My girl pug (confirmed Cushings & confirmed calcinosis cutis) / Tobey has passed
Hi everyone,
My name is Renee. I have three pugs, a female and two males. I am also heavily involved in running pug rescue up here in Alaska (with another amazing animal lover).
My girl Tobey is my first pug. I got her as a puppy from a backyard breeder (before I knew better), and she is 10 years old now. Things have been quite baffling with her these last few years, although looking back, it seems that she has many symptoms that indicate possible cushings. Unfortunately, at the moment, she is unable to be tested for cushings due to being on prednisone (we are tapering her off right now).
About 2 years ago, she started getting UTI's. They were wicked too, and I was sending out culture & sensitivities every month for a long time. For a few months she even had MRSP bacteria (related to MRSA). It was a long road to get these infections under control, but eventually we did. She did have surgery earlier this year for bladder stones, which turned out to be very untypical looking struvites (they appeared to be oxalate, but they were confirmed as struvites from the lab). Before the surgery, the ultra sound showed her kidneys to be 'dark' and containing possible stones / tumors as well, however, her kidney function has never been out of the normal range. After the surgery, she started having incontinence in her sleep. She 'wets the bed' a few times a month.
Starting in October of this year, she began drinking a lot of water and having accidents in the house. She was also very gassy. I thought she may have another UTI, so we went to the vet for testing. She tested negative for a UTI, but given the possibility of early kidney disease (based on the ultrasound), we thought it was just a progression. We decided not to treat the gassiness and just wait and see how it progressed.
About three weeks later, I took her back because she was unable to jump up on chairs / beds, etc that she had previously been able to jump on. In addition, her stomach seemed very bloated, and the gas was continuing. She was still drinking an excessive amount of water as well. We did a complete blood panel and xrays. The organ function and all other levels on the blood panel were within normal range, except for her phosphorus levels, which were in the normal-high range. At this point, given the xrays, my vet suspected some type of blockage. The xrays were taken 10 hours after her morning meal, and yet, her stomach appeared completely full, but it was not recognizable as food.
She went back in the next day for a barium xray series. She had been fasted since the previous morning, and thankfully, her stomach was empty, so no blockage concerns. To help with digestion, I began home cooking for Tobey (which I still continue to do).
Thus began the task of figuring out what could be going on with this random set of symptoms. We tested for thyroid. That was negative. We tested for diabetes. We tested kidney function again. I brought up the possibility of cushings, but my vet didn't think it was possible since her liver functions have always been within normal range. I am kicking myself for not pushing harder for the testing, but frankly, I love and adore my vet. Not only is she amazing with my pets, she is beyond amazing with our rescue dogs. I had no reason to doubt her, and I certainly don't blame her.
Anyway, while we were still trying to figure stuff out, up pops these lesions on Tobey's back. We decided to try a week of abx to see how that affected them. The lesions got worse. My vet thought it was cancer. We did a biopsy last friday on five of the lesions, and proactively started a huge dose of pred. Of course, then the results came back this week that the lesions are calcinosis cutis. Not only has my vet never seen them, but she never even saw them in vet school, and in hundreds of rescue dogs, we have never seen them. She called and apologized and said that it is much more likely that it is cushings, although she is still baffled as to why the liver function is normal.
We are now tapering off the pred so we can take the next step into the cushings testing.
My poor girl seems miserable. Her lesions are painful, she's drinking so much water, and peeing a lot. She hates wearing diapers, but that is my only option for her at night. I hate to see her like this. Her digestion is better since I started cooking for her, which is an improvement. Since she is a pug, her appetite has always been good.
If you've made it this far, bless you. I have read through many other threads, and I know that not only am I not alone, but that everyone has been at this beginning stage before as well. I will post test results, etc, as soon as they are available. We are done with the pred next Monday, then we have to wait before the cushings test can be done, so it may be a while.
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