Greyhound Epilepsy Study

[Guest khwheeze]

Hi. I am new to the forum. But if you tell me how to PM you, I would love to help. My first greyhound had seizures. Not sure if they still go by the terminology grand mal, but that is indeed what she had. She regularly had them every month, 3 at a time with a few hours time period. It was simply heartbreaking. I had wanted a greyhound for years & I did adopt her knowing she had them, but the depth was not totally know or disclosed to me. She was on pheno & potassium bromide. I did a ton of reading, but lost her one week after her 4th birthday to acute liver failure. If any info I can share can help, count me in.

[Guest A3greymom]

I am owned by two greyhounds that have epilepsy; one of which is extremely unstable. In hopes of finding answers and gaining insight into greyhounds with epilepsy, I am conducting a research study in Natalie's honor (my greyhound). Some of you are familiar with Natalie and the struggle we've had to make sense of her epilepsy and to gain control of the seizure monster. If you are not, I'd be happy to share the store with you. Natalie is my heart and I fear for the day she will no longer be a part of my life.

 

If you are owned by a greyhound who experiences epilepsy, even 1 seizure, please contact me. I have a simple questionnaire to send to you for you to complete. The data collected in the questionnaire will hopefully help us find correlations to the many greyhounds that are suffering from epilepsy. All information will remain confidential.

 

Please pm me to receive the questionnaire. Also, share this information with any other greyhound people you know that might be experiencing epilepsy with their greyhound. The more data collected the more knowledge we'll gain.

 

For the Hounds!

 

Gen, Natalie & Peanut (my epi girls)

 

I have 3 greys that own me...particularly the one who has epilepsy he was my first and as of late the one I most worry about. His seizures are fairly well managed with phenobarb and gabapantin. Be happy to share any info I can with you

[Guest scubagirl]

I am owned by two greyhounds that have epilepsy; one of which is extremely unstable. In hopes of finding answers and gaining insight into greyhounds with epilepsy, I am conducting a research study in Natalie's honor (my greyhound). Some of you are familiar with Natalie and the struggle we've had to make sense of her epilepsy and to gain control of the seizure monster. If you are not, I'd be happy to share the store with you. Natalie is my heart and I fear for the day she will no longer be a part of my life.

 

If you are owned by a greyhound who experiences epilepsy, even 1 seizure, please contact me. I have a simple questionnaire to send to you for you to complete. The data collected in the questionnaire will hopefully help us find correlations to the many greyhounds that are suffering from epilepsy. All information will remain confidential.

 

Please pm me to receive the questionnaire. Also, share this information with any other greyhound people you know that might be experiencing epilepsy with their greyhound. The more data collected the more knowledge we'll gain.

 

For the Hounds!

 

Gen, Natalie & Peanut (my epi girls)

I have a greyhound with epilepsy and would love to help in any way I can. I can't use the PM feature since I'm new (and can't receive anything either) - so I'm not sure how we can get in contact with each other without me posting my personal info here.

[Guest BreezeyBoy]

Our boy, Breeze, began experiencing seizures this past April and we now have him on Phenobarbitol. I'm interested in knowing more about your epilepsy study so if you can send me the questionnaire that would be great (I don't know what PM means...new here...)

 

In addition, since putting Breeze on the Phenobarbitol his thirst and hunger have gone through the roof. He is constantly hungry, and drinking 3-4 bowls of water a day. He's also on Prednisone and Pentoxifylline to treat vasculopathy. I'm wondering if anybody else has experienced this extreme hunger with their Grey on Pheno. and what you are doing to help curb their appetite. What do you feed your dog? How much? Our boy is a big boy @ 76+ lbs...

