Sudden Onset Distress With No Apparent Cause & No Diagnosis 72 Hou

[Guest forcefeedbacon]

Mixed news today. She is a tiny bit happier on her feet and a tinier bit more alert but she has a temperature so they’ve started her on antibiotics, and she wet the bed while we were lying with her without a single sign of caring—only noticed by the warm wet puddle on my leg. Never seen her not care before. We took her outside since she kept stopping and starting and she got up with great reluctance, did her business and wanted to go straight back to bed with no sniffs etc at all. On the other hand, she ate the most she’s voluntarily eaten in 6 days—still only a couple of tablespoons with much coaxing, but encouraging to see in any case.

We chatted with the friendly vet who's been very good about listening to concerns and answering our questions, and she was pretty unconcerned about the incontinence (they had noticed she'd wet her bed for the first time last night too). She said it's not uncommon when they're pumping so much fluid through them, which means the kidneys and bladder are working overtime, and the bladder's lining would be irritated and inflamed from the blood that's been in the urine too. She thought it was unlikely it was a UTI but that if it was, they'd see it in the urinalysis they're running at least once a day, and in any case, she's already giving her the antibiotics she'd start for that, and mentioned the anti-inflamms should be helping with the irritation of the bladder lining etc. too.

In more positive news, she said they're now giving her less pain medication to keep her at the same level of comfort, which is a good sign, and today's urine had significantly less blood and protein in it (which is the first positive progression we've had on that front since she's been there). Hopefully that means some corners are being turned, albeit slowly.

We also discussed timelines (understanding it was like asking how long is a piece of string) and possible home care. She said as soon as Asha can come off the IV they'll be sending her home (though first they'll stop it overnight and see how she is in the morning or stop it in the morning and watch her over the day to make sure she doesn't regress without it). It's too risky to try doing IV stuff at home due to needing to change the cannula and the possibilities of it coming out or worse--half out--etc. but they are keen to get her home as soon as they can. She thought (again, with the above disclaimer) that this *might* happen towards the end of the week, but no guarantees. She did feel firmly that progress is being made in the right direction, even if it's taking more time than we'd like.

 

We're grateful for that, and that we get to visit each day while we wait.

 

I'm glad to read that she's recovering. When this is all over and you have a chance to breath, you may want to consider if you should add some anti anxiety medication into this equation. I have had a scared/timid/spooky dog myself so I understand the daily struggle to get your dog to eat, and how horrifying doing everyday things can be for them. Even something simple like DAP diffusers and L-theanine can help, but your girl may need some actual anti anxiety medication like xanax or trazadone.

 

If her anxiety is enough to be a primary or secondary cause of this episode, it's more than enough to medicate her to mitigate any further instances. No dog should have to live in that much fear all the time.

 

Please keep us updated on how things go for you all!

 

Thanks for your wisdom and concern, but she’s pretty bold and confident for a greyhound outside of her few quirks and really isn't anxious except when she's at the vets or there's a buzzy fly in the immediate vicinity. I will strongly suggest they give her a sedative if she has to go into hospital care again though and explain why!

 

Ha! The buzzies! The big black ones drive Iowa crazy. If they are dumb enough to fly into the bathroom, I close the door behind me and do battle with a towel until I win. Then I emerge victorious and brag to Iowa about how brave I was to kill off the fly. Meanwhile she is a total guard dog whenever someone hits the intercom.

 

Iowa is on day 4 of prednisone and doing well enough to eat heartily this evening, even eating up bits of kale mixed into the day's meal with pills. Interestingly I found an article about FUO online and it turns out Dr. Couto is one of the sources for it. I don't see his info listed here for you, so here it is: http://www.coutovetconsultants.com

 

Ha, Asha likes me to show her their dead carcasses on the fly swat so she can confirm the threat has been neutralized, and then she goes back to her peaceful slumber . She knows I always deal with them so she’s a lot more chilled about them these days unless the dastardly thing dares to land on her or be very very sticky about flying right near her. She doesn’t have a guard dog bone in her body though.

