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Neurological or muskulosksletal?


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Hi guys

 

i have a 7 year old mixed breed rescue who has been with us for a few years now. And she is in good health generally. 

 

Last weekend she started having what we thought were leg cramps but didn’t seem to be in pain. 

 

Took her to the vet and did all the normal tests and even some bloods and all normal. 

 

We put her on some low dose anti inflammatory medication just in case it was a muscle spasm and we thought it had passed as no cramps for a couple of days. 

 

Last night she had four. We sent the video to our vet who said she hadn’t seen it before and forwarded it to specialists. 

 

You guys helped me last time with my previous dog so I’m hoping you all can again! 

 

Any experience of this or advice would be much appreciated! 

 

Stupidly just realised I cannot upload videos cos they are too large so if someone can advise me how to do that too! 

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Good for you for getting the videos to your vet and to your vet for forwarding them to specialists.  Poor little mite.   No qualifications here either, but I'd agree with @persephone - that does look like some sort of seizure activity .. so I'd definitely be thinking neurological.

If she were nine, if you're not already doing it  I'd be keeping some sort of record .. date, time of day, circumstances,  .. and sort of detail which might help show a pattern.

Fingers and paws crossed you can get the dear little thing sorted .. she looks such a sweetie.

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Hi all

 

thanks so much for your comments and taking time to look. 

 

Weve come back from sash and they also think it’s neurological. We have an mri booked in on Tuesday to exclude other things. 

 

Thanks all will keep you all posted 

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Does your dog look like it’s completely run out of energy after the episodes?  It’s probably not the same thing but I used to have a dog that had regular seizures when he gets excited.  Not in the leg but full body.    It was painful to watch.  Turns out it was from the heart, he had a heart murmur.  While we couldn’t treat it because he was old and I couldn’t bear to put him through a invasive surgery, it was controlled with medication.  He lived till he was 14.

 

Poor baby, I hope they find out what it is and be able to treat the root cause.  The doctors at SASH seem to know what they are doing.  Treated my older boy from severe pain last year and now he is back to normal.  Best of luck, let us know how it goes.

 

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My old girl had similar seizures.  My vet said probably epilepsy...which is going to mean a lot of testing to rule out other things and the tests will probably all come back negative.  She recommended going right to low dose phenobarbital (with monitoring) to see if it helped.  It did.  My girl was on phenobarbital for around 3 years.  I gradually tapered the dose off to nothing (against veterinary advice).  My girl lived another five or six years with a few mild seizures a year and died at 14 yr 10 mo. (ie a couple of years more than average for her breed) 

 

Not saying you should do as I did (many people would consider it irresponsible to skip the extensive testing that goes into an epilepsy diagnosis) or that you should call it epilepsy because someone on the internet says it looks like what happened to her dog (you shouldn't). Just that 1. Diagnosis is likely to involve a lot of testing, which may be inconclusive and 2. If it does turn out to be epilepsy, it may be a mild and treatable form, not the dreaded grand mal.  

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I think what @sandgrubber and I are trying to point out is it is not all doom and gloom.  It can be treatable and controlled by medication and your dog can live well into old age without significantly  impacting their quality of life.  I know it’s the worst feeling in the world when your dog is unwell, so hang in there!

 

 

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I think the second one is a seizure but not so sure about the first. Seizures come from a malfunction in the brain (that's my understanding but I am not an expert) and it would probably depend on what part of the brain was malfunctioning. It could only be the part that affects the legs. I have a dog who has had regular seizures since she was eighteen months of age. She is now almost twelve. Your voice in the background made me cry because that is just what I do when my girl seizures. It is horrible to watch and all you can do is love them and wait for it to pass.  Cyber hugs to both of you.

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Yes i have owned a dog that has done this due to muscle spasms & the severe pain associated with it .
If you can source an amazing bowen massage person then worth getting the dog checked  to see if anything is pinched .When my dog had his issues it was early morning .
 

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Thanks for all the advice and the love and the hugs. 

 

My last pup (that I actually found through dolforums!) had her first seizure roughly a year after I got her - she was 7. 

 

We never did any further testing as she had a heart problem and wouldn’t be able to be anaesthetised for any procedures or scans. 

We treated her with anti seizure medication as well as her heart meds. 

She lived another 8 years and we had to let her go when she had a series of very bad seizures and the vet thought at this point we couldn’t do any more for her. 

 

She lived till she was 15 and She was the best dog ever!!! 

 

I think my sister wants to conclusively find out what her dog has but I’ll keep you all posted on the outcome 

 

thanks everyone again xx

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