Has Anyone's Dog Had Chemo For Autoimmune?

[Aerosmom]

Cricket's bloodwork from the NCU tests came back negative, but I'm puzzled about why they didn't do the extended testing which takes much longer than a week. She initially perked up and got more coordinated with the Baytril, but just on Sunday she's relapsed and lost a lot of coordination and now she can't walk without a sling. The neurologist wants to give her intradural chemo, which should work with autoimmune and/or cancer, but I'm worried if there is an underlying tick disease that it would wipe out her immune system.

 

I'm concerned because it sounds like many hounds on GT have tested negative and the PCR testing is necessary. I know the neurologist knows a lot more than I do, but I'm worried that we haven't explored this. Am I just grasping at straws? Why would she have an intitial positive response to the Baytril and then get worse?

 

Any thoughts?

 

For background, she developed lameness and neurological incoordination last August and has been on Prednisone (varying doses but unable to wean completely off) since then. She had an URI and I noticed that she got stronger and more coordinated when she took Baytril. We sent her bloodwork to NCU but after a week everything came back negative. I guess the neurologist thought there was a chance that she had bartonella since she improved with the Baytril. From the little I've read here, the drug that targets bartonella is azythromax -- could she have improved slightly but not enough because it was the wrong antibiotic? Or am I just hoping against hope that it's something that we can treat with antibiotics? After an MRI that showed only a slightly bright area in her thoractic spinal cord area and spinal cord fluid that if I remember correctly that had slightly elevated neurtrophils and leukocytes, it was determined that she had unspecified myelitis. Oh, and her bloodwork showed a very minimally elevated result to erlichia canis, but so low that the neurologist said it was insignificant. (I did ask.) She was tested for fungus and common diseases that would cause the symptoms too. She had two weeks or ten days of doxycycline and another antibiotic, but we also started her on prednisone at the same time. She got better for the next four months and we slowly weaned her down to a small every other day dose of prednisone, but when we stretched it to every three days, she had a relapse in January.

 

I feel so helpless and that I haven't explored all the options for her.

 

 

[Batmom]

Ask your vet (who can ask the NCSU lab if need be) just exactly what they tested for at NCSU and whether they would recommend further testing. I'm pretty sure that for some PCRs, you get the results back faster if they don't find anything; the longer time is in order to pinpoint the species -- or something like that .......

 

You sometimes hear it said that if the dog responds to this or that antibiotic, that is an indication the dog had a tick disease ... but that's kind of misleading. The main antibiotics used to treat tick disease are broad-spectrum abx. They're used to treat all kinds of things, from urinary and respiratory infections to skin infections to you-name-it. So a dog who feels better while taking one of these antibiotics probably had or has an infection. There is really no way to know which kind it is/was.

 

Sending hugs to yourself and your pupper.

[Guest Flint]

I'm so sorry you're going through this. Have you contacted Ohio State?

[Aerosmom]

From what I can tell, they didn't do the specialized test because the total cost was $90, and NCU's website says the specialized test costs $100.

 

http://www.cvm.ncsu.edu/docs/PDFS/ticklab/...onella_7-07.pdf

 

It doesn't sound like the neurologist thinks it's TBD at all any more.

 

I feel uneasy because we can't pinpoint what's causing this -- short of opening up her spinal cord, which obviously is not an option.

 

I'm so sorry you're going through this. Have you contacted Ohio State?

 

No -- maybe I should run it by them just in the off chance that they've seen similar symptoms.

[turbotaina]

One of our adopters (who actually posted his story here) had a dog with what was probably bartonella. TBD test at NC State came up negative, but they treated it as if it were bartonella and the pup has returned to normal. He wasn't exhibiting neurological symptoms, however.

 

Good luck getting this figured out!