greyhead

Have you heard of reduced immune function as a reason for failure to show white cells on this kind of exam? Spencer's internist suggested that when we were speaking today and I told her about how Shane's urine is always "clear" on exam but his culture is always positive for E. coli.

Very good point. I've been told that 4 hours is ideal. Also I think it should be mentioned that the recommended dose of thyroid meds for greyhounds is, in general, one-half the dose for other dogs of the same weight. (Don't know for sure about other sighthounds.) I don't recall the formula, but my 80+-pound GH's take .5 twice a day.

It will show whether Rainey's behaviors are due, in part, to too much thyroid hormone. If you can reduce the thyroid med and remove that part of the contribution to her behavior, which may be considerable, you can then deal with what's left in terms of the other meds. I'm sure this is all very confusing. Wishing Rainey and your family the best outcome, whichever way you go!

Dee's Goldie was about to be sent to the bridge, until she was given thyroid med. If Rainey's looking at the bridge, I'd miss a thyroid pill and see what happened. Just skip a pill or two. If my theory is right, she'll still have plenty of thyroid hormone in her system to work with, and a vet neurologist told me it's okay to miss a dose or two anyway. If you're going to put her down anyway, you have nothing to lose.

You don't sound either angry or mean, rest assured. And I wish I were close enough to offer you a break. Is there anyone near you with a buddha-like nature who could give you a break for an hour or two? It won't solve the problem, but it would at least let you catch you breath. Lots of good thoughts, white light, and prayers are coming toward you from many directions tonight, I know. Edited to clean up wonky emoticons.

I have to agree with the possibility that these meds are interacting in unfortunate ways. Aggression can result from both too little thyroid hormone and from too much of it. Kind of like if you water a plant too much, it wilts, and if you water it too little, it wilts. If this were graphed, it would look like a U-shaped curve, with the vertical axis being amount of aggression and the horizontal axis being the amount of medicine given. Also, it can take weeks for thyroid levels to stabilize on a given dose of medicine. So seeing improvement but not perfection at Week 2, for instance, doesn't mean that upping the dose a lot is going to make it better at Week 3. Too much hormone may now be in her system, which could make her worse than manic (so to speak), and the effect of the pheno just adds more discomfort and instability to that. So it may well be the combo of too much of these things, and pheno may not be needed at all. Sorry I can't explain better than this, as I'm running out the door. I'm sure others can clarify what I mean for me if they agree, bless their hearts. But please don't give up. I truly do believe there's a way out of this, and dialing back the thyroid med is Step One.

She may have hyperthyroid symptoms mixed in there now. That thyroid dosage would be high for a big male, much less a girl. If you stopped giving it with yogurt, she may be OD-ing,, so to speak, on thyroid med. I'd back her off to the .6 level, without calcium sources. I would hope that would stop the aggression, but it's just a suggestion. Then you can reevaluate and see if the thyroid dose and even the pheno can be lowered further. All I know is that the thyroid level has to be right, and hers sounds high. Lots of hugs to you and continuing good thoughts for Rainey's improvement.

Definitely read Dee's thread. I didn't care for MSU's interpretation in that case. IMO, armed with greyhound norms and a full panel of test results, in combination with observations (of symptoms like seizures), any good vet should be able to figure it out. But if I needed an outside consult on hypothyroid status, I'd get it from Dr. Dodds myself. FWIW, my Spencer had mild seizures before we started treating his thyroid. If you type hypothyroid* in as a search term in the H&M archives, you'll see the kinds of arguments -- the many arguments -- we've had on the subject. And it may help explain the range of symptoms that have been seen. (I say hypothyroid* as a term because my own thread was titled "hypothyroidism," and with an asterisk you'll get all the variations like that.)

That was a lovely Loved Hound piece on Brandi. I'm so sorry for your loss.

Is there anyone who could let Rebel out a couple times during the day? (I know, that's a luxury out of reach of most of us.) I'm just thinking that then he could wear the belly band at night instead, and you could get more sleep. Between the problems both my dogs are having lately, I'm tired out just keeping track of all the pills and foods and outs! If I had to keep getting up at night too, I just couldn't cope! At age 13, some lessening of kidney function isn't a total shock. Your vet's descriptions are kind of vague to me; I don't know what "not horrible, not great" means, especially in the context of rebel's age. Protein in the urine would go along with that, up to a point. Any chance you could get a number and a range instead of just "high"? I don't mean to be negativistic or nasty, but the fact is that people, including vets, get stuck on ideas that may be wrong. My vet got stuck on the idea that Shane was incontinent, even as far back as when he was 5. So when the leakage returned last year, at age 7, and with the nice looking urinalysis, she again got fixated on incontinence. I can't help but wonder if your vet is doing the same thing about kidneys. But I could be projecting. Sure hope the doxy does the trick for Rebel. It's not yet clear whether the Baytril will do it for Shane.

