Need some help here - Giardia Symptoms

Sammie is having diarrhea today and been vomiting twice . She has very low energy. I had to take her out almost every other hour to eliminate. I can tell her stomach is upsetting. I am taking her to the vet's office tomorrow to do the test

I just want to ask the forum anyone who had this experience what I should do other than take her to the vet? -- I am worried how this is going to effect her , I feel so bad I didn't bring the issue to the vet immediately after Sean mentioned it.

Thank you for advices

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Comments

  • aykayk
    edited April 2013
    Giardia gives bad poop with an awful smell to it. It usually doesn't cause vomitting or low energy.

    She might have gotten into something she shouldn't have and eaten it.

    She should still be checked out by a vet though as there's also a chance it could be something more severe. Obstruction, parvo, etc.
  • edited April 2013
    Hello,

    I had almost the same experience with my JA Tajo, he actually had a worms problem. Has she ever got a deworming treatment? If yes when was the last time?
    You have to check if there are signs of blood in her diarrhea, if yes do not wait for tomorrow, send here to the vet ASAP, since it might even be parvo.

    This is just my personal experience, in my opinion you should send her to the vet as soon as possible because if she has something severe it is better to be treated early.
  • One more thing,

    Are u giving to her the same food the breeder gave her? We had the same problem with Tajo when we changed his food.

    Also be aware that vomiting can be also caused by the cleaning detergent that you use when you clean you floor, the little girl can sniff it and upset her stomach. This was one of the notes that our vet gave us when Tajo had vomiting problems.
  • Food : I have been feeding her Eukenuba Growth puppy food 2 cups a day , however I gave her treats yesterday the Kong filled with peanut butter , I am wondering weather this is one factor , she had no motivation to eat her kibbles but She would licking the juicy water , I gave her some treats but she only accepted one.

    Bad Habit: She picked a bad habbit of licking /eating dirt and put everything on the ground into her mouth, when I take her out. I have to fight with her every time to take it out of her mouth but usually it's too late for the dirt , I suspect she has sth in her throat as she keeps gagging . When I checked her vomit stuff I found a little stone in it :-(

    Diarrhea: There's no blood in it, She had no de worming treatment yet And I don't know weather she had any in Japan , she got here on Wed and and Vet visit on Thur, they gave me the pill but I didn't put into her food as I wanted her to adjust a little. the diarrhea started on Friday .

    Cleaning product : She had no accident in our house , she has always peed on her pee pad in her ex-pen and pooped out side since day one , all of our household cleaning kit is green product. however , she did peed on the door mat this morning , for the first time. I wonder this caused by her upsetting stomach.

    Low energy: She has been pretty mellow and calm since day one, she never jumps up and down or running like crazy . We did a little play in the park on Saturday, she seems very tired after that , fall asleep at puppy training class evaluation

    I am taking her to the vet this morning ,BTW, her poop does smell awful... I thought all the poops are ....

    Thank you so much for the info, I am taking her to the vet at 9AM

  • Another thing

    She was happy eater when I fed her last night with her kibble and she didn't want any food this morning other than licking the juice - I mix her kibbles with water . I left her breakfast in her pen but she showed no interest, However she has been drinking a lots of water last night , I took her out 5 times since 1 AM
  • Do let us know what the vet says.

    Licking/eating dirt are super dangerous until pups have all their shots! I literally hand carried my pup or put her in a shopping bag until she was too big to carry and had her shots. It's not worth the risk of her picking something up. Do you wipe her paws down with baby wipe when you take her inside first?
  • You'll probably be asked to bring a fresh fecal sample to the vet. One of the medicines for giardia, fenbendazole, will treat giardia and most of the worms.

    But if it's an alternative parasite like cocci, it'll require a different treatment.

