Infection Or Osteo? 7 Year Old Greyhound

[Guest KentuckyRock]

I've always searched the forum for information about my greyhound but I wanted to sign up for advice about my greyhound "Kentucky".

 

I adopted Kentucky in 2011, he was born in 2009.

 

Yesterday(Tuesday) Kentucky went outside to use the bathroom in the rain when he came back in he was panting and had trouble walking(like he had no energy to stand up). He laid down but kept panting hard & shaking. We took him to the vet. When the vet checked his temperature it was 107F! They went & put Kentucky in a ice bath to cool him down. They checked his range of motion which was ok, and did a X-ray of his legs. He said there appeared to be some sort of infection on his lower left part of his leg and minor swelling at that spot. He said it wasn't cancer. (The vet went to school at Ohio State & has told us he worked on greyhounds at school).

 

Kentucky on Sunday morning, vomited a while after eating his breakfast of chicken, kibble, & a pepto pill. He takes a pepto pill with his meals, a medication and fish oil for what the vet says is him having too high of proteins in his kidneys. In 2015 Kentucky after a walk in 70F summer weather fell down when he got home, we went to the vet they cooled him down & put him on IVs. He later got better and the vet believed the issue was due to being overweight & low thyroid(which I asked him to check as Kentucky was on low thyroid medication when we got him). That's when they also noticed the high proteins.

 

Last week Kentucky after a walk when he got home we took a tick off of him. We thought we removed the tick before it bite him but maybe it did and that's why the infection?

 

Kentucky came home last night after the vet put him on chloramphenicol & prednisone. I was still concerned worrying about if it could be Osteo but the vet said it wasn't cancer. He sent a culture away to see what kind of infection it is. Kentucky when he got home was not panting walked better but not normal, and laid down & slept though the night. He only would eat a Denistix treat last night, he wouldn't eat his chicken or kibble. This morning he woke up crying as he was hungry and he ate his chicken and kibble. He was walking very lethargically, hesitating to walk up the two back porch steps to come inside.

 

Today he slept most of the day, but after hesitating for a while he jumped up onto the one bed of my Grandmothers that he likes to lay on. Getting off the bed he hesitated a while before doing as well. He only started panting when he kept walking by the stairs up to my room(also his room). We moved his bed down from my room to the living room & also my Grandmothers room(moving it back & forth). Everyday at 1pm & 8pm he gets a Denistix and he knows when it's time and he knows when one of us goes to the closet to get the treat it's time to upstairs. If he doesn't get his treat on time he will cry or bark. I got him his treat and gave it to him in the living room and he stopped panting. He had no trouble walking up the back porch steps this time, he didn't hesitate at all.

 

Vet said his White blood cell count was slightly elevated and would take some days for the culture to come back.

 

Tonight at dinner we had chicken. He got up from his sleep to smell like usual. We never usually give him food off our plates at dinner but we did tonight and gave him some chicken and he started panting again for a few minutes.

 

It's just weird how this came out of nowhere. Tuesday morning he was outside running around like normal, running in circles playing with his toys. Barking at my Dad to play with him. (Kentucky loves to bark when he sees my Dad who takes him on long walks). But since he had his high temperature he wasn't barked at all. Last summer after he fell over & had a fever he wouldn't bark & didn't get back to being himself for about a week.

 

Rest of the family agrees with the vet that Kentucky is just sick and it's some sort of infection but I worry so much that it could be osteo. I kept crying & hardly slept last night. Kentucky is my first ever dog(I adopted him when I was 20). My parents & grandmother have had dogs before(but this is their first Greyhound too). I just love Kentucky so much I want him to be ok. I would post pictures of his legs on here if I knew how to post a picture.

 

Any ideas what could be wrong. Infection? Osteo? Something else? Thank you very much for reading this.

[Time4ANap]

It's too easy to jump to the Osteo conclusion when there are so many other things it could be. Take a breath and give your vet time to get the test results. Stressing doesn't help you or the dog.

 

Photo posting instructions. Most people use Photobucket, Flickr, or Imgur to store their photos and post them here. Those three are the easiest, although Photobucket sometimes gets flaky.

 

Good luck. Hope that Kentucky is feeling better soon and that you get to the bottom of this quickly.

[greysmom]

Really, all of that sounds reasonable, given his experiences. It all depends on if you trust your vet and the care he's prescribing. If you're concerned, you can ask to have your vet send digital copies of the xrays to Dr Couto - who is *the* greyhound expert on diagnosing cancer - through this website:

http://www.coutovetconsultants.com/for-ownersadopters/

 

The only thing I would do in addition is to have your vet run tests for Tick Born Diseases (TBDs) since you live in an area that has them. Once the culture comes back, and you can get him on a specific antibiotic, he should respond quickly. The chloramphenicol may be helping already. Be calm for Kentucky. There are a lot of things that could be causing these symptoms besides osteo.