Shane had accidents and leakage for months because the vet looked at the urine and said she was sure there was no infection, so there was no reason for a culture. She considered it incontinence. Finally he refused food and got floppy, and then a culture revealed E. coli, which we are still fighting after numerous rounds of a/b's. Was a culture done or just a urinalysis for Fenway. Btw, IIRC a creatinine of 1.6 is not high for a greyhound. Shane routinely runs at 2.1 and concentrates his urine just fine. Fenway's urine may be dilute because of all the water he's drinking? I don't know, but I've heard lots of times infections aren't caught even with cultures!

I'm so sorry for your loss. Basher knew he was home the minute he got there!

Thanks for sharing those lovely pictures, Holli. Luna was well-loved and will be well-remembered. What a fine pack you've had! I'm so sorry for your loss.

Just seeing this, and I'm so sorry for Kelly's ongoing troubles! Lots of scritches and get-well wishes. How come he needs to come off his IBD ab's too, for testing purposes? Hope he can do that without a flare. Just be sure you have his med on hand for if that happens!

Good wishes for you and lovable Steak!

Lots of good wishes for safe travel and serenity for you and James.

Had to go to a doc myself, and just got home to notice a few drops of blood and a long, narrow smear of it on the bed Shane was on immediately prior. Saw this after he got up when I let him go outside, which he clearly needed to do cuz there were also a couple circles of leakage in evidence on the bed. I find myself not wanting to give the vet yet another thing to consider, especially since I can't prove where it came from. But I just went over both dogs and all their paws and can't find any boo-boos. So I guess I'll mosey on over to the blood-in-urine thread I just noticed and then decide what to do. This vet won't be back in the office until Tuesday. So... Maybe I'll send her an email about it and call her office to tell them it's there. I just don't know. Does this mean the Baytril isn't working? Ah yes, thanks for reminding me! I think I should say that prayer today! (For the uninitiated, that is the more or less official prayer of AA. Both my parents were alcoholics, bless their souls, so I grew up with that prayer as a philosophy of life!) And in case I haven't mentioned it, a big THANK YOU to each of you who are (is?) helping me try to hold on to some serenity in this situation!

Susan, dearest, I have SO many questions for you that I can only hope I won't be imposing too much in asking them! First off, I don't spend a lot of time on Facebook, but I'd be willing to reform my neglectful ways if I could find ex-track vets or otherwise greyhound specialists on there! How do I find them too?! Second, and more importantly, could you ask your vet friends if one could consider giving Baytril and doxy simultaneously? I don't know if I can stand the idea of 8 weeks of Baytril, only to then start 16 weeks of doxy. Of course, I don't know what I actually will do. The quasi-scientist in me likes to do things stepwise and likes to know things for sure. But the realist in me recognizes that we can't always know everything for sure. And the mom in me just wants to get my boy -- and me -- some relief. Feel free to PM or email me if I've asked anything too ...too anything! And thank you again and again for all the useful info you've shared already!

Good luck to you, Kathy, and let us know how Monday goes. One wonders what's up with this intransigent E. coli, which is what we're fighting too -- as far as our culture showed. I think you can supplement your boy with rehmannia to strengthen his kidneys. Well, I know you can, and my vet loves the stuff for that purpose, but I don't know if it's something that would also somehow be enjoyed by the bacteria, so I don't know about giving it at the same time as treating a UTI. I think she said he did have a culture. I wanted to ask, though, about this business of examining the urine sample. Every time my vet looks at the urine and does urinalysis, the urine looks great -- clear, good color, no sediment, etc. And that's the reason she was so sure last summer that he didn't have a UTI, so we didn't culture it then. So in this case culturing has been consistenly the only thing that shows there's a problem. So apparently you can have a UTI where the urine looks so good upon inspection that it fools people?

Lots of good thoughts for you and Morky!

Oh dear, this is a big blow. I couldn't be sorrier.

I'm so sorry he had to go.

Holding Huston and Mizzy, and you, safely in my thoughts.

WOW Susan! I'm going to look that up right now! I'm guessing mycoplasma is one of those things that vets consider "rare"! ETA: Susan, was a culture done to find the mycoplasma? I think it might require a special medium to grow it, so it might not show up on a regular culture? Or did you just go by the recommendation of the greyhound vets and treat it with doxy? I'm so glad you shared this possibility, by the way!!! After one dose of Baytril (given once at night), Shane's belly band was hardly used. But this morning, after his second dose last night, it was pretty full. My first quick Internet researches show that mycoplasma can also be in the lung and joints and other places. It mimics arthritis. Did George have any problems with limping or slowness?