Very Sick Grey...advice Needed Not Sure How To Proceed Or If To Procee

[galgrey]

Sending good thoughts for your sweet boy.

[Guest grey_dreams]

Hoping that he gets better soon

[tbhounds]

This could be an acute onset of IBD--he may have been harboring the disease and with the stress of a new household it was brought on. Your hound sounds like he needs hetastarch followed with a plasma transfusion ASAP. He needs intensive care-I would transport him ASAP. Check his B-12/folate.

[Guest alannamac]

This could be an acute onset of IBD--he may have been harboring the disease and with the stress of a new household it was brought on. Your hound sounds like he needs hetastarch followed with a plasma transfusion ASAP. He needs intensive care-I would transport him ASAP. Check his B-12/folate.

Thank you this is exactly where my vet was going too. Red's been on hetastarch all day and I'm finishing up the dose here at home. I've strict instructions of what to watch for and when to go to the evet. Aiming to keep the costs lower so I can treat longer but evet may be necessary.

The possibilities being considered right now are IBD and 2 types of gastric lymphoma.

 

Thank you everyone for your good thoughts.

[Guest gomiesmom]

Prayers for your little young guy. I have a crisis also ( ongoing) & at my request my primary vet called OSU- even w/ out Dr. C ; they phone consulted w/ My vet. My guy ended up at NC State teaching complex. Just mentioning OSU as a consult if red tape w/ Cuoto.Alos, learned thru my deal, that teaching hosp will consult - in order to determine the 'referral' , which iS the only way you can get there, or the only way I could get to Internal dept of NC State.

 

Many, many good thoughts for you & your guy - I am walking right with 'ya!!!!!!!

[Guest alannamac]

Prayers for your little young guy. I have a crisis also ( ongoing) & at my request my primary vet called OSU- even w/ out Dr. C ; they phone consulted w/ My vet. My guy ended up at NC State teaching complex. Just mentioning OSU as a consult if red tape w/ Cuoto.Alos, learned thru my deal, that teaching hosp will consult - in order to determine the 'referral' , which iS the only way you can get there, or the only way I could get to Internal dept of NC State.

 

Many, many good thoughts for you & your guy - I am walking right with 'ya!!!!!!!

Thank you. Thinking good thoughts for you and your boy too. Hang in there this is tough. I like to think our guys have little angels on their shoulders watching over them.

 

I forgot to say that my vet did 3 specialist consults today one of whom was Dr. Cuoto (who's in Spain at the moment!) we're working with the best advice out there. That's what we're going with. Thank heavens these wonderful general vets and specialists to consult exist, willing to give it their all day and night to do the best they are able for our babies.

[a_daerr]

How terrible that all this happened so quickly. I bet you (and your petsitter) feels awful.

Following this thread and sending good thoughts for your boy.

[Charlies_Dad]

Good thoughts for your boy. I hope you are able to find a diagnosis and a cure.

[Neighsayer]

Hope you guys had a good night.

[kudzu]

Sounds like your general vet is very thorough and caring. Hopefully the newest treatment is working and no E-vet visit was needed last night. Still holding you all in my thoughts.

[DesiRayMom]

You're doing all you can do.

Prayers coming for your young lad, for the docs treating him, and for strength for yourself to get through this nightmare.

[Guest alannamac]

Thank you for the good thoughts. Yes Kudzu my vet is wonderful. I cannot say enough good things about her and her whole practice.

 

Well last night was hard but no evet was needed. The IV had a few glitches but I figured them out thank heavens for YouTube videos and managed to give him the hetastarch dose he needed last night as well as the various stomach soothing and diarrhea meds. I also basically force fed him a few spoonfulls of food every few hours since he is no longer eating on his own just to try to keep something in his stomach.

He was so weak and shaky and awful looking this morning and I had to lift him into the car. He did not want to get out at the vet this morning either. His spirit just seems so broken and he's so frail looking.

BUT my vet called and some of his blood values are looking better (no increase in albumin yet though) so we are continuing treatment and hospital care today. A specialist is coming to ultrasound his abdomen to look for signs of lymphoma. Still trying to figure out whether this is IBD or lymphoma and treating for both.

[Batmom]

Poor bug, and poor worried person. Fingers crossed that those blood values continue to look better and that he starts to feel better as well.

[MaryJane]

Hope the blood work gets better today.

 

If it is IBD, you might want to consider giving some maruka honey (expensive about $30.00 for small jar). Lucy has IBD (low B12 and high Folate) and I have been giving this every day - about 1/2 teaspoon. It may be helping but, does not appear to hurt. It supposedly has anti-inflammatory tendencies and could help. Vitamin B12 shots is one of the treatment paths for IBD along with prebiotics, special diets, steroids, and anti-inflammatory.

