Brannon74 has been nice enough to answer ?'s and give med advice pertaining to animals. This thread will stay at the top of the page.
Leave ?'s here, and he will answer them here.
Keep in mind he is busy at his clinic, so will answer ?'s when he has time.

this will be a good thread to have duane, thanks, and thanks brannon for the time to answer, by the way where are you located?

great idea and thanks for volunteering defiantly a needed thread….thanks Brannon74

lawton

Thanks Brandon. I love lawton, cool country.

thanks for doing this brandon, thats good country down there, i spent some time this winter down there killing hogs, and sounds like i have to go back acouple more time this month, i might need to get your number in case things go bad

All right Brandon, time to get to work, lol.

A good buddy and hunting partner of mine recently had a hound get sick. he was about two years old, male, and healthy, until about three weeks ago. the dog started acting goofy, and quit eating, and started having seizures. The local vets couldnt figure it out, and he died. We sent the dogs head to Michigan State University for testing, and havnt heard back. Well, the other day, a pup about 5 months old started with the same simptoms. If he makes it till tuesday he is going to MSU to see what they can figure out on the living puppy. At this point its not about saving the one puppy, but figuring out what it is and geting it under controll before it whipes out his own kennel.

We know its not rabies. We know its not distemper. I suggested Blastosis (sp?) which has the vets really scratching their heads, because all the simptoms are their, but they have never heard of it spreading dog to dog. But they all tell us the same thing, their experience with blasto is very limited. infact, they dont seem to know crap about it, lol, and these are exelent vets.

So, i guess any input you or anyone may have will help hopefully.

thanks.

jesse out of curiousity are these dogs related?

i had one do the same thing jesse and it ended up being menigitis

blasto can do just about anything, but is very rare. the chances of having 2 dogs w/ it is almost impossible.

Seizure at that age of 2 epilepsy would be the most common cause and is genetic.

as afar 5 month old. distemper would be high on my radar, as well as liver problems like shunts.

Hypoglycemia can cause seizure in a young dog like that also.

could very well be looking at different dz causeing simular symptoms.

tough to say w/o all the facts, blookwork and ect. sending the one off to MSU was a great idea.

If they are coon dogs you might look at this dz it is rare, but i have seen it in dogs used for coon hunting.

http://www.petwave.com/Dogs/Dog-Health-C...-Paralysis.aspx



tick born dz can cause simular type signs so if they had a heavy tick burden i would look at rocky moontian spotted fever, or erhlichia.

Definatly not ticks.

They are running dogs, not coon dogs. Never seen a coon, let alone chewed on one.

The pup we know is not distemper. the vet checked for it, and said he was clean. Plus, i have given these pups all their shots personaly.

They are not related to the best of my knowledge. I know they share some bloodlines, just not how sure how close.

we are all just scratching our heads, because no body can figure it out. Both dogs have the exact same simptoms.

Hopefully MSU can figure something out for us.

Thanks for the help, i will let you boys know how it turns out.

Jesse: This may be a dumb suggestion, but could it have something to do with flea/tick medication if they are on it?

flea and tick meds that have permethrins could cause the same issues. As well as any toxicity. Ivomec toxicity will cause seizures.

Brannon:
I hunt in an area with lots of ticks. I have my dog on Pet Armor (frontline's copycat). I check him regularly but he has black fur, so it is tough to find them all. I have been hearing a lot of stories lately about dogs getting lymes disease and getting put down because of how severe it gets.

What is the real deal on how concerned I should be? Do you recommend a different regiment of medicine, or other types of treatment to cut it off? He goes to the vet 2x a year and gets the blood work.

Make sure your vet runds a 3dx or 4dx hw test on your dog. 3dx tests for lyme and erhlichia. 4dx also tests for anaplasmosis. Those are all tick borne dz. I don't know how commom lyme is around cal. I know back east is a real issue. around here we see very little. We do see alot of erlichia though. I have seen rocky mountain spotted fever twice. Frontline is a good choice and kill ticks w/ about 12-24 hours which will prevent dz from spreading from tick to your dog. Pet armour has the same active ingediant, but not the same carrier as frontline. It will like work well, but they are not spending any money testing it. So i can't say for sure it will protect like frontline.

Thanks... didn't realize that Pet Armor wasn't the same as Frontline.


Jesse: Any update on the second sick dog?

Sorry guys, I have been meaning to get back to you, but just plain forgot.

