Questions For Anyone Who Has

[Guest koolaidnconner]

We are now going to start Conner on Imuran. We just can not get over this hump of straining and vomiting even on prednisone.

 

Can anyone explain any side effects thier houndies may have had on it? The vet said that we do have to come back every 2 weeks for CBCs the first 2 months to make sure nothing goes wrong with his liver.

 

Anything else you guys can tell me?

[ShantisMom]

Shanti was on it for a bit for IMPA. She had to have her liver values checked and regular blood work. It wipes out their immune system. While on this she developed a bad case of Staph infection and her Valley Fever showed up full force so we had to stop. She felt like crud on it. Hard to get her to eat! Have lots of tempting food on hand.

 

Have you given Pepcid with it? She got 15mg of pepcid 20 minutes before all the medication. It helped. But that stuff is just nasty. Sorry Conner is on it.

[RobinM]

Beau has been on imuran for 7 months. for the first 2 months we did labs every 4 weeks, after that for 2 months it was ever 6 weeks, now it;s every 2 months.

 

No side effects other than some minor skin pusticles.

[tbhounds]

My girl is currently taking it along with a pretty high dose of pred---she has had horrible gas and diarrhea--I don't think it's from the pred cause it's worse on the days she takes the Imuran (takes 50mgs every other day and takes 25 mgs of pred twice a day every day). Can't wait to get her off of it but, for now it's saving her life.

As a side note-prilosec does help--also my pup is taking carafate every 6 hours and metronidazole twice daily---it does help.

[greyhndz]

Iggy Jared has been on Imuran for about 8 years for Immune Mediated Thrombocytopenia, and has had no problems with it whatsoever. His littersister Lexi was started on Imuran for Immune Mediated Polyarthritis. She was already on prednisone, but the plan was to taper the pred once the Imuran was on board. Unfortunately she became very ill with drug-induced hepatitis -- from Imuran. Within a week, she had to come off it.

 

As a rule, bloodwork is very carefully monitored for the first month (every 1-2 weeks), and then every 6-8 weeks thereafter, looking for elevated liver enzymes or bone marrow suppression.

 

If a dog can tolerate Imuran, however, it's a far better option than lifelong steroids.

[lovinggreysslp]

Clay was on Imuran for over a year and we did not see any side effects. We were initially very concerned about giving him medication that said to wear gloves when handling medication. The addition of the Imuran to Clay's other medications to control severe IBD made all the difference for him though.

[ahicks51]

Refresh my memory- his primary problem is IBD?