 

I’m so glad to hear Iowa is doing so well!!! And good to know about the FUO although Asha really hasn’t had the fever side of things—the first temperature she had when they admitted her on Sunday (so the fourth day since all this started) went away of its own accord very quickly, and so this morning was the first time they’ve needed to give her antibiotics. Please give your precious girl hugs and kisses for me xoxox

[Guest newyorkgrey]

Iowa accidentally peed in the hallway once when she was trying to get to where she does her business right after we got home from the hospital. It was a tremendous jet stream, and I knew it was all of the fluids. She also accidentally peed while greeting me on day three of subcutaneous fluids, so I took her off.

 

These are roller coaster rides with our best friends, and they are so worth the devoted care. I hope you get to take Asha home soon. I'm sure she will be much more comfortable at home.

[Batmom]

Hoping your girl continues to improve (and Iowa too).

[Guest forcefeedbacon]

Thanks all!

 

Asha turned a corner today. Though there was still blood and protein in her urinalysis, she was much, much brighter and ate several decent sized meals (relative to her recent starvation)--which is particularly amazing considering how much of a fussy eater she is, and usually won't eat at all in stressful environments. We're so thrilled and relieved to see her feeling a bit happier and more normal, and are hoping her kidneys catch up with the rest of her so we can take her home tomorrow. She's lost a huge amount of weight, and it'll be a long time til she's a hundred percent, but so long as the progress continues in the right direction we'll all be happy.

 

Hugs to you and your hounds!

[Houndtime]

Good! Thanks for sharing.

[Guest newyorkgrey]

That's great news! I used calorie counting to lose weight myself, so I did the opposite to help Iowa gain weight. I recommend it. I'm using table spoons and teaspoons to measure out the portions and keeping a diary. Iowa is back to begging, and I never thought that would make me happy. Hugs from my four legged family here in New York to yours down under.

Edited November 9, 2017 by newyorkgrey

[Guest forcefeedbacon]

 

Hey all, one last update for everyone following along.

Asha’s urine was looking better yesterday--still some blood and protein, but significantly less than the day before, and at that stage they felt she’d recover better at home. She'd gone back to not eating for them, which was another reason they wanted to send her home. We went to visit her again while we waited for her to be discharged and she was particularly exhausted and strung. I think she must have found it extra stressful staying there after she started to feel brighter and more with it the day before. She was shuddering and jumpy but settled the longer we stayed there, and at the same time was falling asleep sitting up. She’d also been forced to lie down in her own poop which she likely would’ve found stressful too. All of that meant we were extra grateful to be allowed to bring her home where she could truly relax.

The vet was yet another person who we hadn’t dealt with before but was good in talking through all our questions. We had a final blood test run before we left, mostly to check her kidneys, and everything was normal except for a slightly elevated ALKP, so unless we’re worried about her progress in the next few days, they don’t want to see her again for a week when we’ll do another blood test just to make sure everything’s going okay.

Asha did a little trot when she got home--the bounciest I'd seen her this whole long week--and after two hours of exhausted sleep, she wolfed down some kangaroo. She went on to eat two more small meals with zero coaxing required and slept through the night without any upsets or accidents.

Today she's been expressing how much she missed being able to stretch out fully at the doggy hospital and is doing a good job of taking over the entire king size bed by stretching out ever limb in every direction as far as it will go (even her tail)! She has a healthy appetite and is feeling pretty perky, jumping up and down from the bed to answer the door and even going for a tiny walk. The walk seems to have finally restarted her drinking (which was our hope for it after she seemed to have forgotten the need for drinking after almost a week on IV) so that's a big relief, though I think I'll have to try to make her drink extra with a syringe since she never drinks enough, and her kidneys need her to right now. She hasn't been super impressed with "kangaroo soup" either but we have got a decent amount of liquid into her that way. And after a reading a tip elsewhere on this forum, we discovered that coconut water is occasionally more appealing to her than chicken or beef stock and milk too, something we never would have guessed! All in all, so long as we can keep on top of her fluid intake, for the first time in 9 long days, I'm feeling pretty confident she's going to be okay.

