Related -only- to the scale, but I clearly remember one time being told by the "good" vet we used to go to (my parents have since gotten extremely cheap on vet care, and as I have no income right now while being a full-time student...) that my Lapphund was the only dog he'd seen all day that wasn't overweight. I would have been shocked, but I'd seen the cattle dog in the lobby that looked more like a furry ham on legs...
It's good your friend finally got a diagnosis for her GSD, and I'm glad the vet apologized. It definitely would be annoying to have to deal with that kind of an office, though; I've also often noticed how much it seems like things get overcharged. When Emmee (the Lapphund) got a scratch on her eye from the cat, it was always expensive just to get the vet to look in her eye and say "Oh, yes, there's a scratch there." Well, yeah. I could have told you that.
I used to always enjoy having an aunt who was a vet. She'd give us some advice for free... which is how we learned that Emmee has a corn allergy. She was shaking her head like mad and itching her ears (we had her on cheap-ish kibble back then), but they were perfectly clean. We had no clue, mentioned it to my aunt. She said it sounded like a food allergy, and most of the ones she had ever seen were to corn. So try feeding her something with no corn. We did. The head-shaking and ear-scratching went away. Hurray.
The one thing that makes me glad about that, though, is that it means my parents don't argue about buying higher-end food. They'll still only spring for kibble, but at least it's decent kibble because 9/10 of the cheap stuff has corn in it. And they accept that we shouldn't feed the dog something she has an allergic reaction to.
@shibamistress holy cow those are some insanely expensive antibiotics, even working at two different vets I've only ever seen antibiotics be that high a few times, and it was because the dogs were so large (think 150lbs+). The way these are priced you're almost always better getting them from a pharmacy. VCA pricing is based per region, but in 2009 on quantities under 5 it was a $9 "dispensing fee", even on single pills worth 30 cents. The only antibiotic that I highly recommend for being worth the price at the vet are the ones that work for several days with one injection since it will start working immediately in serious situations vs oral which can take a while to go through and your pet could be sneaky and spit out when you're not looking.
Sounds like quite the vet horror story, I just moved and hopefully won't run into anything like this!
So, another update on my best friend's GSD. It's not good.
He's dying. Probably going very very soon. He's 8 years old.
My friend took him back to our regular vet today and she was there for four hours. He did not have a UTI, or if he did, it was really the least of his problems. He has actute peritonitis. His stomach and intestines are pretty damaged, and his bladder too. We had noticed that he looked thin in some places and bloated in the belly (which is why we were worrying about cancers, liver disease, etc). It turns out his abdomen is filling up with blood and pus, which is why he is so bloated. His urine is full of blood and mucous. He's so bloated they are having a hard time finding out if there is an actual rupture or puncture causing the peritonitis, but they think there is, they just can't tell where.
When the did the xrays, his stomach and intestines are full of rocks. So in a way, this was about what he ate, but was not about raw feeding. My friend has little lava rocks in her backyard as landscaping rocks. It turns out, he's been eating them. He has always had a problem with feces eating, and he goes to the bathroom on the rocks, and apparently has been eating the rocks too. Of course, they are lava rocks, and are very sharp, and they seem to have shredded his stomach and intestines. Even his urine has blood in it now, though to be fair to the first vet, it did not have blood in it at that time.
And in addition to everything else, his blood isn't clotting.
Our vet says he may go within days. Maybe a week or two, though. If he's in too much pain, she'll put him down, but right now he's stable and clearly isn't himself, but doesn't seem to be suffering either. He doesn't have much of an appetite, unsurprisingly, but he is interested in barking at the neighbor's dog, and going for walks still, and she'd like to have some time to say goodbye.
Of course, I care much more about this dog than I do that other vet, and to be fair, they didn't do xrays so they didn't know about the rocks (she declined the xrays because she knew they'd cost a fortune there, and at that point, they thought he had a UTI). That said, they also did not pay attention to or understand some things our vet found immediately troubling in the blood work and the urinalysis. would it have saved his life? No. But it's pretty troubling to have the dog diagnosed with something he doesn't have, and be charged three times what our regular vet charged, and for my friend to still be in the process of losing her dog.
Anyway, we're pretty heartbroken about Gideon. He's 8 years old, and she got him a month before I got Toby, my Shiba. They were puppies together. I'm so sad about this.
I should say, though, that I now think people should be super careful about lava landscaping rocks. I did a quick search and found too many questions/brief posts about dogs eating these rocks. They are super abrasive and sharp, and obviously do not pass! I imagine most dogs wouldn't eat them, but I've seen all my dogs take a chomp out of them too (my dogs pretty much lost interest right away, luckily, or we took the rocks away). But obviously, some dogs will swallow them, and the effects are awful.
We're going to get the rocks out of my friend's house, and my husband said, oh, we need more rocks in our driveway! Uh, no! I'm not willing to take the chance that one of our dogs--esp a curious Kai puppy--will find them tasty. It's just not worth the risk.
Yeah, I was thinking about the cocoa mulch too. Both can and will kill dogs that ingest them.