  • I am really suspecting for a warming issue, Tajo had his first deworming pill given by his breeder (i dont know at what age) and by the time he was around 11-12 weeks old he had the same signs as Sammie. Lack of energy, diarrhea vomiting and he was refusing kibble food, but he didnt refuse raw meat.
    After we went to the vet he made him 2 injections, one with deworming medicament, and one with reanital, to calm down his stomach. After the treatment he got better after 2-3 days, and something gross happened, first he pooped out a big number of small warms like 20-30, and then one day after he pooped one 4-5cm long big worm, it was really gross, i guess it was the mother of the smaller worms.
    Our vet then told us that we have to give him one other deworming medicine after 21 days, since with the first injection they killed only the grown worms, but the small eggs were still there.

    He told us that this was a really common issue.

    But however, the vet will give you a professional answer to your problem.

    PS: Sorry for the disgusting description.
  • Thank Tajo mom , no worries about the details , as I couldn't believe an "OCD" cleaner myself would go through her vomit and poops looking for clues , I do clean her up with wet towels at the door but not baby wipers

    I don't know what to do with her dirt eating issue, I was hoping the training program would help her but she goes to my front & back yard numbers of the day. She seems doing a lot better when I take her out for walk as she would be curious of everything else and forgot to check what's on the ground .

    Tajo mom, did your Tajo had the same habit? how did you correct him? or he just grow out of it?

  • I did pick up her poop sample into a tube, the vet wanted me to follow up after the first appointment
  • and what do you suggest to feed her if she refuses her kibbles?


  • Rice white and or plain natural yogurt. Sweet potatoes
  • Tajo was not licking dirt, but however he was really interested into eating grass when he was a small puppy, and also he was acting like a "vacuum cleaner" if any breadcrumbs were present on the floor.
    After he grew up a little bit he stopped eating grass.

    PS: I'm Tajo's Daddy :)
  • Saigo eats dirt like it's going out of style.
    So whenever he is off leash, we monitor him. Our vet said it's either because he's still hungry or because he likes what he smells in the dirt. The way he was eating it, we suspected it was because he was still hungry. So we started to better manage his calories and he doesn't do it as much anymore. Our trainer asked us to start using the spritz bottle method and since then he's pretty much stopped, but i can tell he still wants to do it.

    For food, Saigo eats Blue Buffalo Wilderness Puppy & Orijen Puppy. He's had Hill's Large Breed and Royal Canin also. His poops were good on all of these but we like BB and Orijen the best. We will be transitioning him to adult food soon (he's 5 months now) and we'll probably stay with BB/Orijen. For snacks he gets either freeze dried 100% Salmon or Liver treats. He'll get a lamb bone now and then to chew on.

    This was the direction from his breeder: no processed snacks, no peanut butter, no wet food, no canned food, no human food, etc, etc lol.
  • In addition to what was mentioned above, I would suggest getting your pup off of Eukenuba. We have many threads here on the forum about dog food, and nutrition is important for good dog health. :)
  • It could be just a switch in food, from what the dog ate before. It could be peanut butter. It could be giardia or coccidia. Your dog came from Japan? If so, the food switch is a likely issue, but the vet will be able to tell. Coccidia and giardia both cause loose stool with a very bad smell--you'll recognize the smell once you've experienced it. And it is super hard to get rid of because it can live in the soil for a very long time indeed. So if there are other dogs around, you need to be hypervigilant and clean, though often adult dogs don't actually get it.....

    Your vet will tell you if it's one of those.

    You should look at a better quality food than eukanaba. Check out the threads on canine nutrition. (oope, ttddinh posted as I was typing!)

    And there is nothing wrong with giving your dog food other than their main diet (it drives me crazy how many breeders still say that, esp. about "human" food. Thats all I feed my dogs is human food, except for the the few liver snacks we give them, as they eat meat from the grocery store as their main meal). But if a dog isn't used to a variety of things in their diet, then you have to introduce them carefully, if you're going to do it. A dog that only eats one thing, like a certain type of kibble, will tend to have problems digesting novel things.
  • @cdyinger,
    There few options for commercially prepared foods:

    -Kibble
    -Canned
    -Raw (dehydrated or raw grinds from freezer cases)

    I avoid canned food myself... it's like Chef Boyardee for dogs... I do both dehydrated raw and raw grinds for my JA, she doesn't do as well with kibble being her main meals. We mostly use kibble as training treats.