Well, me and him are no longer talking due to totaly unrelated personal issues. But from what i have been told by mutual friends distemper seems to be the culpret. I have not heard the whole story, and i think there is definatly something fishy going on, because i have been told by several reliable friends that he had to put down every one of his hunting dogs. No they did not get sick, just put them down. If distemper was the only concern then i see no reason to kill all the healthy dogs. they ether get it or they dont. It seems to me like it may have been something else, and he was trying to avoid lots of expensive testing, and quarantine, and vet bills to have critters destroyed and disposed of. Again im not sure what exactly the deal is, just seems like and aweful drastic move.

If i find anything new out i will let you know.

If it was distember he should not have euthanized the other dogs.

I'm planning on taking my female German wirehair out coyote hunting with me soon, she's a great listener and is trained to come back to beeps so I'd like to give her a try on coyotes. Just wondering if there's anything special she might need for vaccinations? Would hate to see her get mange or something.

Vaccines I would recommend would be distemper, parvo, lepto, bordtella, and rabies. Mange is certainly an issue and could be transmitted to your dog. IMO mange is not easily transmitted and ussually takes a long period of exposure to do so. Fleas are much quiker to jump ship to a new host. Mange is easily treated with ivomec. If you have some trouble just let me know I can help with a dosage.

What is your opinion of the Rattle Snake vacination vs. Snake breaking.
I mean, i am in AZ and think that once you snake break a dog, they don't want to mess with them. But in your opinion is it worth it to get the snake vacine.

I would recommend snake breaking. The vaccine seems to be safe, but there is zero evidence that it helps in any way. We do know from people the incremental dosage of venom given to people can produce effective protection against snake bites and lesson the effects of a bite. The theory behind the vaccine is good but is is just a theory. FDA will never alow a study to be done to prove one way or another. There are so many varribles in snake bites its hard to pedict or know how much venom is passed making cases where dogs that were vaccinated and bit almost useless. Dogs rarly die from snake bites, but alot do get very sick. You can bet though if you have a great dog he is the one that will get bit and die.

Thank you for the information.. I was sitting on the fence about giving my new 6mnth old dog the vacine.
I wasn't sure about it because I was thinking about the fact that some snakes are Hymo, and some have Nero toxin venom, and i found it hard to believe that one shot could handle both types effectively.

Is there anything you could share, other than snake breaking that does work in your opinion, and what you would suggest to do in the event of a bite. If there are any home things that we could do? or a type of drug I could order and carry in the truck that might help save the dog.

bump

Tbone, there were some good threads on snake bites, do a search you should find some good info.

Thank you, I went and read all of them.. There was a large number.
However they didn't address the Dog question.

I know what to do if I get bit. But wanted to know, since i will be out in the middle of no where, what i can buy to carry in the truck for the Dog. If there is something that i can get for the dog if she is bit, to help keep her from dying, i would like to know.

Tbone-Dexamethasone and Benadryl. Many will live with or without intervention...but its almost a sure thing your best dog will die if bitten.

Take care.

I use mineral spirits. Rub it in to the bite areareal well. After i rub it in i wash the area with dawn dish soap. Try to keep the dog locked up.

Sorry I don't get over here that often.

As someone said dexamethasone for post bite tx is great.

There was a retrospective study on dexamethasone vs antivenom and it showed that it was just as effective. Antivenom is very expensive and hard to find at times.

Supportive thearpy like fluids for shock and dexamethasone work in most cases.

Thanks for the advice guys.. I am going to try taking her out on stands and see how it goes.

Brannon

I have a 7 year old male black lab. Today i noticed a dime sized growth of sorts on his nose just behind the nostril. I feels spongy almost. I just don't know if it's a spider bite, bug bite or something serious. There aren't a lot of good vets around these parts. I did not notice this until today. I have taken a picture of it with my iPhone, so i could show some fellow dog owners. My question is should I truck him to the vets or wait a a week or so and see if it gets better.

Mark2

sorry busy summer kept me off the boards. will try to check in more this week.

I recently picked up a 8 week old catahoula/collie male that I was gonna pair of with my aussie mix. Well i had him a few days and then he died tonight, I gave him his first shot the first day I had him. Yesterday morning he was acting great running around being a puppy, eating, drinking. So I went to sleep since I worked night shift, I woke up around 12 to him being really tired and acting funny. I gave him some more water and food he drank alot of water but not a lot of food. His gums were white as could be, he hadnt thrown up or had diarrhea. Vet ran a test for parvo that came back negative but they still wanted to treat him like parvo so we got some iv bags, pepto and pedialite. We kept him pretty hydrated but the little guy couldnt hardly breath, he was breath fast and hard and eventually died around 730 or 8. Doesnt seem like parvo to me just looking for some help.