Gi Issues?

[Guest KiKi_Girl]

I will be taking KiKi to the vet this week; just wanted to get some thoughts from all of you.

 

The first week of July I went out of town for a week and had a dog sitter stay with KiKi. She only ate about 1.5 cups of food the entire week, along with some biscuts (I knows she goes on hunger strikes when I leave so this was not alarming). When I got home she was back to eating two cups a day. About a week or so after that she went on another hunger strike with a little mushy poo (she is usually nice and firm) but then was back to normal. For the last three weeks or so she has really been off her food (Innova, which she has been on the 6.5 years I've owned her). It was the end of a bag so I thought maybe it was stale (I only buy 15# at a time so it doesn't go bad). I also bought some EVO to add to maybe tempt her to eat (which she has also had in the past). She did not want eat that either. She is a dog that will turn her nose up at chicken, so she is hard to tempt even with tasty treats.

 

For the last two weeks I have made her boiled chicken and rice with about 1/3 to 2/3 of her Innova mixed in. There are days she will eat a little and then others where she will turn up her nose. I have been coming home to a few diarrhea messes and then she will have a poo or two that is good. The past three days we have had the air and water show here in Chicago with the jets flying over which really stress her out, as well as thunderstorms so she has been a stressed out girl for the last three days. This morning she had the runs again and now there is occasionally a bit of blood (bright red) mixed in, as well as some of her semi-firm stools have a mucous covering.

 

I know I have let this go a bit too long, but it always seems like I can find an excuse for her not eating (ie, traveling, the hot humid weather, the jets, storms, etc.)

 

She recently had her anal glands express (they were full but not infected) and she weighed in at 60# so she doesn't seem to be losing weight but I can tell she is just "off".

 

 

Any thoughts of what might be going on with her GI system?

 

BTW: KiKi is 7yrs 8mos

[MaryJane]

I would strongly suggest bringing her to a vet since this has been going on since the beginning of July. If it had been going on a few days - I might recommend trying other things first but, 6 to 7 weeks is a long time ....

 

edited to add ... these types of things where the pups are good for a few days and then bad tend to lull us into thinking that it's not a big deal and before we know it, weeks have passed.

Edited August 17, 2009 by MaryJane

[Guest Energy11]

I would VET her ASAP! Just to be sure ...

[5blackgreys]

I took my girl to the vet's today and she'd only been off her feed since yesterday. Blood work showed she has pancreatitis. I wouldn't wait any longer to take your pup to the vet's.

[Guest koolaidnconner]

Get her to a vet immediatly.

[Guest KiKi_Girl]

I'm taking her in on Wednesday; I'll keep everyone posted. Thank you.

[Magdalyn58]

Please do. I'll be sending healing thoughts her way.

 

By the way, she is beautiful!

[Guest KiKi_Girl]

Update...Sorry I didn't post earlier but I wanted to wait and hear from the vet regarding her blood work.

 

Thankfully, everything came back normal! CBC, Chem profile, thyroid, fecal all looked great.

 

So, we are assuming that it is colitis/possible IBD. She is on 20mg of pecid/day, 1/4 tsp of Tylosin powder/2X day, and a bland diet of chicken and rice. I will be switching her to a new protein and grain-free food once she is back on kibble. She is stll not eating much, but she is eating and drinking and she had her first stool this morning that was soft, but not liquid so that is good.

 

Tylosin is not fun stuff to try and get down her so I went and bought capsules yesterday and dosed her that way last night and today - SO much easier. KiKi does not eat most "people food" so tempting her is really tough, especially if she even thinks you are trying to hide something in it. Gotta love my stubborn girl.

 

The vet will check back next week to see how we are doing.

[Guest Energy11]

Good update! She should be feeling better soon! :-)

[Guest kydie]

I would guess IBD, sound familiar here!

[Guest SoulsMom]

Sounds like stress colitis to me. Glad to hear she's feeling better!

[Guest lynne893]

we went through about 4 mo. of similar issues with Timber, and tried every stomach med you could possibly name, and it turned out to be lymphoma of her GI tract. i don't mean to scare you, but Timber was just diagnosed a couple of days ago, after an abdominal ultrasound, which I wish we'd done a couple of months ago.

 

if kiki's symptoms persist, even after diet and med attempts, i'd see about the ultrasound.

 

good luck, and sending you healing thoughts.

[dbullwinkel]

I know how you feel..I am going through this same thing with Garry at the moment. He also has been having problems on and off since July. Been to the vet 3 times for it. He is now on pepcid, flagyl (double the dosage) and amox. Vet said it is gastroenteritis...so I understand what you are going through.

[Guest pillman2]

Our Niki has periodic stomach/bowel problems. He has bowel sounds so loud we can hear them half a room away. His vet has sold us a medication called Gastricalm. Has anyone had experience with this drug? I can't tell if it really helps or not.

[Guest LindsaySF]

I would deworm her as well.

 

 

[greyhead]

Our Niki has periodic stomach/bowel problems. He has bowel sounds so loud we can hear them half a room away. His vet has sold us a medication called Gastricalm. Has anyone had experience with this drug? I can't tell if it really helps or not.

I don't know about this product, so I googled it and got this: http://www.petstruly.com/3356.html

It sounds promising, but much depends on why you pup gurgles. We use simethicone for that purpose, but then we use several other things for our pup's IBD. But your pup could have hookworm and get the same noisy effect.