epileptic dogs

[ussnewco]

our yellow lab (3 yrs old), just had 5 cluster seizures. The vet said he has epileptsy. So now he is on Phenobartial. This happen on Thursday, he sent all day at the vet and had one more seizure there. They gave him an IV and valuim and then the Pheno through the IV, we brought him home and he is just not our pet. He has loss some streagth in his hind legs and has fallen coming down the stairs and sleeps all day and paces. He use to bark if anyone came to the door and rang the bell, last night someone rang the bell and he didn't budge.

my question is "is this normal"? And will eventually become our loved pet he used to be.

[yoda's mom]

Give the poor boy as much rest as he needs. A seizure uses up so much energy that he could sleep for as long as a full 24 hours, so multiply that by 5 & in one short period, he's gonna need time to come back from that. Imagine what your muscles would feel like if you had to run a marathon 5 days in a row. He's going to be stiff & sore. He's also going to need to be able to adjust to the medications.
We had a cat who suffered from seizures, once we had his seizures under control (with Pheno also) and his meds leveled off he was almost completely normal. Some days were not so good - but for the majority of the time he was fine. Hang in there. I'll be pulling for you & your poor dog!

[Dax]

No personal experience with this but you're in my prayers for a speedy and full recovery.

[ussnewco]

thanks for the words of encouragement.

[Dobified]

What are you feeding him ? Diets can have a lot to do with seizures and correcting them, or at least lessening them.

How long has this been going on ?

[weimlover0816]

Please check out the Sticky in this section; there is a link to a great site with a lot of epilepsy information, including treatment and care and symptoms, etc.

Good luck to you and your pup....!

[ussnewco]

Food is ol roy from walmart, he's been eating this for over a year. His first seizure was in late November and the vet said it was islolated and watch him. Then he had the 5 between 930pm on Wed. and 5am on Thurs.

[Dobified]

Get him off that as soon as you can , that is one of the worst foods you can feed him. You do not want to know what is in that.

When I was feeding commerical foods I would not get them at a store like Wal-Mart, I would go to a store like PetSmart or a store that sold pet foods only. One of the best commerical food I found was Nutros, they used mostly all top quality ingredients and hardly any stuff in like: Meat by products ( when it says only " meat " and doesn't specify what kind of meat then you have a problem ). Any foods that say " Tallow " are also bad. Ok back to the decent kinds of commerical; read your labels, usually the more you pay the better quality it is but I did find Nutros to be a mid priced good dog food.

The best advice I can give you on feeding commercial foods is read your labels watch for what I have already said.

I do not feed commrecials anymore.

Next , seizures can be caused by a number of things, foods, poisons, genetics..... here is a website that can help you understand and also how to help your dog :
http://www.purelypets.com/articles/epilepsyarticle.htm

and another:
http://www.thepetcenter.com/gen/epilepsy.html

One more :
http://www.italiangreyhound.org/causesez.html

Hope this helps.

S

[Keeshlvr]

Originally Posted by ussnewco

our yellow lab (3 yrs old), just had 5 cluster seizures. The vet said he has epileptsy. So now he is on Phenobartial. This happen on Thursday, he sent all day at the vet and had one more seizure there. They gave him an IV and valuim and then the Pheno through the IV, we brought him home and he is just not our pet. He has loss some streagth in his hind legs and has fallen coming down the stairs and sleeps all day and paces. He use to bark if anyone came to the door and rang the bell, last night someone rang the bell and he didn't budge.

my question is "is this normal"? And will eventually become our loved pet he used to be.

The pheno is a muscle relaxer. That could be the cause of his strange behavior. In 3 months go in for a phenobarbital serum test to make sure his levels are not too high! I've worked at a vet for a year and i too have a epileptic doggie!

[alimel]

I have a 4 year old Beagle on Phenobarbitol. At first he slept all day and was very mushy, but with time, he got used to the medication. He has gained weight, so watch for that. It could be that the dosage may be too strong, if you do not see a change in a few weeks...after you change food, please! change your dog's food...then I would speak to your vet, perhaps all that is needed is to adjust medication.

When given any medication through IV, it is much stronger than oral medication and could take a few days to regulate his system.

Here is my boy, silly as ever!