KF_in_Georgia

Thanks for the info. I've sent it to my nephew, whose beagle recently had a seizure.

He actually may need a stool softener, but I'm not sure what to recommend. My two have really firm poop, and occasionally the girl is uncomfortable when she starts to poop, but it doesn't happen often, so I haven't treated for it.

Re. Avocados:

Lucky me: I've been where you were--with 8-year-old ex-racer named Jacey who developed idiopathic immune mediated thrombocytopenia (I lost her after 4 days)--and I've been where you are. Silver (who arrived the day after I lost Jacey--both girls have the same birth date, two years apart, and it seemed as if the universe was sending a message) was picked up as a stray by animal control in a neighboring county. She was skinny, no microchip, apparently not adopted out through regular channels (turns out, she hadn't been spayed), heartworm negative (thank dog). I got the distinct impression that she didn't go even a little feral during her time on the streets, and I wouldn't be surprised if she marched up to the animal control officer on the street and just demanded her dinner. She was six years old, had raced until she was three and a half, but her former track (Victoryland) had closed and we don't know what happened between when she retired and when she showed up on the streets two and a half years later. She arrived with a corn (front right) and with a slipped Achilles tendon (back right), so it seemed likely that one or both of those problems ended her career (she'd been a good racer and had run A-grade for about 9 months). World's softest, thickest coat, with downy white fuzz all the way down her belly; personality to spare. Zero-tolerance for cats. In addition to the problems with her right legs, her front left leg looked like this: The animal control vet, the vet of the rescue that examined her first, the vet that treats SEGA's dogs, and my own vet: they all looked at this, did skin scrapings, looked under black light, said "bacterial infection" and prescribed Simplecef and a round of prednisone. In all cases, it briefly looked better, then went back to this. It itched a lot--Silver chewed it madly. She'd relax if I smoothed on some soothing cream, then she'd start chewing again the moment I stopped. I kept her muzzled to stop the chewing. She learned to scratch the front left leg with her back left foot. (Considering that neither foot on her right side could support her normally, the back-left-foot-scratch was something of a challenge.) My vet tried a few other things: ivermectin (in case it was mites), different antibiotics. The rash of raised bumps wasn't contagious: neither I nor my other dog had any problem. I finally did what I wish I'd done in the beginning: I took her to a veterinary dermatologist. He took three punch biopsy samples and immediately put her on Simplecef. Again. (I thought he was blowing smoke with that prescription.) Two weeks later, we got back the biopsy results. Under the bacterial infection on her skin (caused by the constant chewing), Silver had plain ol' ringworm. It was below the skin, which is why it never showed on skin scrapings or under black light, and why it didn't spread to me, the other dog, or even anywhere else on her skin. The dermatologist prescribed oral ketoconazole to go along with the Simplecef. In a week, Silver stopped chewing and scratching. In two weeks, the rash was almost completely gone. I don't remember now how long she stayed on the meds, but the dermatologist wanted her on the ketaconazole extra time to make sure the fungal infection didn't come back, resistant to what we'd used already. The rash went away, her hair grew back, and she had not (as we feared she might) developed a behavioral tic requiring constant licking of that front left leg. This is Silver. She's 10 years old and she's a registered therapy dog. There's no indication that there's ever been anything wrong with her skin. For your girl, I'm more concerned about the swelling in the leg than the fungal infection. That's probably because Silver kicked her fungal infection to the curb, while I lost Jacey--and one of the last complications she experienced was disseminated intravascular coagulation (DIC) accompanied by swelling in her back legs. So, after saying all this, I'm going to echo what the others have recommended: Consult with Dr Couto. You may be on your way to controlling the fungal infection, but that swelling worries me a lot.

How much does he eat? How old is he? What did he used to weigh? What's he weigh now? (I know you can't answer that before tomorrow.) How many meals does he get a day? You can try just adding another meal. If you add more food to an existing meal, it'll be more than he's used to getting at one time. An extra meal might be easier for him to handle. My guys get their biggest meal of the day (about 1 cup per dog) at 10 pm or so. They then sleep like rocks, and let me sleep late in the morning. I wouldn't change his food if his poop has been good up until now. (Iams green bag here, too.)

I'm so sorry you've had to say goodbye to this lovely girl.

I checked on GoodRx.com. They don't list Allivet, but your price with them beats anything GoodRx lists.

I've always read that UTIs were more common in females than in males, but I've never seen anything that suggests they're uncommon in males.