    Another option before you go switching to raw (which requires freezer and refrigerator space and some dedicated shopping), is consider adding some water, or low-sodium chicken or beef broth to the kibble. My pup never had kibble dry until she was older just so she didn't swallow pieces whole and throw up. You can also mix cottage cheese or yogurt with pup's kibble, so it resembles canned food. I try not to use cooked human food or cooked meats. I would offer rice/kibble mixture as well.

    If you decided to do raw, there are a lot of raw food options in the SF Bay Area. I recommend these:
    Dehydrated raw:
    Addictions Pet Foods (can be offered dry or wet, easy to mix w/ kibble, this is an Australian/New Zealand brand so select retailers or online),
    Stella and Chewy (if you get them at Pet Food Express the food qualifies as buy 3 get 1 free and cuts down the cost significantly)
    The Honest Kitchen (we don't like the form factor, too powdery and doesn't absorb water fast, plus recent recall notice)

    Raw grinds:
    Green Beef Tripe Xkalibar (most cost effective, based in Hollister),
    Small Batch (expensive, based in SF)
    Tucker's Raw Frozen (based in Wisconsin, select retailers carry them, also cost effective)

    There are others such as @saya on this forum who feed home made combination of raw, often whole parts of the animal, but I prefer the commercially prepared grinds myself

    I hope this helps!

    ps. We always keep a small box of FlortiFlora around for diarrhea, I recommend all dog owners do the same b/c sometimes it's nothing contagious/pathological, pup might just have a sensitive stomach and ate something too rich (we just experienced this yesterday)

    http://www.amazon.com/Purina-Veterinary-Diets-Fortiflora-Sachets/dp/B001650NNW

    pps. Make sure you wipe down pup good after going outside. We prefer baby wipes b/c of the disposable nature. If you use a towel just make sure it's single use and you wash it afterwards
  • Rice white and or plain natural yogurt. Sweet potatoes
    Good point @*JackBurton*!
    Canned purred pumpkin, not the pie-filling kind, works well as with sweet potato to help w/ diarrhea and constipation.
  • Update

    Got back from Vet's office , Dr checked Sammie and thinks she is quite all right , She probably ate sth she shouldn't have. Lab results will be back tomorrow reg Giardia , Vet told me to monitor her for the rest of the day, and gave me 2 cans of IAMS Veterinary Formula. He told me to feed her a couple of scoops of these , He also gave me the deworming treatment pills. I mixed it into the food , Sammie seems very happy with it and ate almost all of it ( total of 4 scoops table spoon).

    However , I might found the problem cause this vomiting though. I found her vomit yesterday was mostly watery with the peanut butter smell. It didn't ring a bell then but this morning I lured her into the travel crate (which she absolutely hates) using the peanut butter filled kong toy ( a small one ) , she loved it and licked it then after her meal, she vomit again , at this point I am pretty certain she shouldn't have peanut butter .

    I will get some baby wipers , I prepared numbers of old towels to clean her before she gets into the house , and wash them afterwards.

    I thank you all for the tips and advices , I think I will feed her white rice and sweet potato
    for a couple of days, I really appreciate all the tips above.

    I will update tomorrow regarding her lab results




  • Yay!!! Glad to hear vet thinks she is quite all right.

    Come to think of it, depending on what kind of peanut butter you use (the natural kind that becomes runny in room temperature vs. the hydrogenated kind that stays creamy and paste like), I can totally see vomit triggered by swallowing a chunk of peanut butter.
  • Good news :)

    Now that the vet told you that there is nothing serious at least you can stay calm :)

    If you suspect that the penaut butter is triggering the vommit, just dont give it anymore to her.

