Wordless Wednesday
Sniffs, The HoundDogs
Wednesday, August 31, 2011
Wednesday, August 24, 2011
Thursday, August 18, 2011
Thankful "Cleo" Thursday
Today is Thankful Thursday at the HoundDogs House
Today, Cleo had a follow up appointment to have her blood rechecked to see if the Predisone (steroids) have jump started her again to rebuild her RBCs. She is always such a trooper, she is always ready to go for a BUV ride, I can distract the other two hounds where I can just have Cleo walk out the front door with no collar or leash (we live on a dead end road/last house) so this is okay. She no longer attempts to chase the outdoor cats that are lounging on the porch. She walks right out to the BUV and waits for you to open the back end and lift her up. We have a new/used folding ramp coming next week from a friend that is going to be great for her. She lays down in the BUV so nicely, waits to get out of the BUV, walks with her tail held high as we enter the vet office. Heck she doesn't even need to have a bandage on any more after her blood draws, such a big girl.
Note: This is a re-enactment from a previous vet visit. :)
We are not out of the woods yet, but we have poked our head around a bush
and
we can see a few flowers
between the weeds today
Oh, ya'll are going ya come on HDM tell us the results....
.
.
.
.
.
Cleo's blood work from today
Has you can see we are ready to call "Houston" and let them know we are moving closer to the launching pad.
I am sure all are blog friends have seen a blood test or two on our fur-kids. Well as you can see last Saturday (8-13-11), Cleo almost crashed due to her low, low RBC. As you can see from today's (8-18-11) Cleo has increased her RBC by several percentages. The numbers you are seeing are a percentage of the RBCs that are in her system, today Cleo is at 27.5%. A normal range for a dog is 37-50%, Cleo has a long way to go to "normal" range but we are so "Thankful" for the gain she made to day. Dr. T was quite impressed with her gains, but said she is still considered an "Acute" case at this point and we may see the numbers go back down again. She will remain on the same amount of Steroids she has been on for the last week and we will recheck her blood in 10 days.
And also, Dr. T said that after this weekend we can begin to take Cleo on short little walks when it is cool in the evenings. Cleo wants to let the vet know that is all fine and dandy, but she will prefer to stick to the golf cart rides.
We want to say "Thanks" to everyone for all the wonderful comments, POTP and good healing vibes. We know they are doing their work on Cleo for sure.
Cleo and HoundDogmom
Wednesday, August 17, 2011
Monday, August 15, 2011
Cleo Update (An Adjustment Doesn’t Fix It All) New Diagnosis
Well once again here I sit typing and reaching out to my blogging friends in blogville for some much needed Power Of The Paw and some words of advice for Miss Cleo and myself. I believe I “jinxed” myself and got way too excited about the great improvements that happened with Cleo. I guess this time I may have counted my chickens before they hatched.
For starters my husband and I hardly ever go out and do things, but this past weekend was his birthday so I splurged for a movie and hopefully dinner for us. Our fur-kids eat supper between 5-6pm every night. Well we decided to go to a movie at 5:00pm so I decided to wait and feed the dogs after the movie was over. I gave Cleo her meds for her tummy acid, thinking this would keep her tummy calm so she would be ready to eat when we got home. It was only going to be like 45 mins after their normal feeding time that they would eat, I felt this was not a big deal.
Well, we received a very frantic call from our son around 6:30 just as the movie was getting over. He stopped out at the house to pick up his laundry and found Cleo laying there unable to get up and move. He is total panic which places me in total panic and we rush home, to find Cleo barking, jumping and running around like hey what is all the fuss about. She is still pretty wobbly in the back leg area, so I pretty much decide she must have twisted herself or just had a little spasm or something. Just must be getting time for another adjustment or something. So I went ahead and feed them and she seemed to be okay, just moving slow and not much energy. I did notice that her gums were a very light pink color, which I know is not a good sign. Of course, I didn’t sleep hardly at all Friday night worrying about her and how many hours till the vet opened so I could call.
Saturday morning came and Cleo seemed to be a little perky and ate well, but I still called the vet. After talking with Dr. T. and telling him what I was seeing he had me bring her back in for an EKG and more blood work. Cleo’s EKG came back great (thank you GOD), but her blood counts were not so good. Cleo’s RBC has dropped again after rebounding just a few days prior. Instead of 2 points up she was 3 points down from where the blood work on Tuesday was. Dr. T has always shown concern and has been trying to fully understand why Cleo’s RBC is so low but shows that she is trying to make little baby RBCs.
Well it was today, Saturday August 13th, my husband’s birthday that we have found out that Cleo has Immune Mediated Hemolytic Anemia (IMHA) formally known as Autoimmune Hemolytic Anemia or AIHA. There is no explanation has to how or why one animal will get this over another.