Expect fireworks this coming holiday weekend. I saw fireworks displays in the store tonight (right next to the flags), so my neighbors may be stocking up.

My angel Sam spent the last 18 months or so of his life (he was 13 when I lost him) on a low, maintenance dose of metronidazole. We'd put him through the regular therapeutic dose and his poops would firm up (no worms in the fecal samples); he'd finish the metronidazole, and within 4 days the diarrhea was back (sometimes just soft poop, sometimes a blowout). Put him back on a therapeutic dose, repeat results. I was tracking it on a calendar--marking the days he got the metronidazole, and recording what his poop was like, and after three rounds of the therapeutic dose followed by diarrhea, the vet was convinced. If you haven't been doing so, you might want to start plotting for Fusion: which day(s) he gets pills, what food you're starting/stopping, and what kind of poop he's producing. Putting it on a calendar enabled the vet and me to see what was coincidence and what might be more than that. We did another therapeutic dose. Then we started cutting back the metronidazole: one pill a day instead of two for 10 days, then one pill every other day. (Easiest to remember was to give him a pill on an odd-numbered day of the month; sometimes he'd have pills on consecutive days--31st and 1st--but that didn't hurt.) It's been a few years and it's hard to remember, but I think we eventually got down to a half pill every other day (I remember coming home with a fresh prescription and immediately chopping all the pills in half). It was such a "barely there" dose, and he did great on it. Long-term metronidazole use can have some neurological side effects. Most of the time, the side effects will go away if you decrease the dose, and the vet hoped Sam wouldn't have any side effects once we got his dose down so small. We watched for trouble, saw none, and whatever other problems Sam had (arthritis, LS, back trouble, failing kidneys, etc.), his gut was fine. And if he had a morning that unexpectedly had soft poop, he might get a half pill three days in a row rather than every other day. (Tylosin doesn't have the same potential side effects, but Tylosin never helped Sam.) Sam mostly ate Iams in the green bag for his last year or so. He'd had episodes of diarrhea off and on for all the years I had him (I lost him after 10 years, 10 months), and those episodes undoubtedly damaged his intestinal tract and made it quicker to flare up. Finding one food he seemed to tolerate well, and then finding a med that helped him stay stable were the two things that made his last year possible. The old man stopped losing weight. He'd sometimes get finicky; sometimes I'd have to grind his kibble and mix it with yummy add-ins, but he wasn't having diarrhea from that stuff. One thing I did was get both my dogs off Heartgard Plus and put them on a topical heartworm med. Sam (and my current girl, Silver) inevitably had soft-to-liquid poop within 24 hours of a dose of Heartgard Plus; my vet said it probably was the flavoring in the meds. If you try plotting Fusion's poop output compared to what meds he's taking on what day, don't forget to include his heartworm meds on the calendar.

Play it by ear with Gabe. Reading here, I've seen that some patients haven't wanted to eat well in the hospital, haven't rested well there, and have done better at home quickly. Some were so delighted by the attention they got that they were fine at the hospital, while going home would have been hectic. You want his pain well controlled and a routine for meds established (if he's going to have an upset stomach from meds, let him have it at the vet's); you want him to be able to get to his feet with a minimum of trouble (so he'll be able to get up okay when he's home). He needs to figure out his balance and learn to get around potential obstacles at your house. (Is he going to need runners on slick floors?) And he needs to adjust to things--including doing some of the panicked yelling I've heard about--without setting off your other dogs. Suggestion: Take a t-shirt you've worn but not laundered. Let the other dogs sleep with it to get it nicely smelled up, then leave it with Gabe.

The blade of grass might have irritated her gums--sort of like a flat dental floss that could have drawn blood. But it's certainly something to discuss with her vet.

Yes, my boy is fine but he does those "that feels good groans'' when he lies down and when I rub his ears. Typically, groans are fine; yelps are not.

Check GoodRx.com. They even have a pet division that gives on-line prices. http://www.goodrx.com/rimadyl Adjust in the left margin for the correct dosage for Rainy.

My old boy Sam had one good visit, one very bad one (GSOD and he nearly went for the chiropractor). And he was in a lot of pain again very soon after that second visit. (It took longer to get an appointment with the chiropractor than any good effects lasted.) After that second visit, we stuck with meds (gabapentin, methocarbamol, tramadol; no NSAIDs after he developed an ulcer). If Henry is doing well, I'm happy for you both. Just be sure you keep pain meds on hand. The effects of Sam's two adjustments wore off on a Friday night, and he stood and panted rather than trying to lie down. First time, I didn't have pain meds on hand; second time I did and it made a huge difference. Henry's adjustments probably will go well. He's probably experiencing back pain as a result of altered movement from the amputation. Sam actually had back trouble rather than back strain, so adjustments weren't as useful for Sam.