Gideon's going to be put down tomorrow. If he makes it through the night. He's resting, he's off all meds which won't save him anyway, but were making him nauseous on top of everything else. Today he's having some ice cream and bits of chicken (he's adog, they're probably mixed together and he doesn't mind). His abdomen is filled up with fluid and he's mostly just being still, but he doesn't seem to be in much pain, thankfully. Poor boy. He's a sweet, silly, GSD who was very good with my friend's birds, and even tolerated parrots climbing on him. We're going to miss him.
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It's good your friend finally got a diagnosis for her GSD, and I'm glad the vet apologized. It definitely would be annoying to have to deal with that kind of an office, though; I've also often noticed how much it seems like things get overcharged. When Emmee (the Lapphund) got a scratch on her eye from the cat, it was always expensive just to get the vet to look in her eye and say "Oh, yes, there's a scratch there." Well, yeah. I could have told you that.
I used to always enjoy having an aunt who was a vet. She'd give us some advice for free... which is how we learned that Emmee has a corn allergy. She was shaking her head like mad and itching her ears (we had her on cheap-ish kibble back then), but they were perfectly clean. We had no clue, mentioned it to my aunt. She said it sounded like a food allergy, and most of the ones she had ever seen were to corn. So try feeding her something with no corn. We did. The head-shaking and ear-scratching went away. Hurray.
The one thing that makes me glad about that, though, is that it means my parents don't argue about buying higher-end food. They'll still only spring for kibble, but at least it's decent kibble because 9/10 of the cheap stuff has corn in it. And they accept that we shouldn't feed the dog something she has an allergic reaction to.
Sounds like quite the vet horror story, I just moved and hopefully won't run into anything like this!
He's dying. Probably going very very soon. He's 8 years old.
My friend took him back to our regular vet today and she was there for four hours. He did not have a UTI, or if he did, it was really the least of his problems. He has actute peritonitis. His stomach and intestines are pretty damaged, and his bladder too. We had noticed that he looked thin in some places and bloated in the belly (which is why we were worrying about cancers, liver disease, etc). It turns out his abdomen is filling up with blood and pus, which is why he is so bloated. His urine is full of blood and mucous. He's so bloated they are having a hard time finding out if there is an actual rupture or puncture causing the peritonitis, but they think there is, they just can't tell where.
When the did the xrays, his stomach and intestines are full of rocks. So in a way, this was about what he ate, but was not about raw feeding. My friend has little lava rocks in her backyard as landscaping rocks. It turns out, he's been eating them. He has always had a problem with feces eating, and he goes to the bathroom on the rocks, and apparently has been eating the rocks too. Of course, they are lava rocks, and are very sharp, and they seem to have shredded his stomach and intestines. Even his urine has blood in it now, though to be fair to the first vet, it did not have blood in it at that time.
And in addition to everything else, his blood isn't clotting.
Our vet says he may go within days. Maybe a week or two, though. If he's in too much pain, she'll put him down, but right now he's stable and clearly isn't himself, but doesn't seem to be suffering either. He doesn't have much of an appetite, unsurprisingly, but he is interested in barking at the neighbor's dog, and going for walks still, and she'd like to have some time to say goodbye.
Of course, I care much more about this dog than I do that other vet, and to be fair, they didn't do xrays so they didn't know about the rocks (she declined the xrays because she knew they'd cost a fortune there, and at that point, they thought he had a UTI). That said, they also did not pay attention to or understand some things our vet found immediately troubling in the blood work and the urinalysis. would it have saved his life? No. But it's pretty troubling to have the dog diagnosed with something he doesn't have, and be charged three times what our regular vet charged, and for my friend to still be in the process of losing her dog.
Anyway, we're pretty heartbroken about Gideon. He's 8 years old, and she got him a month before I got Toby, my Shiba. They were puppies together. I'm so sad about this.
I should say, though, that I now think people should be super careful about lava landscaping rocks. I did a quick search and found too many questions/brief posts about dogs eating these rocks. They are super abrasive and sharp, and obviously do not pass! I imagine most dogs wouldn't eat them, but I've seen all my dogs take a chomp out of them too (my dogs pretty much lost interest right away, luckily, or we took the rocks away). But obviously, some dogs will swallow them, and the effects are awful.
We're going to get the rocks out of my friend's house, and my husband said, oh, we need more rocks in our driveway! Uh, no! I'm not willing to take the chance that one of our dogs--esp a curious Kai puppy--will find them tasty. It's just not worth the risk.
I think any rocks can be an issue though lava rocks too if food dropped on them the rocks would absorb it and make the dog want to eat it.
Thanks for the warning.
I hope he doesn't have too much pain when he passes.
We had to put down our 7year boxer due to leukemia.
I hate lava rocks. They hurt even to walk on! I can't imagine how much it would hurt to ingest them...
Poor Gideon
Another bad landscaping material for dogs is cocoa mulch.
Gideon's going to be put down tomorrow. If he makes it through the night. He's resting, he's off all meds which won't save him anyway, but were making him nauseous on top of everything else. Today he's having some ice cream and bits of chicken (he's adog, they're probably mixed together and he doesn't mind). His abdomen is filled up with fluid and he's mostly just being still, but he doesn't seem to be in much pain, thankfully. Poor boy. He's a sweet, silly, GSD who was very good with my friend's birds, and even tolerated parrots climbing on him. We're going to miss him.
Cocoa mulch is something I won't ever use..