[Guest janiek]

After all these years and this thread is still being viewed........greyt. My Coaster had 2 grand malls within 6 hours in the middle of the night. Never had one before. The vet did everything from blood work to ultrasounds, no luck in finding the culpret for the cause. He then decided that it was neurological, and suggested a "trip to the bridge". I said NO. I then suggested a spinal xray. Sure enough, there it was and old injury to a disk. So, we decided to put him PhenoBarbitol (human heart meds). To date (knock on wood) over 3 years NO MORE SEIZURES. We have knocked down the dosage, so he get 1/4 of the tablet in the AM and a full 1/2 at night. A friend of mine has one of his bloodline and he is a seizure patient too. So, maybe it does run in the "family".

 

Hope this info helps someone to ANY degree...................

[Guest CFPWonder]

I have only been on Greytalk a few times but view it quite often. My 4 year old greyhound just had her first seizures.... at 1:30 in the morning Monday. We took her to the vet Monday - did bloodwork which came out ok. She put her on Potassium Bromide. She just hasn't be herself since her seizure.

I would be interested in filling out the questionnaire. Let me know how or what I need to do?

[Guest cristaron]

The bromide will take a while to build up in her system. Usually 3-4 weeks unless she was given

a loading dose. This too will make her a little off until her system gets used to it.

More often than not, the bloodwork they do shows nothing abnormal and they will classify it as

idiopathic epilepsy (meaning there is no known reason).

Hope your girl is doing ok. Give the medication time to do it's work.

Did your vet mention putting her on phenobarbital at all?

[Guest CFPWonder]

She did get a loading dose - 9 cc twice a day for 5 days and then 5 cc once a day - recheck in six weeks. Thanks for your reply - this is scary to me. I have been volunteering with Quad Cities Greyhound Adoption for 6 years and got my first greyhound in 2003 - and have never witnessed a seizure until now.

[Guest cristaron]

It is scary. We have a male that we adopted 9 years ago. His seizures started just after he turned two. It took a while and

a lot of change in medication, but he's still doing good at almost 11 years old. Granted, he still has his ups and downs. He

can go for months being perfectly fine and then all of a sudden something gets out of whack and he'll seize. I've tried for

years to figure out what his triggers are (as most of us do), but had a list so long that I was becomming paranoid of everything.

I've gotten to the point that we just go along with whatever happens and deal with it at the time.

Life does get easier as you get more used to it and it's not so scary to you. We all just do the best we can and take it day by

day.

Ask all the questions you want - there are wonderful people on this site that have been through this for so many years and

they will offer all the advice they can to help you.

 

By the way, our beautiful boy is a Quad Cities grey (Copperkettle Ron). He's a sweetie!

[Guest CFPWonder]

Thanks for all of your information. It's nice knowing there's someone out there who can help with their knowledge of these issues.

 

That's great you have a QCGA dog - our first greyhound was adopted in Nov. 2003 - maybe yours and ours were at the kennel at the same time? Her name was Cajun Fine Point; she passed away in Feb. from osteo.

We all still miss her so.

 

We've been thinking about getting a companion for Wonder, but I think we need to get our hands around this seizure thing before we pursue that. I worry how others would react during a seizure. One friend says her females run away and her male barks when the other male seizes.

[Guest cristaron]

Yup, that's one thing you'll have to be careful of. Some will never pay attention to the seizing dog, others will be afraid and

run away, and then again, some will try to attack.

We had two older females here that never paid attention to his seizing. They have since passed and now we have a 7 yr. old

broodie that just looks at him and walks away. So I've always witnessed - I still never leave them alone together when I leave

the house. They are both kenneled and safe. You just never know and it's better to be safe than sorry.

[Guest CFPWonder]

That's probably a good thing to do. Another friend of mine muzzled her non-seizure dog when she was gone as she had attacked her seizing dog when she wasn't home. Since this only happened a couple days ago, I'm constantly watching her for signs - so far so good. My husband is retired so she's not home alone too often - or at least not for long periods of time.

[Guest cristaron]

I know the feeling, you can't take your eyes off her.

You never know though, she may never have another one.

 

Our first girl had two grand mals when she was 12 and never had another. She lived to be 14.

