Is Seizure Study Still Being Done?

[Guest capers7]

I saw the pinned seizure information up above, but there have been no posts by the author in quite a while. Not sure if the study is continuing, or if something happened. My boy has grand mal seizures and I would like to help if I can. Also would love to get all the information I can as well. He is well controlled right now, but went 11 months with no seizure then for no reason I could see just started having them out of the blue. It has been since May last year and we have been gradually weaning him down on the medications. Thanks!

[heartdogs]

Julie, there are several good sites on the web where you can get information. I joined the yahoo epilisey group when sent there from another group I belong to as my girl has several medical problems. Last night Noelle had several seizures but thank doG none were GMs.

[MaryJane]

I had sent a message to the seizure study owner but, never received anything back. I would have loved to see the results of the study .. or even continue it.

 

I also joined the yahoo epilepsy group and it can provide good support and information about medicines. I personally miss having something like greytalk for seizure greyhounds but, it is what it is.

 

Also, dogs can start seizing again once you start weaning down or changing the medicines - was the decreasing of medicines on the recommendation of a neurologist?

[Guest capers7]

I had sent a message to the seizure study owner but, never received anything back. I would have loved to see the results of the study .. or even continue it.

 

I also joined the yahoo epilepsy group and it can provide good support and information about medicines. I personally miss having something like greytalk for seizure greyhounds but, it is what it is.

 

Also, dogs can start seizing again once you start weaning down or changing the medicines - was the decreasing of medicines on the recommendation of a neurologist?

I would like to know what happened to the study as well. I will check out the yahoo group.

 

The weaning was suggested by the vet as we had gone from one 64 mg phenobarb twice a day (all doses twice a day) to 1.5 and then added 1 mL Kbr and then upped that to 1.5 mL before he finally settled down. He had been seizure free for 11 months on just the 1 phenobarb, so we hoped to get him down a little. I had a lot of other grey owners very concerned about liver toxicity and all from the drugs. I am down to 1 phenobarb and 1 mL of Kbr right now. Trying to reach a happy medium.

 

Although he has grand mal seizures, they are evidently considered fairly short, about 2 to 3 minutes for the thrashing phase, though that is enough for his half gallon bladder to relieve itself. The vet was mentioning if they last over 10 minutes to start hosing him down. I cannot imaging him or any dog going through that for that long.

[Guest capers7]

Julie, there are several good sites on the web where you can get information. I joined the yahoo epilisey group when sent there from another group I belong to as my girl has several medical problems. Last night Noelle had several seizures but thank doG none were GMs.

Poor baby. It is so hard to see them go through it. Hang in there Noelle!

 

My previous dog (toy poodle) had petit mal seizures. I could hold her in my lap and comfort her during her seizures. I know she could tell I was there and it did help. I thought I was equipped to handle another dog with seizures when I adopted Theo. I wasn't, but got on board real quick! He is not "there" during his seizures and is 84 pounds of pure muscle. Best I can do is hold him down and keep him safe as best as possible.

[TheFullHouse]

Saint was controlled with pheno and potassium bromide for 6 years with no effect to his liver what so ever. He was on 2 96 mg. tablets of pheno and 600 mg. of potassium bromide. Once his seizures were under control we never messed with the dose. We ended up losing him last weekend to an issue totally unrelated to his seizures.

 

I hope you reach a level that will keep your boy seizure free.

[MaryJane]

I had sent a message to the seizure study owner but, never received anything back. I would have loved to see the results of the study .. or even continue it.

 

I also joined the yahoo epilepsy group and it can provide good support and information about medicines. I personally miss having something like greytalk for seizure greyhounds but, it is what it is.

 

Also, dogs can start seizing again once you start weaning down or changing the medicines - was the decreasing of medicines on the recommendation of a neurologist?

I would like to know what happened to the study as well. I will check out the yahoo group.

 

The weaning was suggested by the vet as we had gone from one 64 mg phenobarb twice a day (all doses twice a day) to 1.5 and then added 1 mL Kbr and then upped that to 1.5 mL before he finally settled down. He had been seizure free for 11 months on just the 1 phenobarb, so we hoped to get him down a little. I had a lot of other grey owners very concerned about liver toxicity and all from the drugs. I am down to 1 phenobarb and 1 mL of Kbr right now. Trying to reach a happy medium.

 

Although he has grand mal seizures, they are evidently considered fairly short, about 2 to 3 minutes for the thrashing phase, though that is enough for his half gallon bladder to relieve itself. The vet was mentioning if they last over 10 minutes to start hosing him down. I cannot imaging him or any dog going through that for that long.

 

 

Are you using a neurologist or a regular vet? If you are using a regular vet then I would suggest switching to a neurologist - seizures are pretty tricky in being able to keep a dog relatively seizure free and without the side effects of many of the medicines and regular vets may not have the expertise on these particular drugs.

[Guest capers7]

Saint was controlled with pheno and potassium bromide for 6 years with no effect to his liver what so ever. He was on 2 96 mg. tablets of pheno and 600 mg. of potassium bromide. Once his seizures were under control we never messed with the dose. We ended up losing him last weekend to an issue totally unrelated to his seizures.

 

I hope you reach a level that will keep your boy seizure free.

I am so sorry for your loss! And thank you for the info about Saint. It is good to know. I don't have any other sounding board for what is being done, gotta get on the aforementioned Yahoo group! Again, my heart goes out to you, Saint looks like such a sweet dog.

[Guest capers7]

I had sent a message to the seizure study owner but, never received anything back. I would have loved to see the results of the study .. or even continue it.