 

Good thoughts for you and your boy! {{{hugs}}}

[NeylasMom]

Do you mean Pepcid, rather than pepto?

 

And did they do a full blood panel and urinalysis both times? Results would be useful if they did. I ask because the first incident sounds very much like rhabdomyolysis and can cause protein in the urine. Rhabdo is a disease of overexertion or overheating. The muscle starts to break down, producing myoglobin, which has to be processed by the kidneys and often overtaxes them. If left untreated a more severe acute case can lead to death though there are milder cases where the dog may even recover on its own. A common symptom is dark red urine from the myoglobin (different than blood, you can tell the difference by spinning down the urine - red blood cells will pack down, myoglobin won't). Also typical are signs of kidney problems like protein or casts in the urine. Elevated CK enzymes are a telltale sign as well. I mention all of this because I'm concerned that your vet thought that incident was due to a low thyroid. And dogs who have had rhabdo (thought it may have just been that he overheated, not that he had rhabdo) or have overheated are prone to have it happen again so it's good to be well informed of signs and proper treatment.

 

Having said all of that, this sounds very different and also doesn't necessarily sound like cancer. When you say he sent off a culture, did he do any other tests? A panel for tick borne diseases would be a good place to start. I doubt the tick you pulled off would be the cause as the ones that cause TBDs tend to be small, but if he's getting ticks, it's certainly a possibility. A full panel from NC state or Protatek would be a good idea. Also worth sending the x-rays off to Dr. Couto to be safe.

[SanTanSnuggles]

http://www.antechdiagnostics.com/main/PatientEducationTools.aspx

 

http://www.cdc.gov/ehrlichiosis/

 

http://www.merckvetmanual.com/mvm/index.html

 

These three sites helped me with my dog. She recently got ehrlichiosis from a tick, fever, muscle aches, etc. We live in Maryland, not sure where you live. Since I have two, they are both on doxy for eight weeks. Than more blood tests. We caught this early on. My boy is eight, going on nine and the girl is two and a half. They are doing good with the med.

 

The girl dog had a slightly unusual thyroid reading, so the vet thought, until he checked what was normal for greyhounds. Than the vet said she was just fine. Good luck with yours/ Prayers.

Edited December 1, 2016 by SanTanSnuggles

[Guest KentuckyRock]

Kentucky is walking like normal again, easy getting up the two back porch stone steps. He was tested for Tick Borne but the results haven't come back yet. The vet has called every day to check on him, he's very good & caring.

 

Kentucky is very lethargic but that's probably due to the medication. His temperature is normal. His ears are perking up again & he's not walking with his head down. He's barked at night when he wanted to go outside to use the bathroom. If you call him he'll wake up and come over & he's eating his food & looking for more like normal. Not running around in the backyard, and hasn't come up the 14 carpeted stairs to my & his room yet. He looked up the stairs tonight for a while & laid at the bottom of them. I don't want to coach him to come up the stairs as I worry what if he has a problem coming back down them. I'd rather see him become more active before I coach him to come upstairs.

 

Thank you all for your expertise & well wishes, it truly means a lot to me & Kentucky! Thank you so much!

[greysmom]

Up stairs will be harder on the back legs, down will be harder on the front legs. (I'm unclear which leg Kentucky is favoring.) But either way, he should manage OK as long as the stairs have some carpet or tread runners, and aren't too steep. My osteo boy had a bak leg amp and ended up doing our stairs for 9 months! If he needs some help, and he'll let you, you can rig up a temporary assist harness so you can help him up or down.

 

Use a large towel so you have enough to grab and hold on to when it's around him. OR if you have one of those cloth reusable grocery bags, cut out the two short side pieces so you're left with the large sides with the handles and the bottom (without the cardboard).

[NeylasMom]

Great to hear he's improving. If he's not bothered with staying downstairs I think you're smart not to push it. Zuri had LS and ended up slipping on our (carpeted) stairs on more than one occasion. Thankfully he wasn't seriously hurt, but it made him reticent to use them at times as a result.

[Guest KentuckyRock]

Kentucky made it up the stairs with ease with no coaching or anything on Saturday. That made me feel great.

 

Vet called today, and said Kentucky's culture came back & he has "Tick Borne illness" he said just keep taking the medications he prescribed for him last week. He said he should get better. He seems to be getting better each day.

 

Thank you all

[MP_the4pack]

you have a definitive diagnosis. While tick borne diseases are dangerous they are very curable if caught soon enough.

[3greytjoys]

Welcome to GreyTalk!

 

First, I'm so relieved that Kentucky survived that 107 F. temperature! Wow, that was close. I can imagine how relieved you must feel that his condition is not from osteo. Poor boy, no wonder he's been feeling so ill. Glad you have his diagnosis now so he can be treated. Curious if your vet mentioned which type of tick borne illness(?). Great that you're already seeing a bit of improvement.