 

You might also want to consider slippery elm for the GI tract - this comes in capsules and you make it like a tea. This coats the GI tract and could help inflammation. You have to be careful with this one as it can hinder the ability to absorb medications. I haven't tried this yet as Lucy is also an epileptic and on many medicines for that so I would have to be careful of the absorption issue. Check with the vet before giving this one.

[deboosh]

So sorry you're facing this health crisis. Seeing as it seems to be such a mystery with an acute onset, I think I'd be asking the sitter again, if there was any possibility that he got into something? I'm just wondering if the sitter could possibly be aware of something like an accidental poisoning, but is afraid to divulge it? Not trying to cause trouble, and I know it's a delicate subject, but if the mystery seems to be only getting deeper, then I'd turn to the sitter again.

[Guest alannamac]

So sorry you're facing this health crisis. Seeing as it seems to be such a mystery with an acute onset, I think I'd be asking the sitter again, if there was any possibility that he got into something? I'm just wondering if the sitter could possibly be aware of something like an accidental poisoning, but is afraid to divulge it? Not trying to cause trouble, and I know it's a delicate subject, but if the mystery seems to be only getting deeper, then I'd turn to the sitter again.

I'm sure the vet must have considered this. They see poisonings all the time and I think the symptoms don't quite fit.

She and 3 other specialists think it was a low lying condition that I was managing by keeping his stress levels low and when he went to the pup sitter's house the condition just took off along with his stress hormones.

My sitter is a very honest and kind person. A huge animal lover and I am positive that if there was anything gotten into she would've told me if she knew about it.

[carronstar]

Just checking in on you and your boy this morning. Happy to hear that you had a quiet night.

[Remolacha]

hoping for an improvement today! sounds like you have an excellent team, giving him every chance!

[mom2four]

So sorry this is happening to Red. We hope he gets well soon.

 

Something similar happened to our Diego years ago, he all of a sudden got sick with bloody, watery diarrhea. He got dehydrated very quickly. He ended up spending a long weekend at the ER vet's. We never found out what it was (it was hot outside that August so dehydration was one thought), parasites was another thought, although he had been dewormed. In the end he recovered just fine and has never had another episode. We hope the same for Red.

 

Hugs.

[robinw]

Just checking in

[Neighsayer]

Hope this is a better day.

[Guest alannamac]

Things may be improving....albumin is still off the charts low but his physical appearance is looking better, less edema etc and apparently he's starting to eat a bit voluntarily in fact mooching angel food cake from the staff! This is a good sign. Doctor says we are not out of the woods yet but that she is cautiously optimistic. Still don't know if it's the kidneys or the GI tract doing the protein dumping.

(I get the impression if it's kidneys that's bad, GI tract, treatable) But in general the current line of treatment seems to be working and we're going to continue with it.

A specialist is coming to do an ultrasound to check for lymphoma later today. If there's a mass causing all of this, then he may be suffering and my vet wants to make sure that's not left hanging all weekend unknown.

 

Thank you all for your words of encouragement!

Edited May 30, 2014 by alannamac

[tbhounds]

Have you checked his urine for protein??

[Guest alannamac]

Hope the blood work gets better today.

 

If it is IBD, you might want to consider giving some maruka honey (expensive about $30.00 for small jar). Lucy has IBD (low B12 and high Folate) and I have been giving this every day - about 1/2 teaspoon. It may be helping but, does not appear to hurt. It supposedly has anti-inflammatory tendencies and could help. Vitamin B12 shots is one of the treatment paths for IBD along with prebiotics, special diets, steroids, and anti-inflammatory.

 

You might also want to consider slippery elm for the GI tract - this comes in capsules and you make it like a tea. This coats the GI tract and could help inflammation. You have to be careful with this one as it can hinder the ability to absorb medications. I haven't tried this yet as Lucy is also an epileptic and on many medicines for that so I would have to be careful of the absorption issue. Check with the vet before giving this one.

Thank you I will ask my vet about this honey. I've heard people mention it before as a wound healing agent I think....

Have to find out first if this really is IBD but I'll keep it on my list of questions once we know!

Have you checked his urine for protein??

Yes but there were two types of tests (not sure what) and one contradicted the other (one said off the charts protein the other said none) and the lab is rerunning the samples as obviously there's been some sort of error.

Frustrating....

[XTRAWLD]

Catching up on this thread, how awful and stressful of a situation. Just wanted to offer up my thoughts and prayers to you for Red to pull through and keep on pulling.