 

I also joined the yahoo epilepsy group and it can provide good support and information about medicines. I personally miss having something like greytalk for seizure greyhounds but, it is what it is.

 

Also, dogs can start seizing again once you start weaning down or changing the medicines - was the decreasing of medicines on the recommendation of a neurologist?

I would like to know what happened to the study as well. I will check out the yahoo group.

 

The weaning was suggested by the vet as we had gone from one 64 mg phenobarb twice a day (all doses twice a day) to 1.5 and then added 1 mL Kbr and then upped that to 1.5 mL before he finally settled down. He had been seizure free for 11 months on just the 1 phenobarb, so we hoped to get him down a little. I had a lot of other grey owners very concerned about liver toxicity and all from the drugs. I am down to 1 phenobarb and 1 mL of Kbr right now. Trying to reach a happy medium.

 

Although he has grand mal seizures, they are evidently considered fairly short, about 2 to 3 minutes for the thrashing phase, though that is enough for his half gallon bladder to relieve itself. The vet was mentioning if they last over 10 minutes to start hosing him down. I cannot imaging him or any dog going through that for that long.

 

 

Are you using a neurologist or a regular vet? If you are using a regular vet then I would suggest switching to a neurologist - seizures are pretty tricky in being able to keep a dog relatively seizure free and without the side effects of many of the medicines and regular vets may not have the expertise on these particular drugs.

I am on the Oregon coast at least 2 hours from any specialists (not even a human neurologist for 2 hours). Aside from the unexplained bout of seizures last April/May, he has been completly seizure free since we started the initial phenobarb 6 weeks after I adopted him. My vet is pretty savvy with greyhounds. He treats a lot of them in this area and he seemed to be right up on the seizure information as well, not needing to check books for medications or dosage increases, so for now I feel pretty well covered. If he starts having a problems I will definitely seek a neurologist's input.

[greypuppyluv]

I've also wondered whatever happened with the study. It's pretty useless to have the thread pinned if the OP isn't responding to anyone. I would rather see a pinned thread on just greyhounds with epilepsy than the thread that's there now.

 

I had a lot of other grey owners very concerned about liver toxicity and all from the drugs. I am down to 1 phenobarb and 1 mL of Kbr right now. Trying to reach a happy medium.

 

Although he has grand mal seizures, they are evidently considered fairly short, about 2 to 3 minutes for the thrashing phase, though that is enough for his half gallon bladder to relieve itself. The vet was mentioning if they last over 10 minutes to start hosing him down. I cannot imaging him or any dog going through that for that long.

 

A couple of things.....if you (or others) are concerned with liver toxicity, you can and should run a bile acids test every 6 months while your dog is on pheno (not sure if your vet has had you run this test or not). We run the test to see how Phaelin's liver is doing (he's on 97.2 mg of pheno twice a day along with sodium bromide). If the test comes back high, you can always rerun it to make sure you're getting a correct reading. It costs a couple hundred dollars, IIRC, but it's well worth it to know what's going on internally.

 

Second, if a dog is seizing for over 10 minutes, I would personally get that dog to an ER. The dog could go into status and you could lose him/her. This is one reason Mary Jane probably recommended a neurologist. Your vet may be very good with greyhounds, but if they aren't really educated about epileptic dogs, you might get some advice that isn't the most accurate.

 

I'm not on the yahoo list, but I am on the EPIL-K9 list through this website. If you haven't seen this website before, you may want to check it and this one out. Both have some really good information on seizures.

 

eta: I forgot to add that sometimes neurologists will consult with vets, so maybe that could be an option for you since you don't have one close by.

Edited February 8, 2012 by greypuppyluv

[Guest capers7]

I've also wondered whatever happened with the study. It's pretty useless to have the thread pinned if the OP isn't responding to anyone. I would rather see a pinned thread on just greyhounds with epilepsy than the thread that's there now.

 

I had a lot of other grey owners very concerned about liver toxicity and all from the drugs. I am down to 1 phenobarb and 1 mL of Kbr right now. Trying to reach a happy medium.

 

Although he has grand mal seizures, they are evidently considered fairly short, about 2 to 3 minutes for the thrashing phase, though that is enough for his half gallon bladder to relieve itself. The vet was mentioning if they last over 10 minutes to start hosing him down. I cannot imaging him or any dog going through that for that long.

 

A couple of things.....if you (or others) are concerned with liver toxicity, you can and should run a bile acids test every 6 months while your dog is on pheno (not sure if your vet has had you run this test or not). We run the test to see how Phaelin's liver is doing (he's on 97.2 mg of pheno twice a day along with sodium bromide). If the test comes back high, you can always rerun it to make sure you're getting a correct reading. It costs a couple hundred dollars, IIRC, but it's well worth it to know what's going on internally.

 

Second, if a dog is seizing for over 10 minutes, I would personally get that dog to an ER. The dog could go into status and you could lose him/her. This is one reason Mary Jane probably recommended a neurologist. Your vet may be very good with greyhounds, but if they aren't really educated about epileptic dogs, you might get some advice that isn't the most accurate.

 

I'm not on the yahoo list, but I am on the EPIL-K9 list through this website. If you haven't seen this website before, you may want to check it and this one out. Both have some really good information on seizures.

 

eta: I forgot to add that sometimes neurologists will consult with vets, so maybe that could be an option for you since you don't have one close by.

Thank you very much for the information. Thankfully Theo is very well controlled so far, but I will keep the information cataloged!! Also, thank you for the links to other groups!