Not the yelling, I think. Possibly the morining walk. It's also possible that he was on his feet for a while before you got home, so that by the time you got the groceries put away, he'd been on his feet for longer than was comfortable for him. If the yelling got to him, I think it might only be if he was surprised and moved quickly and tweaked something, so less an upset over yelling and more a startle-reaction. (In other words, the reaction could be to the dropped stuff rather than to you.)

Robaxin (methocarbamol) is lovely stuff. My vet prescribed a loading dose for the first couple of days, then a maintenance dose. We saw a big difference in less than 24 hours. (If Desmond is walking "funny" because of his corns, that might have caused some back trouble. And if a dog is tensing muscles against back pain, the Robaxin will help.) I've been through this with two different dogs. These days, my girl dog's vet file has a standing order for meds; the vet says I can call and get the prescriptions filled any time Silver's back is bothering her. She's an older girl (nearly 10) with shoulder arthritis that we saw on an x-ray two years ago. She's normally fine (roaches like a champ), but if she's ouchy, I just put her back on the meds for a few days. I'd be careful about seeing a chiropractor without x-rays first. When Sam saw a chiropractor years ago for back trouble, the adjustment was extremely painful (the only time he ever threatened a person, but the chiropractor was suitably impressed), and he was in severe pain again in just two weeks. From then on, we just did the drugs and not the adjustments, and he was much more comfortable.

Before you start aspirin, check with your own vet to be sure the aspirin won't interfere with Ace's bronchitis meds. (That possibility may be why the ER vet didn't recommend aspirin.)

Woo-hoo! We're about to need a new set of prescriptions for heartworm meds. I'll talk to my vet next week.

Call your vet. That's a lot of fat and there may be a risk of pancreatitis, but I'm not sure what the vet would advise. 8 oz. of Salmon oil is generally 335% an adult human's daily allowance of fat, and I don't think it helps that it's "good" fat. And yes--there's the clotting issue to worry about.

My dogs consistently had diarrhea after Heartgard--every time. I switched them to Advantage Multi. It's a topical that prevents heartworms and other parasites and prevents fleas. It smells awful--worse than Frontline Plus. But the smell and pretty much all trace of the oil are gone in 24 hours. I give it on the first Monday of the month; that gives the oily patch time to disappear before a weekend meet and greet. I also put bandannas on both dogs to remind me not to pet the oily spot. My dogs had taken Interceptor without a problem. Then it was discontinued, and Heartgard was trouble from the beginning. My vet said it's not uncommon for dogs to react to the flavoring in Heartgard; the medicine itself isn't the problem. And given that potential diarrhea is listed on the Trifexis paperwork as a possible side effect, we didn't want to try that one. We've used Advantage Multi for 20 months here and have had no problems. (And no fleas, although my guys don't have a yard to play in, so they're less likely to pick up fleas than other dogs may be.)

Regarding the drain: Did you see even a little goopy stuff leaking from the drain? Or from his skin around the drain? If so, the drain did exactly what you needed for it to do.

How many stitches? My feeling is "no," they didn't take advantage of you. Bites on greyhounds grab the skin and pull it away from the underlying tissue. That means infection gets between the skin and the tissue, and stitching it closed like that is absolutely the worst thing they can do. So the wound will need a drain, and clean edges, and lots of antiseptic solution, and that is absolutely nothing you'd want to have happen to you while you're awake. Your dog would not tolerate it and shouldn't be expected to. A local is for three staples in a wound on a dog's foot. Like this. (Sam was okay with getting the staples with a local. But he screamed bloody murder when it was time to remove the staples.)

Silver is often (but not always) an open-mouth sleeper. But her current issues (3 years after the vet pulled the bottom ones) are with back teeth. The vet says her gums are badly receded, but there's very little tartar/plaque on her teeth--back or front.

I don't know about bad front top, but bad front bottom ones were the first to go on my girl. She has a little two-tooth gap in front, where the vet pulled two when she was just six years old. He was doing a cleaning, and he said the teeth were wobbly and he could see the roots. But she needs to go back soon (she'll be 10 next month) and probably will lose something from the back. She's being very careful where she positions treats in her mouth before she bites down... Make sure you know someplace to get Amicar for Diana. Some dogs do have bleeding issues after a dental.