On Wednesday, Meeko, our 17 week old German Shepherd, that we purchased 3 weeks ago as a companion puppy to our 15 week old English Mastiff puppy, suddenly developed a serious medical issue. Yesterday, she was lethargic, would not eat or drink, yelped if we touched her collar or sometimes other parts of her body and layed around all day in the utility room. Last night she would not even come upstairs and kennelled downstairs for the night.
This morning when I went down to let her out, she had fouled her cage and was laying in it, unable to rise. I helped her up to go outside and she staggered and fell several times going only a couple dozen feet. She fell again outside and couldn't get up. She yelped when I tried to pick her up and help her back inside. As we already had an appointment for Ranger to get his rabies shot, we called the vet to see if she could be seen as well.
After exam and xrays, we were referred to the Virginia Tech teaching hospital for a neurological exam. We spent nearly 4 hours there and left with no diagnosis except that she was having neurological problems. We could drive to Vienna, VA for an MRI that would not diagnose the problem, but would rule out a congenital vertebral issue at a cost of more than $2000. That test would require we have her anthesized and as she has a heart murmur and we would have to have an echo cardiogram before they would do that. None of these tests would be conclusive. They also discussed drawing spinal fluid also under anesthesia to see if maybe it was an infection or inflammation, but the bottom line is that there is no treatment that would cure her, only possible put her into a remissive state with strong chance of repeat episodes. She will likely always be ataxic, may have respiratory failure or other organ failure and probably in pain.
We left with a round of antibiotics, prednisone, and pain meds to try to relieve her symptoms.
Ranger is confused, not understanding why she is having to be kennelled, can't play and is not responsive to him. My hubby is sad and confused also.
I didn't want to get attached to another dog after we had to put down our Old English Sheepdog a few years back, and tried not to get emotionally attached to the two puppies, however, I cried and will likely have to cry some more when we are probably faced with the decision in a week or two of having to do the same with her. It hurts to have such a sick puppy whose outlook is deterioration not improvement. She is a beautiful, sweet little dog, but so very ill.
This morning when I went down to let her out, she had fouled her cage and was laying in it, unable to rise. I helped her up to go outside and she staggered and fell several times going only a couple dozen feet. She fell again outside and couldn't get up. She yelped when I tried to pick her up and help her back inside. As we already had an appointment for Ranger to get his rabies shot, we called the vet to see if she could be seen as well.
After exam and xrays, we were referred to the Virginia Tech teaching hospital for a neurological exam. We spent nearly 4 hours there and left with no diagnosis except that she was having neurological problems. We could drive to Vienna, VA for an MRI that would not diagnose the problem, but would rule out a congenital vertebral issue at a cost of more than $2000. That test would require we have her anthesized and as she has a heart murmur and we would have to have an echo cardiogram before they would do that. None of these tests would be conclusive. They also discussed drawing spinal fluid also under anesthesia to see if maybe it was an infection or inflammation, but the bottom line is that there is no treatment that would cure her, only possible put her into a remissive state with strong chance of repeat episodes. She will likely always be ataxic, may have respiratory failure or other organ failure and probably in pain.
We left with a round of antibiotics, prednisone, and pain meds to try to relieve her symptoms.
Ranger is confused, not understanding why she is having to be kennelled, can't play and is not responsive to him. My hubby is sad and confused also.
I didn't want to get attached to another dog after we had to put down our Old English Sheepdog a few years back, and tried not to get emotionally attached to the two puppies, however, I cried and will likely have to cry some more when we are probably faced with the decision in a week or two of having to do the same with her. It hurts to have such a sick puppy whose outlook is deterioration not improvement. She is a beautiful, sweet little dog, but so very ill.
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