Our second girl had one grand mal when she was 10 and never had another. She live to be 12.

 

Ron is the only one that has had them for so many years. I think sometimes it can be just something

in their system that goes haywire and they'll have one and then be fine for the rest of their lives.

I hope that's the case with your girl.

I'll keep my fingers crossed for you that it goes that way.

 

If you want to e-mail me privately, feel free - any time. I know how trying this can be and any

help you can get always helps so much.

 

cristaron@peoplepc.com

 

[Guest w9816]

Don't know if this info is needed anymore but thought I would share my experience. One day when I got home from work, this was in December 2011, I found my then 6-year old greyhound unconscious on his bed, mouth frothing. Within minutes he began seizuring (and I suspect this had been going on for some time prior to me getting home). The seizure lasted for a few minutes, whereafter he was panting like crazy but still did not "come out of it". I was already on the phone to call the vet - but of course this was a Friday evening so my regular vet was no longer available, and I had to rely on the "cow doctor" 1,5 hours drive from our place. My dog had several seizures in the car but when we finally got to the vet, he was "just" knocked out completely.

The examination did not really give anything, but the vet administered a muscle relaxant and a prescription for Barbivet. Loaded my dog back in the car and got on our way home, and despite the drugs we had several seizures occurring during the trip back. Drove by the pharmacy to get the Barbivet also, although I did not really know how to get the pills into the dog, in the state he was in... Managed to get hold of two others veterinarians to get their advice too, but they could not really help me much. The seizures continued through the night and there was not much I could do but try to cool him down inbetween.

The next morning, when nothing had changed, I was already preparing for a trip to the nearest animal hospital 200 miles away but then the situation seemed to slowly improve so I waited a little...and by 11 am the seizures had stopped altogether.
Recovery was slow. He remained semi-unconscious for the rest of the day. I mixed salt and sugar in water and managed to get him to swallow some, using a syringe. Of course he had wetted himself and we were all a mess by that time... I cleaned him up as good as I could, and basically just sat with him for the rest of the day. By evening he seemed to getting more awake and finally managed to stand up, with some help and support. He was, however, still really confused and did not really react to anything. Around 10pm I helped him out and then he just wandered off into the dark - I was not really prepared for this (more or less in my underwear and slippers, no flashlight) but fortunately there was snow on the ground so I was able to follow his tracks - eventually found him in my neighbours backyard.
It took him a couple of weeks to recover. I did take him to my regular vet for a check-up the following Monday, she could not really say what it was, but recommended that we continue with the Barbivet. Blood sample did not show anything out of the ordinary. He has not had any seizures since and does not seem to have suffered permanent damage.

[Saffron]

w9816 That is a very frightening story. It sounds as though you were lucky not to lose your grey as continuous seizures like that are definitely life threatening. I'd hate to be so far from a vet with a seizure dog. Good job on keeping him cooled down and hydrated, and I'm glad he is doing well today. Barbivet = Phenobarbital, I think. We usually check liver values every few months as Pheno can be very tough on the liver long-term.

 

Caesar's story in case it helps anyone else.

 

He has had a full neurological work-up at Mass Referral Hospital and his official diagnosis is idiopathic epilepsy with hypersensitivity to drugs.

 

He had his first seizure last June, aged 5. It was a full tonic/clonic (grand mal) lasting about 2 minutes. This was followed by a focal (petit mal) seizure 3 days later. He also had/has a very bad post-ictal phase lasting about 25 minutes where he is terrified of everything and tries to run away from himself and jump out windows. He is bit of an anxious guy, but usually very sweet. Immediately after a seizure, however, he is dangerous to humans and other dogs, let alone himself, as any sort of movement feels like a threat. He'd prefer to run from it, but will bite and snap while still confused. Not his true character at all, and I am still really scared about what would happen if he has a seizure during a walk.