  • Also the fact that you gave her worms treatment is really good. At least now you know that she has been dewarmed. I suggest you to take note the date she got each treatment, so you will know the time she will need dewarming again.
  • like I said on the phone the other night, Giradia is still a legit concern. It is easy to deal with though. We did peanut butter in the kong too when K was a pup.

    Just remember that you want to get everything out but you also want to monitor hydration as well. Rice and yogurt are kinda of an akita wonder drug in my house.

    I'm glad she is doing better.
  • Any update regarding the lab results?
  • greek yogurt for the win.

    Toki hates rice. and peanut butter. and sweet potatoes. my dog generally doesn't eat unless it involves meat and cheese/dairy.

    cooked chicken works well for an upset tummy, too. Its nice and bland. Unless your dog is allergic to chicken, then maybe it wont be so bland. But it always works for Toki.
  • Update:

    Lab results back that Sammie is POSITIVE with Giardia. Dr prescribed a couple of meds. get those meds into her food was quite challenge. However I think the vomit & diarrhea was caused by peanut butter. She is doing well, yesterday's stool was solid

    She still refuses kibbles, I have been feeding her with canned puppy dog food mixed with baby carrots ,I am going to try white rice + BB's puppy food this evening .

    Sammie is very smart and she gets SO much attention whenever she is out , almost too much. She is great around people and children, she lets everyone pet her and being cute.

    However, she is very mouthy , she keeps nipping on me and my husband, it seems she wants my hand and fingers in her mouth at ALL times . also she is a little aloof, She wouldn't come when I call her name, unless she knows there's a treat in my hand and she would walk away once she took her treat. I think she needs time to adjust her new life, I have signed her up one class here in PG and will look into sign up Sirius training in San Jose

    I wonder about her #1 is too frequent though. it seems she pees almost every hour, more often after she drinks water , I am not sure this is normal, she poos 3-4 times a day

    here some photos

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  • She's gorgeous!

    I wouldn't be so sure the diarrhea is from peanut butter. Giardia and Coccidia cycle--meaning that dogs don't show all the symptoms all the time. They may seem better, but they're just in a period when the parasites aren't being shed. Giardia can be easily passed, and she could even be reinfected, so you have to be hypervigilant about cleaning up, even outside. Clean with bleach. It's a major pain--I had to go through this with my Akita, too.

    Otherwise, she sounds like a normal puppy. Mouthing is normal. so is needing to pee every hour or so.
  • try to limit offering too many different kinds of food to Sammie. puppies got sensitive tummies. best to keep it simple. especially now. in few months or so when things settle, you can start to add different food to her diet.
    mouthing is normal. my adult akitas are still mouthy with me sometimes... more playing. she'll eventually learn her name. Was she always sammie? or was she called differently name in japan?
    btw, why is she drinking out of the bottle? this is normally used during shipping. Best not to use that. A water bowl would be just fine. :)
  • @dogmom8

    I took the photo the day she arrived, my husband used that bottle to play with her, we do use a water bowl at home.

    Thank you for the tips , She is very happy with white rice/chicken/carrots meal, I am going to add kibbles little by little until she get used to the kibbles. She is on anti biotic meds now, I think it would makes her stomach even more sensitive.
  • @Cdyinger,

    Antibiotics not only kill off the bad stuff in their tummy, it also messes with the good flora. The good flora needs time to bounce back (giving yogurt helps) Since she had diarrhea as recent as Sunday/Monday, you might want to hold off on adding any kibble to her meals until she's completely recovered. Like @dogmom8 said, keep it simple. You want to make sure she's not only eating and pooping well but she's gaining weight (she's a growing puppy!!)

    Kibble is convenient for human but it's also the worse food you can feed your pet. No reason you have to get her used to it right away when she has 10+ years ahead of her...

    My 10-month-old JA loves to kiss, lick and mouth. She also likes to pick up twigs and munch grass on our walk so I think she just explores her word through her mouth more. She has excellent bite inhibition so I don't mind her being mouthy, if anything it prevents/discourages random strangers from messing with her
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