Keeping you both in my thoughts and prayers and hoping Hannah is feeling like herself real soon.
Love and huge hugs,
Lori
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Keeping you both in my thoughts and prayers and hoping Hannah is feeling like herself real soon.
Love and huge hugs,
Lori
hey friend
do you give massage therapy to her? or in her diet give her cosequinn ds sprinkle tablets? have also heard adequinn injections work well. though i would do those when other things have not worked. but the supplement has worked fairly well for my girl. and i know i site that sells it online for fraction of cost. if you do any sort of massage techniques and stretches for her it may help but careful of the selection of strecthes for her. :)
Hi Julie,
I hope this is nothing major and Hannah is bouncing around real soon. Let us know what the vet says and how she is doing.
Hugs,
Leslie and the gang
Thanks, guys. I took Hannah to get an exam yesterday and acupuncture if they felt she needed it. We saw the third of the three vets who perform acupuncture and I really liked her. Hannah's reflexes were fine, and she felt that she was not suffering from a new issue, but thought she could use acupuncture. She watched Hannah walk around the room and felt that she has more weakness in her right back leg and wanted to support her hips and her back.
The acupuncture did NOT go well. Hannah has never really liked it, but yesterday was terrible. She was flailing around and even whipped her head back to bite (not a person, but where she tried to put the needle). That spot happened to be the right back leg. The vet was unsure if it was really painful, or if Hannah was just so aware of the needles that she was tense and panicked. She ended up doing okay for the 10 min. we sat with the needles in, but we never had one in that back leg. It was rather traumatic for me and even for my mom (she came with to help hold Hannah). She was fine last night and today, and I am finally feeling a little better too.
The vet yesterday loved that I do laser treatment with Hannah and recommended that I do it in about 48 hours and suggested that I try to maintain her comfort with laser based on yesterday's experience. I'm not sure if Hannah didn't like the touch of this vet, or if something really hurt, or what. She never liked it, but was never reacting like that. I'm not sure if the leg weakness is more due to Cushing's or a back issue. Anyway, we have a laser treatment tomorrow at 5:30 so I hope that will provide her some relief.
She also recommended I try a fish oil to help with her allergies and also her joints. We will see how that works, and then may add some Chinese herbs to help her allergies. That would only cost me $18 per month, so I am open to it since traditional medicine has not relieved her.
Julie & Hannah
Hi Julie,
I hope the laser treatment helps Hannah. The only problem I found with Chinese herbs is you need to know any side effects and it is not always easy to find out what is in the Chinese medicine. I even called a manufacturer and emailed because it was written in Chinese on the bottle and they would not tell me. Zoe was on Shen Calmer and I wanted to know if anything in it worked like a diuretic, etc. The holistic vet assured me that it would not be a problem to use with Cushing drugs and really could not discuss what was in it. Made me nervous. Hopefully your vet will be more knowledgeable and read Chinese:D:D:D:D:D:D:D
Sending lots of love
I'm sorry the visit didn't go too well. Jenny suddenly decided she hated getting her insulin shots so I can empathize too well with how Hannah was acting. I hope the laser goes well.
And only Addy would be translating Chinese for her dog! lol
me too, Julie, seems like we are in the same place right now. zoe made it home, they only kept her for 2 1/2 hours instead of the usual four- hubby gave everyone a big tip:D:DQuote:
Actually I probably worry about everything with her these days. I have been having a really tough time lately and have been doing a lot of crying and worrying that my time with my girl is limited. I am trying to accept it, and just embrace the time with her, but it is so hard to do. Then she'll bounce back and seem great. She, like Zoe, is still very happy and interactive with me, and she can move faster than Izzy when food is involved
I hope Hannah's back is better, Zoe slips alot now on the hardwood floors.
I don't know... something about huskies and needles... they never even flinch at them. Kira has no problem with acupuncture. Poor Hannah. Give her a hug for me.