 

We put him on Phenobarbital after the first seizures because I felt the post-ictal phase was so dangerous for him and the rest of us. He did well adapting to the Pheno. He had a couple more focal seizures and then another tonic/clonic in December. As his levels were rather high we decided to add Potassium Bromide (we did not do a loading dose) with the goal of weaning him off the pheno slowly and protecting his liver. Within a week of starting the Potassium Bromide he pretty much went psychotic! His anxiety went through the roof, and he was pacing, whining, barking at nothing, reacting badly to the other dogs, and keeping us awake all night. He was miserable.

 

Due to the behavioral changes, we suspected a brain tumor, thus the full exam with CT scan and spinal tap at MRH. Everything came back clear and we had our diagnosis. We took him off Potassium Bromide immediately and put him on Leviteracitam (generic Keppra) instead. (Note: we could not have discontinued the Potassium Bromide cold turkey without putting him on another drug.) I had my sweet dog back within 3 days! He is doing well on the Keppra/Pheno combination and we hope to wean him off the Pheno slowly while keeping him as seizure-free as possible.

 

Apparently psychosis is a rare side effect of Potassium Bromide. It is not often mentioned in the literature, nor mentioned much by seizure dog owners, and after our experience I wanted to alert people. I wouldn't want to put people off Potassium Bromide altogether because certainly I'd use it again on another dog. I just have a special snowflake who couldn't tolerate it. Unfortunately, we kept him on it for almost a month hoping that things would get better and, in retrospect, I wish we had taken him off it sooner.

 

A final quick note on Keppra: Fewer side effects and easier on the liver than Pheno, and it is working for us. Downside is that it is expensive! We found much the best price at Costco.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[a_daerr]

We're five months seizure-free on Zonisamide!

[Saffron]

We're five months seizure-free on Zonisamide!

 

Yay, for the seizure-free!

 

Zonisamide was another drug we considered with Caesar. Both Keppra and Zonisamide are "newer" drugs for seizure dogs in the US.

 

Caesar's neurologist went with Keppra instead of Zonisamide because Keppra is apparently easier on the liver and doesn't need as frequent blood tests in combination with titrating off Pheno (Caesar is also vet-phobic but that is another story and he is getting so much better!)

 

I have a great grey-savvy vet who refers us as necessary to specialists. Honest to goodness, Caesar is my third seizure dog and the only one who has had such a nasty post-ictal. The other two did well on Pheno/Potassium Bromide. Caesar's reaction was ... unexpected.

 

We now know that Caesar is hypersensitive to drugs, but if I ever have another seizure dog I'm not sure whether I wouldn't go the Pheno and potassium bromide route again before reaching for the $$$$ drugs like Keppra and Zonisamide.

 

What do other seizure dog owners think?

[Guest w9816]

w9816 That is a very frightening story. It sounds as though you were lucky not to lose your grey as continuous seizures like that are definitely life threatening. I'd hate to be so far from a vet with a seizure dog. Good job on keeping him cooled down and hydrated, and I'm glad he is doing well today. Barbivet = Phenobarbital, I think. We usually check liver values every few months as Pheno can be very tough on the liver long-term.

Yes, Barbivet is a phenobarbital. The vet said that there would not be any long-term issues but I am still a little reluctant to medicate for the rest of his life, considering they were not really sure that it actually was epilepsy, so I am compromising and giving only half the prescribed dosage.

[Guest abbysmom]

I, too, would be willing to fill out a questionaire, but haven't posted enough to pm. My Emmy (who will be 8 in Sept.) has had two focal seizures (that I know of)--one in April and one this month. Even these are terribly upsetting to witness. My vet is giving me pheno to use after seizures, but doesn't want to start her on regular potassium bromide yet.

[zoesmommy]

I'm Epileptic.

 

I have been since I was 26.

It started later in life as it often does.

It was a result of physical abuse and repeated "slaps upside the head" from an abusive step-father as his way of disciplining, training and educating me.

I'm disabled. I don't work. I don't drive. I don't have children because of it. I petite mal seizures that are clonic tonic in nature with atomism's. (Please look that up. It is too time consuming to explain).