 

My only TBD experience was 35 years ago with a different breed. My dog suddenly became completely paralyzed from a tick bite. I was afraid it was permanent, but the vet pulled him out of it with careful treatment. Thankfully, he fully recovered and lived a long, healthy life thereafter. The region had a lot of ticks, but we avoided future problems by avoiding tall grasses and shrubs. After leashed walks, he was inspected for ticks. A flea comb can be very useful to help find ticks also.

 

I'm not clear if Kentucky's 70 degrees F. walk was in sun, or the duration of his walk, but many healthy Greyhounds can't handle very much walking over about 70 to 72 F, especially if in direct sun. Our hounds slowly begin melting at 70 F -- in the shade.

 

Please let us know how things go with Kentucky. He will be in our healing thoughts.

[SanTanSnuggles]

Just checking in on Kentucky. Hope he is doing fine. My greyhounds are doing good so far on the doxy.

[Guest KentuckyRock]

Kentucky is more active in reacting like barking, ears, coming when you ask him but he seems weaker.

 

He's not eating all of his breakfast or dinner. When he does eat it's only the chicken & rice(and sometimes not all of it), he's not eating his kibble. We got him new kibble and he ate some of it. He gets excited when you ask him to go for a walk but when he starts walking he wants to go home. He enjoyed going for a ride in the car. He's now gotten worse at the stairs. He struggled trying to get up them, so we helped him. He kept trying but didn't fully try. We had to put one rear legs on the bottom step then he will go up the stairs. But as the week went he kept walking up the stairs slower. From a gallup/run to a one step at a time very slow. Today he struggled going down the stairs.

 

He was overweight, but you can tell he's lost a lot of weight in the past two weeks from not eating all of his meals. Could it be that he's lost muscle which is why he is struggling with the stairs? He makes it up the back porch stairs fine and those stairs are just two stone stairs but it's a bigger height from the ground to the first step compared to the stairs(first step is closer to the ground, compared to backporch steps).

 

Just worrying about him, want him to get better. Vet said to let Kentucky eat when he wants to, as we usually feed him at 6am/4:30pm, but now he won't eat all of his breakfast but he'll ask for food around 1-2pm, then same at 4:30pm, so we'll give him food at 6pm.

 

He jumps onto the bed easily and gets off of it easily, which is a bigger height difference than the stairs.

 

I live in NY btw, Vet didn't know which kind of Tick Borne disease he had. From looking at his ear tattoos when I adopted him in 2011, Kentucky raced in Florida, but was born in Kansas.

Edited December 11, 2016 by KentuckyRock

[NeylasMom]

So I didn't want to be a negative nelly, but I was wondering when you posted whether the vet just didn't give you specifics and if so, how he came to that conclusion, or he really wasn't sure and if so, what led him to them diagnose a TBD without further testing. It all strikes me as a bit un-thorough if I'm being nice.

 

If it were me, I would want more detailed info. Which TBD and what test results gave that info, what are treatment options, and how do you retest down the road to ensure he's free of disease.

 

In my experience, TBDs can be hard to eliminate and more and more it looks like they go into remission rather than being eradicated and treatment depends on which TBD. For instance, Lyme is often treated with an AB like doxycycline while Babesia requires an entirely different class of drugs. I've not heard of steroids being used, which doesn't mean they aren't. There are also less common TBDs that are harder to diagnose starting to show up, like bartonella. So if it were me I would want a full tick panel - most common places are NC State, which many consider the gold standard, especially as they offer PCR testing, or Protatek and then go from there.

Edited December 11, 2016 by NeylasMom

[3greytjoys]

I agree with Neylasmom. If you're unable to get a more detailed diagnosis, perhaps a different test and/or second opinion could help(?).

 

Our Greyhounds are very stoic, but they are smart in knowing when their body is not up to certain movement/activities. I try to watch and respect our hounds' physical limitations, especially when they're struggling with injury or illness. I probably wouldn't try to push the main staircase activity too much. Perhaps arranging sleeping quarters downstairs could help for a while(?).

 

He might be feeling weaker due to reduced food intake, medications, and/or his illness. When our hounds are taking medications, I look up the veterinary side effects of each medication. Many medications affect appetite level, some increase drowsiness, cause ataxia (wobbly coordination), etc. If meds are supposed to be given with food, he might eat various flavors of canned ground meat dog foods more easily. If meds are given on an empty stomach, it can make them feel poorly overall, and reduce their interest in eating meals.

 

BTW, a nice visual indication of healthy pet Greyhound weight is seeing the last two ribs (and hip points). Thank you for letting us know about Kentucky's update. Continued positive healing thoughts for Kentucky.