Health Update

One week ago today was the start of Mumble's recent illness. He spent that day at daycare, and apparently spent much of the day just lying around and also threw up once while he was there. That night and into the next morning, he was vomiting almost constantly, not even holding down water, and we rushed to the vet on Tuesday.

Since then, he's been doing much better. The injections and medications the vet used to calm down his upset stomach and reduce the nausea really seemed to work well, as he was showing signs of improvement almost immediately. For several days following that, he was on a totally "bland" diet made up of cooked chicken and rice, which he ate in several small meals throughout the day instead of two regular sized meals. This meant he has been coming to work with me every day, so that I could monitor his health, give him all of his doses of medications, and feed him on his frequent-meal schedule. He, of course, has loved coming to the office and getting all of the attention from everyone here!

As of today, he's doing so much better I'm almost willing to say he's back to normal. "Almost" because he still has been having a little bit of digestive issues, although there has been absolutely no vomiting since we went to the vet last Tuesday. With Mumble, it is so hard to tell what is really going on with these types of things. Any change in his food whatsoever, even change to a "bland" diet, typically makes him a little bit sick because he has such a sensitive digestive system. So when he was getting better and better, but still having some diarrhea, it was hard to tell if that was still related to whatever was going on last week or if it is just because the chicken and rice is "different" than his normal diet.

I like to have answers. I tend to overthink things, read everything I can about any topic I need to know anything about, ask millions of questions whether in a meeting for a client or a doctor's appointment for myself, and try to decipher logical explanations for any and everything. There were no definite answers for why Mumble was sick (although I am grateful that there was a clear answer for what to do about it). The X-Rays taken by the vet showed a blurred appearance that she said was sometimes present as an indicator of pancreatitis. This seemed to have really surprised her though (indicating that other signs of such a serious condition weren't there?) because she said that she had them repeat the X-Ray just to be sure that he was actually lying perfectly still.

All of this lead to me going home and reading everything I could on canine pancreatitis. I tend to utilize a few different books whenever I have health-related questions about my pets. One is the Dog Owner's Home Veterinary Handbook, by Debra M. Eldredge DVM, the second is the Veterinarians' Guide to Your Dog Symptoms, by Michael S. Garvey DVM, and the third is the Natural Health Bible for Dogs and Cats, by Shawn Messonnier DVM, each of which I have on my Kindle. So I went home and consulted them to find out about this pancreatitis thing. What I read was pretty scary, but it seemed unlikely that this is what Mumble has. Although not uncommon, pancreatitis can apparently be life-threatening, and certainly some of the symptoms matched what Mumble was presenting with - vomiting up water, for example. It seemed like all of the descriptions I found, however, were of much more severe symptoms, like of dogs being so lethargic they were almost non-responsive, in so much abdominal pain that they wouldn't want to lie down, or showing signs of shock. So either Mumble only had a mild form of this, and I got him to the vet so quickly that these signs didn't show up yet, or it was not truly pancreatitis at all. Another thing that made me doubt that this could be what was wrong was that pancreatitis is most commonly seen in dogs that eat a lot of fatty foods or table scraps. Mumble is certainly not one of those dogs, given how limited his diet has to be because of all of his existing allergies and digestive issues. Also, pancreatitis is more common in middle-aged to older dogs, and according to some sources, more common in females. Again, all not characteristics of Mumble.

The vet determined that the best course of action was to immediately (and thoroughly) treat Mumble's symptoms, and that if he showed any signs of getting worse in the subsequent 48 hours or if he did not improve, then she would run some blood work to determine if indeed he had pancreatitis. Ultimately, we did not go that route because he was immediately so much better, so I guess we'll never know what the blood work would have shown, but the point was for him to get better, and he did.

What we did know is that Mumble did not have an obstruction in his bowels, he did not have bloat (thank God!), and he had not eaten anything poisonous. And what was suspected was that he did not have pancreatitis. That leaves more questions that answers, and not wanting him to go through this ever again, it leaves a huge "unknown" as to how to prevent it. I'm all about preventative treatment. Mumble is on every supplement and herbal remedy that has been suggested for him and eats organic dog food because these things are supposed to prevent his allergies from acting up, his joints from becoming arthritic, etc. So I want something we can do to stop this from happening too!

One thing that the vet mentioned is that all of this could have been related to his existing allergies. Mumble definitely suffers from seasonal allergies, and he is much more itchy, sneezy, runny, etc during this time of year. Generally, he goes through at least one time period in the spring or early summer where he just doesn't seem to feel 100% because of allergies.

Another thing that is possible is that his existing digestive issues flared up and caused this more extreme reaction. I've always suspected that Mumble could possibly have inflammatory bowel disease or irritable bowel syndrome. It doesn't seem like we need to put him through any tests or anything like that for this though, as all of the possibly-related issues are very well managed with a carefully planned diet and supplements. I've also always thought that he has excessive amounts of stomach acids. Whereas most dogs benefit from "fasting" when they have any kind of stomach illness, this has only ever made Mumble worse. If he has an empty stomach, he retches and vomits. I learned that early on with him, and in the countless times he's had an upset tummy, I never fast him like many people do with their dogs. I may reduce his food or give him rice or something else bland, but I know that an empty stomach will just make him worse.

You know how when you were a kid and you didn't feel well and your mom would say "if you'd just eat something, you'd feel better." And even if you felt like you'd throw up if you ate something, you'd trust her and eat a few crackers or some bread or something else really bland, and it WOULD make you feel a little better. Well, there's no way to reason with a dog in that way. No matter what I did, I couldn't get Mumble to eat that day when he was so sick. So my suspicion, not being a vet but just an overly-vigilant pet mom, is that Mumble was feeling ill because of allergies or because his tummy was just a little upset, and then he didn't want to eat because of that, and after skipping just a few meals, we found ourselves in the situation of him being really sick. It's like a bad cycle - he doesn't feel well, so he doesn't eat... he doesn't eat so he has an empty stomach and throws up... this makes him not feel well, so he continues to not eat.

Maybe this explains why the medicines worked so well. One was basically Pepcid, so it definitely would have reduced the stomach acids. Once those were in his system, he finally wanted to eat food and then he was on the way to recovery. I guess I'll never know for sure what caused all of this, but I'm grateful it didn't become anything more serious, and I'm beyond grateful for the thorough and expert care he got at Shane Veterinary Medical Center. And now if he ever DOES have pancreatitis, I guess I'll know what it looks like!