Hey Julie,
I posted Zoe's eye stuff on my thread for you. How is Hannah's back? When it rains it pours.:(:(:( I know you are upset, we are so alike;);)
I mentioned on my thread that it may be allergic conjunctivitis as that is what they suspect Zoe has though I think it is immune related.
The fluriprofen was to help inflammation and we had also had to use the higher dose of cyclosporine. We went from .2% to 1.%. Eye vet wanted to go to 2%, I said not yet try 1% first. He hoped that would help her eyes stay well lubricated. He said there is a small window to work with as far as dry eye is concerned and if we cant control it well (she had a mild case of it but the crystals posed a problem) the gland atrophies and then you cant produce tears with the cyclosorine.
We compound the cyclosporine (in coconut oil) froma company in NC. I pay $40 I think and it lasts almost 3 months.
The fluriprofen is pricey because we were going through a bottle every eight days and it was about $15 but then we cut a discount card for Pet drugs so we pay I think about $10 for a bottle. It should last us a bit longer as we cut back to one drop each eye twice a day.
I hope your vet can help until you get in to the eye vet.
Hang in there. Lots of love and prayers for you and Hannah
Hi Addy,
I saw your reply-thanks! I called my regular vet this morning as well, to see if they wanted to see her, and my vet said he would call the opthamologist vet to see if he could get us in faster-but that I would probably pay more. I said that was fine since at this rate I would pay to see two vets anyway. I guess they take emergency appointments and my vet said he wanted her seen this week. We got in TODAY! I had to pay $95 instead of $59, but I would've paid more if I had to go to my other vet and then this vet, so that's fine. I just had to go and be prepared to wait until he had some time. They ended up getting us in right away-like a 5 min. wait. They are wonderful.
Anyway, I was right. She is having big issues with a dry eye. There were no ulcers and the pressure was fine, but her dry eye is getting worse. He mentioned the same thing about the window of time before things deteriorate rapidly. My parents dog was really bad when they adopted her and the drops didn't help her. He said that as the eye gets worse they have less feeling on their cornea which makes them blink even less, and then things just get worse. He said I could try Cyclosporine or Tacrolimus drops, but that he recommended Tacrolimus because he thinks it works better-95% of dogs have success. I am to use it in her left eye only once per day. He said that within two weeks I should see less mucus on her eye and it should have a shiny appearance again.
I am also supposed to use NeoPolyDex ointment in both of her eyes daily. (He said if we are gone all day or any time she is going to be inactive and sleeping I should give it and then give it at night as well). If I am home I should use Genteal or other moisturizing drops to keep her comfortable. I guess the NeoPolyDex also keeps them moist. I used it a few times on her about a year ago and can't remember why I stopped. Of course I realize there is a steroid in it, but he and my regular vet said it won't affect Cushing's. He just said I need to be sure she doesn't develop an injury because then I need to stop it immediately and start with antibiotic drops.
I brought my whole bag of doggie eye meds with and he added the Tacrolimus. It was $49 but I only need to use one drop per day in her left eye and he is going to have me get it through Meds 4 Vets after that. I am hopeful that she will be feeling better soon since I feel like I caught it early and was able to get in. I'm very grateful to my vet and to the specialist for the rush, even if it did cost more.
Her back seems okay. No one was ever able to determine if there even is an issue with her back. They seem to think it could be more of an arthritis issue or leg weakness in general. She got laser treatment Thurs. and we now include her hips. That vet said that Hannah doesn't really show any muscle wasting or hair loss or pot belly, and she usually feels that the back end weakness comes on with the other muscle wasting issues, so she was more inclined to think it could be arthritic. I paid for three laser treatments so and will use the other two when I feel like she needs them. We have been going for our short walks and she is doing fine. I just notice that she sits more to eat...but again I am watching more so maybe she has done this for a while. For now I am hoping that things are okay and that they'll stay that way for a while. Thanks for checking!
I'd love to hear if you have heard of this med that I got for Hannah. Maybe it's something Zoe could try too, as an alternative for Cyclosporine. I also searched it online and didn't see anything scary.
Stay cool!
Julie & Hannah