Diarreha

[Joanie]

Hi everyone :). Need some help. For the past few days Lan's stomach has been "off" but not really bad. She always is gassy and her stools were kinda semi solid. She woke me up because she had to go to thr bathroom. This time is full blown out watery. Since it just got like this do I monitor, give FortaFlora, and give her a bland diet or do I, since her stools haven't been 100% normal for the past few days, take her to the vet and get flagyl? Her stomach only got weird when the weather changed from unseasonably hot to cold. My yorkie uses to get stomach issues when the weather changed. It sounds weird, but could that be whats going on here?

[Joan C Hatfield]

Joanie - If the vet finds nothing irregular - perhaps you have to fiddle around to find the dogfood that works best - I wasn't  suggesting you had to change her over to RD completely - just until her stools are normal.  I tried 3-4 different brands to come up with something my dog would happily eat and kept her regular.  I now feed my dog Royal Canin large bites and it has done the trick.

Good luck!

[Joanie]

Hey everyone :)  So Lan went to the vet earlier.  Lol, she thought the vet today was Social Hour and wanted to play with all the other dogs in the waiting room and not go see the vet.  Lol, she even decided that although she knew she had to get onto the examing table that she would rather sit next to me.  Her vet looked at her and said "What are you doing?  You know the routine.  Get over here."  Lol... my silly little Lani.  Anyhow after doing a whole exam he decided to give her fluids under the skin since she was a little dehydrated.  He sent me home with Flagyl and this powdery stuff that I am to give her for three days.  He said to keep this powdery stuff handy incase she has bouts of loose stools in the future... that it'll help to relieve it.  He also sent me home with a perscription food and went food.  So, for the morning meal I'm to prepare her dry food with wet food mixed together and mix into that one pill Flagyl and a teaspoon of the powdery stuff.  At night I am to do the same exact thing except this time with only a half Flagyl and no powdery stuff.  He said to see how she does with that and when I start noticing that her stools stay solid consistently I can start getting her back onto her regular food.  So when I came home I prepared her morning meal and added in some water to make sure she stays hydrated.  She wasn't very happy with it, so I decided to mix in some rice and chicken and that helped.  She gobbled it down... medicine and all.  I repeated this for the evening meal (including rice and chicken and water) and she happily ate it... AND had her most solid bowel movement yet!!!!  So this seems to be working... fingers crossed!!!

[Karen, Jasper and Jackdoodle]

The powdery stuff is Panacur. Panacur is the drug of choice for treating giardia, along with Flagyl, which is metronidazole. So from the meds, it sounds like giardia. Did he run a fecal? I wouldn't just give Panacur for loose stool "in the future" without knowing what was causing it. The metronidazole will firm up the stool, but unless you get rid of the underlying cause of the diarrhea, it will come right back after the metro is discontinued.

I'm glad you brought her in, since she was dehydrated.

You really don't need to give her the Rx food, especially if she doesn't like it. It isn't medicine, there's nothing therapeutic in it, in fact the ingredients are pretty bad. The chicken and rice on it's own is fine until the problem resolves.

If it is giardia, there are some precautions regarding clean-up you need to do, so it would be good to know if it is.

[Joanie]

I just looked at the powdery stuff the vet gave.  It's not Panacur.... it's Tylan.  Have you ever heard of it?  I never have... I'm familar with Panacur.  Lan's fecal came back completely normal.  Yeah, I hate having Lan on the perscription food the only problem is the rice and chicken was not filling her up so that's why the vet gave her a bland perscription diet so she would feel fuller to supplement.  I'm not going to keep her on it long.

[Karen, Jasper and Jackdoodle]

My Jack is on Tylan for his IBD. It's an antibiotic. It's also one of the ingredients in Angel Eyes, interestingly enough.

It's absolutely foul tasting, too.