Cleo was given an injection of “happy juice” steroids and sent back home with her anti-acid, amoxcillian, and predisone again. From all the information that I have read, the heavy dose of steroids is the only way to begin to fight this and get it under control. There is known cure for IMHA at this time, you can only manage it and “pray” that it goes into some sort of remission to where she can maintain a good quality of life. We are NOT giving up on Cleo, and Cleo continues to fight so we will do whatever we can to help maintain this disease. We will continue to work Dr. T and Dr. A Cleo’s Canine Chiropractor to determine the best course of treatment for her and hopefully move to reducing her steroid intake. The main thing we must do right now is get her body to reproduce RBCs and keep them. Unfortunately, the only way is for to take heavy doses of Steriods. She tires very easy, has a slight cough from the acids in her tummy. She is weak at times, but then has a burst of energy at times as well. Her gums are very pale, but the white of her eyes look good. We are just taking it one day at a time and we will have her RBC retested at the end of the week to see if it has come up. We are feeding her small amounts of ID food every two hours to help keep the acid in her tummy under control. This also seems to help her keep her energy levels up and keep her gums a little pinker.
Here are a few websites if you would like to have some more information on this disease.
http://www.veterinarypartner.com/Content.plx?P=A&A=1390&S=1&SourceID=42
http://www.cloudnet.com/~jdickson/index.html
http://www.peppypaws.com/LillisLegacy.html
So needless to say, we are asking for some more Power of the Paw for Cleo and reaching out to anyone of our blogville friends to see if they have ever dealt with this disease.
Sniffs, HoundDogMom and Cleo
For starters my husband and I hardly ever go out and do things, but this past weekend was his birthday so I splurged for a movie and hopefully dinner for us. Our fur-kids eat supper between 5-6pm every night. Well we decided to go to a movie at 5:00pm so I decided to wait and feed the dogs after the movie was over. I gave Cleo her meds for her tummy acid, thinking this would keep her tummy calm so she would be ready to eat when we got home. It was only going to be like 45 mins after their normal feeding time that they would eat, I felt this was not a big deal.
Well, we received a very frantic call from our son around 6:30 just as the movie was getting over. He stopped out at the house to pick up his laundry and found Cleo laying there unable to get up and move. He is total panic which places me in total panic and we rush home, to find Cleo barking, jumping and running around like hey what is all the fuss about. She is still pretty wobbly in the back leg area, so I pretty much decide she must have twisted herself or just had a little spasm or something. Just must be getting time for another adjustment or something. So I went ahead and feed them and she seemed to be okay, just moving slow and not much energy. I did notice that her gums were a very light pink color, which I know is not a good sign. Of course, I didn’t sleep hardly at all Friday night worrying about her and how many hours till the vet opened so I could call.
Saturday morning came and Cleo seemed to be a little perky and ate well, but I still called the vet. After talking with Dr. T. and telling him what I was seeing he had me bring her back in for an EKG and more blood work. Cleo’s EKG came back great (thank you GOD), but her blood counts were not so good. Cleo’s RBC has dropped again after rebounding just a few days prior. Instead of 2 points up she was 3 points down from where the blood work on Tuesday was. Dr. T has always shown concern and has been trying to fully understand why Cleo’s RBC is so low but shows that she is trying to make little baby RBCs.
Well it was today, Saturday August 13th, my husband’s birthday that we have found out that Cleo has Immune Mediated Hemolytic Anemia (IMHA) formally known as Autoimmune Hemolytic Anemia or AIHA. There is no explanation has to how or why one animal will get this over another.
Cleo was given an injection of “happy juice” steroids and sent back home with her anti-acid, amoxcillian, and predisone again. From all the information that I have read, the heavy dose of steroids is the only way to begin to fight this and get it under control. There is known cure for IMHA at this time, you can only manage it and “pray” that it goes into some sort of remission to where she can maintain a good quality of life. We are NOT giving up on Cleo, and Cleo continues to fight so we will do whatever we can to help maintain this disease. We will continue to work Dr. T and Dr. A Cleo’s Canine Chiropractor to determine the best course of treatment for her and hopefully move to reducing her steroid intake. The main thing we must do right now is get her body to reproduce RBCs and keep them. Unfortunately, the only way is for to take heavy doses of Steriods. She tires very easy, has a slight cough from the acids in her tummy. She is weak at times, but then has a burst of energy at times as well. Her gums are very pale, but the white of her eyes look good. We are just taking it one day at a time and we will have her RBC retested at the end of the week to see if it has come up. We are feeding her small amounts of ID food every two hours to help keep the acid in her tummy under control. This also seems to help her keep her energy levels up and keep her gums a little pinker.
Here are a few websites if you would like to have some more information on this disease.
http://www.veterinarypartner.com/Content.plx?P=A&A=1390&S=1&SourceID=42
http://www.cloudnet.com/~jdickson/index.html
http://www.peppypaws.com/LillisLegacy.html
So needless to say, we are asking for some more Power of the Paw for Cleo and reaching out to anyone of our blogville friends to see if they have ever dealt with this disease.
Sniffs, HoundDogMom and Cleo
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