BauersMom

Berkeley broke his toe about 6 months ago. It's never returned back to the same size. We re-x-rayed and it healed fine, but it's likely scar tissue. It doesn't slow him down, so I don't worry about it too much. Was the foot splinted at all? Is it bothering him?

One of mine could grow mushrooms in his ears. Always has, no matter the diet or season. I just wipe them out every once and a while and other than being grossed out, it's no big deal.

I do think so. I mean, the vet never said anything about not finding one of them? Interesting, this sounds very similar to what this adopter is facing!

I know they did bring in a sample but I can't confirm it was cultured or not, or how the diagnosis was made, honestly. I should hear back from the adopter and then can update with more info. I have no experience with prostate infections, but clearly, it happens!

We have an adopter whose dog Nick has been diagnosed with prostatitis (infection in the prostate). The symptoms were very similar to UTI - inappropriate urination, etc. Symptoms were going on for a few weeks before the diagnosis, and unfortunately, have continued even on the meds. The adopter brought Nick back in to the vet last week, meds were changed, and he emailed me the other day to say the dog got up at 6am and just started urinating on the bed - so no improvement still. Has anyone dealt with this before? Is it commonly this difficult to treat? Thanks!

That would be a HECK YES. I'm glad we have an answer though. He was clearly having issues.

My foster was just diagnosed and I've been playing phone tag with the vet. Anyone deal with this before?

For some reason I thought I'd posted in this thread already, but it doesn't seem so, so here are my horror stories! 1) Bauer was attacked while both dogs were ON LEASH. 2) Berkeley's ear bitten partly off by Bauer. In the house, while my husband has handing out treats. These were very "controlled" environments. If you think you will be able to head off a fight, trust me, you won't. It explodes faster than you can react. My rules for muzzling: if there's any doubt, muzzle! Outside all the time, for sure. Inside whenever there's a new dog in the house.

Oh wow. What a shock. Godspeed Specky.

Where's the "all of the above" option? We own the plastic vari-kennel (I believe it's a 700?), the mesh, soft sided "travel" crates (48"x36") and the wire crates (48"x33?"). We have them set up in the bedroom and the living room. Our first grey preferred the vari-kennel - liked his privacy, I guess. That was in the bedroom at the time. My senior looooves her soft-sided crate. We have two, one in the bedroom, one in the living room. One is in the wire crate during the day, and fosters use the second wire crate. They are both in the living room. I only have one that doesn't need (or want) to be crated, and she gets to roam free and taunt the others.

We use the joint supplement from Springtime. Drastic results for both my arthritis dogs!! I swear by it (which reminds me... I have to order some more!)

Mine was partially-fed raw. The night before he had the kibble, he had a rabbit. The vet wanted to peg it on the rabbit, but I guess it could have been either. We'll never really know.

Our experience was very sudden. At noon when I was home for lunch he was fine, and when I came home at 5 he was sitting in a crate of Big D. From there it went downhill fast - more diarrhea, vomiting everything and then by 7 he was completely unable to stand on his own and had lost total control of his bowels. By 8, we were at the e-vet!! Easily the scariest thing I've ever had to experience as a dog owner. He was on IV for a day, sub-Q fluids when we left and a round of antibiotics. He's never had an issue since. We had tried Wellness Fish and potato that morning - no idea if that's what caused it, but I tossed the bag when I got home the next day! Edit to add: In our case, it wasn't bloody diarrhea, but the vet said that because of the low blood volume and high hematocrit, he felt that's what we were looking at. And the fact that we started seeing signs of going into hypovolemic shock.

Oh no! I too really enjoyed Mac's signature lines. I'm so sorry. Godspeed Mac.

I have one dog who has dislocated lots and lots of toes. Yay for me. She also came to us missing a toe - and has no limp and doesn't bother her at all. Here's an early other thread that had some helpful information: http://forum.greytalk.com/index.php?showtopic=170595&hl= I would take it conservatively. I know people have been lucky enough to have dislocated toes be a one time thing, but that wasn't my experience at all. We splint for 3-4 weeks each time, and leash walk only after that for a few weeks, to give the ligaments time to heal up. If you have any other questions, feel free to PM me. I've been through it all.

They fit, I think I got a 3T? I have a picture on my old computer, I'll dig it up for you. edit: Well... this isn't the best angle, but hopefully you get the idea. The neck was high enough to cover his boo-boo.

Ouch! What about a toddler turtleneck? Would that cover it? (I've had luck with those in the past, with neck wounds)

Has he been tested for any tick diseases (lyme, etc) recently? If not, that might be the next thing I'd look for! Spartacus is a cutie.

If anorexia is one of the possible side effects of the meds, could it be that? If so, are there any anti-anorexia type meds available?

Yeah, I was going to say - the stuff tastes horrible! My chow hound refused to eat when I mixed the powder in, so I tasted a bit of it... ICK... wicked bitter.

We were facing a similar situation with our 2 year old - LS diagnosis based on the initial tests and exams. We went ahead with the MRI, and we also had an EMG done at the same time - to test the nerve function in his hind legs. The grand total was $2500 for both tests. The MRI alone was like $1800 (in Boston). Everything came back normal, except for a malformation in his back that may or may not cause his issues. No signs of LS at all. Normal nerve function. I believe it's very hard to diagnose LS without an MRI, and for us, it made the difference between a correct and incorrect diagnosis. Good luck with the exam.

You know what's odd is that the one time my brood had a bad reaction, she was only under for a very short time. But she didn't come out of it for nearly 24 hours - couldn't walk, couldn't stand, nothing. She was like in this pseudo-awake state. Very scary.

And I'd rather not have all that horrible bacteria sprayed around the operating room with a fresh abdominal wound available for infection, maybe leading to peritonitis. The vets that I worked for wouldn't do teeth with anything else for preference, though they would do them with minor surgery if it would save going under twice. They would never have done them at the same time as major surgery - too much of a risk of post-op infection. Interesting. Of all the females that I've known to be spayed with a dental (50+), I can't think of a single one who ended up with any complications with infection. In my experience, the dangers of anesthesia have been more prominent than anything else. Not saying there isn't a chance of infection, just relating what I've seen. I'm sure if the teeth were horrible, with extractions, there'd be reason to not combine it with a spay, but in routine cases, I'd rather not have a dog go under twice.

I've had my 7 yo and 10 yo go through a spay fine, but our group has had several young females not make it through spays. And my 7 yo did fine with her spay, but then went under for another (much less invasive) reason and had a BAD, BAD time with it. Same vet, same anesthetic procedure, WAY different reaction! Scared the crap out of me. Going under is a serious thing, at any age. And as far as I can tell, there's no real rhyme or reason to it. There's debate to the spay/dental at once or doing them separately... I personally would rather my dog not have to go through anesthesia twice, if at all possible.

I never said, nor did I intend to intimate, that they were negligent. I was just saying that it seems slightly unfair that one dog gets thousands of dollars worth or treatment and an MRI, while another one does not. If anyone thinks I am so off base for thinking that is unfair, then please accept my apologies, but I will have to disagree. It never really had anything to do with fairness. You're making an emotional argument for a decision that has to be made with a lot of other factors involved - cost, chances of success, etc. Emotions or "fairness" is a low factor, honestly. Adoption groups have to make tough decisions all the time. They're never going to be able to do everything everyone wants or everything for every dog. That's the unfortunate reality. The role of the adoption group is to place dogs in homes where they can be cared for. In this case, it sounds like they did that! So for your own sanity, stop worrying about what "should have" been done by other people, and focus on where Bruce needs you now.