 

What I do have is a life.

This life.

I am not deaf, blind, dying of cancer, paralyzed, unloved, abandoned, alone and a burden.

I am liked and loved by many.

 

I have a loving, faithful, deep friendship with my husband and he with my self.

My husband is not "owned" by me.

I am not enslaved or indentured to him.

The seizures are not the monster.

Letting the seizures ruin my life and "us" is.

 

I am respected.

I am admired.

I am looked up to and an inspiration to others.

I was a professional artist (I am disabled. If you are disabled you can not "work". If you can "work" you are not disabled.)

I HAVE a painting in the White House.

 

Although I can not work or drive

I give of my time.

I volunteer

I give of my self

I show up personally to help at functions

I give what little I can financially

When I am able to.

If I believe in it enough I will sacrifice and do without.

Do I NEED that $5.00 frozen mocha frappachino at Starbucks?

Is there not a better use for it?

 

If your dog could talk what do you think it would say about its life?

What would it say about your attitude?

Does the dog's Epilepsy "own" you or do the two of you enjoy a mutual life together and "deal" with a disability called Epilepsy?

 

Anyone who has witnessed or lived with seizures that are uncontrolled or uncontrollable knows that they are fatal, dangerous and can be deadly.

 

I deal with the possibility of "death" every day as my seizures are not predictable, reasonable, logical, reliable or able to be controlled. Who knows what I could be doing, where, when or how when I have one.

 

But I "own" my Greyhound Zoe. I am grateful for her love, affection, attention, time and companionship even if she is just quietly sitting or sleeping in her bed downstairs.

 

When my husband is at work and I am alone in the house, and I remember my family lives across the country I look at her. I pet her. Or all I have to do is call her name and she will come.

 

It is so nice to know whenever I think God has left me alone in this world and abandoned me there is proof he hasn't. Maybe your Epileptic Greys feel the exact same way about you?

 

May I gently suggest you rethink how you view your Grey's Epilepsy?

It is very frustrating I know.

It is a very hard disease to understand.

I don't know what to say in regards to dogs.

 

I can say they need your love. You may be the living proof that after their hard life at the track God did not abandon them and they are not alone in this world.

 

Zoesmommy

[Guest Blaze]

has there been any summary written on the results of the survey? my sweet Blaze has not had brain work up, but has had seizures now for a year, about every three weeks or a month - he has had three episodes where a seizure is followed by another within a day or day and a half - (like this last one).

[MaryJane]

has there been any summary written on the results of the survey? my sweet Blaze has not had brain work up, but has had seizures now for a year, about every three weeks or a month - he has had three episodes where a seizure is followed by another within a day or day and a half - (like this last one).

 

As far as I know, there has not been any summary written up.

 

I might suggest that you join the yahoo epi group and there are also groups on facebook (canine epilepsy) which can be a great help.

[Guest Jesse12789]

very intresting

[Guest Amber]

My Fey is the first dog I've looked after, to have a seizure. She had one focal seizure last January a few weeks after i adopted her and then a second one last night, so a year apart. The seizure itself doesn't seem severe but afterwards she goes blind for around 15 mins. First i knew of it last night was about 4 am and i woke up as i could hear her walking about at the foot of the stairs, but she didn't come up like she normally does. Then i heard her slowly coming up the stair and she stopped half way, so i go see and she is rooted to the spot backwards on the stairs, all confused with her head darting about.

 

I lifted her up and put her on my bed and after a while she recovered. I really think she loses her sight in the aftermath. It was pretty scary first time but i knew what was going on the second time.

[peglywegly]

I realize this post was from 2004 - however I am about to receive a foster with epilepsy. he is cat safe and my husband had medically controlled epilepsy. We had a golden that had a few seizures, when he had valley fever (a desert fungus). if you are still collecting data i would be happy to send the questionare back to you.

peglyhubba@gmail.com