 

It's so, so wonderful to see her looking happy and very almost normal. Thank you to everyone for your support. Hugs and happy hounds to all xx

[Guest forcefeedbacon]

That's great news! I used calorie counting to lose weight myself, so I did the opposite to help Iowa gain weight. I recommend it. I'm using table spoons and teaspoons to measure out the portions and keeping a diary. Iowa is back to begging, and I never thought that would make me happy. Hugs from my four legged family here in New York to yours down under.

 

Ha ha! Yay for begging . I feel similarly about Asha feeling well enough to lick her leg obsessively (the one that's had the cannula in it). I've had to bandage it up so she'll stop worrying at it, but at the same time I'm thrilled to see her back to her usual antics.

 

Asha has almost 4kg (about 8.5 pounds) to gain back. I can't believe how quickly she dropped that weight. Lucky she was a good healthy weight to start with--on the chubby side if anything--and I think based on her regaining weight after past surgeries she'll get it back fairly easily. Hugs and well wishes right back atcha!

[LaFlaca]

Prayers for Asha's continued improvement. Asha -

[RaineysMom]

sending prayers she continues to improve!!!! :hope

[carronstar]

Wonderful news!

[Guest forcefeedbacon]

Hey all. I just wanted to post a final update in the hopes of helping anyone else whose hound is unfortunate enough to experience rhabdo. After we got her home, Asha continued to have a healthy appetite and grow brighter every day. However, she was weak and sore, struggling to walk a few hundred metres, and her pain seemed to get a little bit worse based on her reluctance to jump up onto the bed. We were collecting her urine every morning to make sure her kidneys were still concentrating it and trying to get as much liquid into her as we could to help her kidneys continue to flush everything out. The urine was dark yellow with a brownish tint, though did improve daily after the first few days.

Anyway, we took her back to the vets for a check up four days later (twelve days since it all began) and they found a fairly high amount of blood and protein in it, which suggested the muscles were *still* breaking down. The vet was concerned and considered giving her corticosteroids (which is the treatment for an auto-immune disease which causes muscle breakdown, even though Asha didn’t have the signs of this disease), just to see if it would help, but in the end (after consulting with another vet) decided not to. She was on a high protein diet which could’ve possibly thrown the results a bit under the circumstances so we were told to greatly increase her carbs and continue to monitor her.

We were of course worried and so anxiously watched for any signs of going backward or her kidneys stopping working after all the strain they’d been through. She continued to eat and improve on every observable level (though I noted she had started going to the toilet a little more often (maybe 4-5 times instead of 2-3 a day) and she had done several bile vomits which I assumed was from the diet change since she’s very susceptible to them). A week after we got her home, the urine I collected was pale yellow and significantly lighter compared to the day’s before (even though they’d been improving each day) and that combined with research that said that one of the early signs of kidney overload can be bile vomiting, made us decide to hurry her back to the vet just in case (after pausing to collect a second urine sample along the way which was darker yellow again).

This time it was good news, and I was just being a worry wart. She had no blood and only a tiny bit of protein in both samples of her urine. That combined with her continued improvement in all other areas such as pain levels, general perkiness, and wanting to walk further etc. means we were given the all clear, and instructed to treat her as a normal dog (except for building her up slowly to longer walks again).

Ha. Like we’d ever treat her like a “normal dog”

Anyway, it was a very anxious week and a half up until this point where we really didn’t know whether she truly getting better, so I wanted to share our experience in the hopes of helping anyone else with a similar case.

She is now totally back to normal, including loving her long walks and then still finding energy to play again later

Thanks again to all who shared wisdom, prayers, and support!

That's great news! I used calorie counting to lose weight myself, so I did the opposite to help Iowa gain weight. I recommend it. I'm using table spoons and teaspoons to measure out the portions and keeping a diary. Iowa is back to begging, and I never thought that would make me happy. Hugs from my four legged family here in New York to yours down under.

 

Just wanted to send further love to Iowa and our warmest of wishes that she is feeling all better at last too! xx

[EllenEveBaz]

Wonderful news and thank you for the follow-up info. Ear scritches to Miss Asha.

[Batmom]

Thank goodness! Happy for you and your girl.