an MRI today and spinal fluid tap. The vet mentioned meningitis also. I am just frustrated that we had to wait 2 days for an MRI, especially if it is Meningitis and needs to be treated ASAP. I went to see her yesterday and she was excited to see me but can’t stand up or really lift her head up.

      1. Sarah

        Oh my goodness. I truly feel for you. I hope that something shows in the MRI so that you can start the road to recovery and that she is ok ???????? If you fe up to it, please keep us posted.

  2. CARY Post author

    We got the results back from MRI and spinal fluid and she has meningitis/encephalitis . They immediately put her on broad spectrum antibiotics and steroids. Today they got back the spinal fluid results and it showed no bacterial cause so they took her off all antibiotics and started an immediate 24 infusion of Cytostar, an auto suppressive medication. We now wait for another 18 hours to see how she is responding.

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Bev Reagan | 4 years ago
A Friend In Bel Air Just Found A Very Pregnant Wood Frog In Her Yard. Many …

A friend in Bel Air just found a very pregnant wood frog in her yard. Many of us are wondering how her babies will survive at this time of year.

2 Responses

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  1. Laura

    Wood frogs are not livebearers, and cannot be pregnant. Are you certain this frog is gravid? It’s highly unlikely at this time of year. The frog may have something medically wrong with it.

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Edie | 4 years ago
Just Wondering What Your Thoughts Are On Giving A 12 Year Old Dog Full Round Of Yearly …

Just wondering what your thoughts are on giving a 12 year old dog full round of yearly vaccines? There seems to be a lot of different opinions. Also, I just paid almsot 19.00 for 1 month HW preventative..I am waiting on 1 year shot next month, but needed 1 dose until they could do that. It seems pretty high to me, so just wondering. Thank you

2 Responses

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  1. Sarah

    Good morning-
    I think that you should discuss this with your primary vet. We recently lost one of our GSDs in July. He was 14 and in failing health, so he did not receive his last round of vaccinations in April. But prior years, he was still getting all of his vaccinations as he was in fairly good health.

  2. Krista Magnifico

    Hello,
    I agree with Sarah. It is very much case dependent. Every vaccine should be discussed and scrutinized at every exam. Only do what is needed and only if the patient is well and has a potential risk of exposure. In some cases we split up the vaccine load. Ie we spread them out over months. Or omit if no longer necessary. But remember the old and the young are probably those who are at greatest risk of acquiring disease.

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Natalie | 4 years ago
We Brought Mila, My 7 Year Old Mixed Domestic Savannah Chausie Female Spayed Kitty, Early This Morning …

We brought Mila, my 7 year old mixed domestic savannah chausie female spayed kitty, early this morning for emergency attention because she was moaning and groaning in pain last night and could hardly move. Prior to this morning she had been seen two weeks ago at the same emergency clinic and her primary vet. Both determined she had crystals and a UTI and prescribed medication which we’ve been giving as instructed along with keeping her on the strict urinary care diet from hills c/d.

She tried yesterday and this morning to use the litter box but was unsuccessful in relieving herself so we had to treat it as if she was experiencing a blockage which you know is very dangerous.

The Dr. was able to express Mila’s full bladder and found no blockage there, but said Mila was in a lot of pain while undergoing the procedure. She did not feel any stool so Mila is not considered to be constipated, but a good sized stone or crystal was visible during the ultrasound.

The Dr. strongly believes Mila still has a UTI and wants to get that under control first, so we were given the following medications:

Pradofloxacin (antibiotic)
Prazosin (for urethral spasms)

We were also instructed to increase the dosage of the Gabapentin from 0.3ml every 12 hours to 0.5ml every 8 hours since it didn’t seem to be doing enough in terms of managing Mila’s pain. She was previously on buprenorphine for pain but we were concerned that it was constipating her.

We need to bring Mila in as soon as possible to perform another urinalysis and culture as was recommended by the Emergency clinic. This was recommended to determine whether or not the bacteria from the UTI has spread to Mila’s kidneys.

We chose to decline those diagnostics at the emergency Clinic today as they were going to charge an additional $800 for an already expensive treatment and we felt more comfortable going through our primary vet for Mila (the diagnostics will cost a fraction of what emergency quoted.)

I want to do everything I can for Mila but we are now in the hole nearly $2k at the point between the two emergency visits and the primary vet visit, so wanting to know what is necessary now Vs. what can be phased in.

I hate seeing her in pain and I’m just worried that she isn’t improving.

2 Responses

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  1. Sarah

    Good morning-
    Im sure you are getting her into see your vet right away. I would have a very in depth conversation regarding your budget and what you expect as well as your concerns and Mila’s overall comfort level. Years ago one of our cat’s had a urinary blockage and I do remember him being kept for a few nights, catheterized, and surgery to remove the blockage and Rx cat food for the remainder of his years. And it was expensive, and it was a long recovery, but he did well. I hope Mila does too.

    1. Natalie Post author

      Thanks Sarah!

      We’ve been acting with urgency and Mila is finally starting to improve – she was given a stronger antibiotic to tackle the UTI in addition to the pain and urethral spasm medications. It seems to be the right cocktail, allowing Mila to urinate without strain. I never thought I’d be so happy to watch her go! haha.

      After her most recent visit to the vet this past Monday, they confirmed no blockage, no stones, and a smaller less full bladder! Good girl Mila! We are waiting on the urine culture results which will tell us exactly what type of bacteria she’s got in her UTI, but in the meantime we are no longer in the “up all night watching her like a hawk” phase.

      After 3 emergency visits and 2 visits with her regular vet, we seem to be finally getting our playful Mila back.

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Cristina | 4 years ago
Hi! I Have A 5-year-old Beagle Who Was Recently Diagnosed With IVDD. 5 Days Ago, He Woke …

Hi! I have a 5-year-old beagle who was recently diagnosed with IVDD. 5 days ago, he woke up with pain, and things got worse when he tried jumping on my bed. He was in so much pain that I could barely move him. I took him to the vet, and they prescribed him methocarbamol, tramadol, and prednisone. I gave him his medication the first day, but it did not help at all, and he continued being in a lot of pain. The next day I took him back to the vet, and they hospitalized him for a day to administer the medication through IV. That seemed to help a lot because now his practically back to normal. I’m still giving him the medication that was prescribed, but I recently noticed he has begun to walk a little bit slower and is panting a lot. I’m worried that his reason for panting is due to him being in pain. Also, I’m scared that he will have another crisis and go back to being in the pain he was before. Can anyone give me guidance on how to care for my dog?

2 Responses

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  1. Sarah

    Good morning-
    Have you relayed this information to your vet? And have they given any other advice or requested you to bring him back in? Other than medication, have you been told to do anything else? (Cage rest, etc?) I do know that Dr.Magnifico has a lot of videos on ivdd on YouTube and through her blog. It may be a good idea for you to check those out and see if any advice she has will be helpful to your pup. Perhaps talk about some alternative therapies with your vet as well to get their opinion. I hope things are ok.????????

  2. Krista Magnifico

    Hello,
    The first few days of this disease are so difficult. Please lean on your vet and tell them how much you appreciate their help. It gets better. But it takes time and dedication with determination. Be patient and ask loads of questions. I have a ton of information on my blog and YouTube channel. I hope it helps. I’m here too if I can help.