inflammation around hip 8/11 – 23

August 11th 2014

Big Steve has been depressed since around July 31st, the day we picked him up at the dog sitter’s house. The symptom has gotten worse around last Friday. He doesn’t have an appetite and he doesn’t want to go walk. He seemed to having some discomfort in his lower back. His hind-legs are shaking as if he can’t support his body. He can’t even jump up to the sofa or car. Since he doesn’t eat well, he won’t pee and poop so much. He is not taking enough water since he is not eating his food.(We add water in his food so that he can take recommended amount of water every day.)

I wanted to take him to his vet, but I don’t have a car I could use anytime I want anymore. So I have to find a new vet somewhere I can go without driving.  Luckily I found one nearby and made an appointment today.

Dr examined his back and suspected something was wrong, so he took his back’s X-ray and explained what’s going on. There is a space between each spine that is stable except the last spine around his hip. It looks like something that connects those spine are narrowed around the last spine. Dr said, maybe he has some inflammation around that area that might be giving him a pain that causes him a less appetite. He gave injection (Rimadyl) to him for the inflammation, however Rimadyl won’t go well with prednisolone which is a medication he is taking once a week.  Big Steve needs to be on Rimadyl for a week (twice a day for the next 7 days), and it takes another week to rid of Rimadyl from the body. That means he can’t take prednisolone for 2 weeks.  Vet gave us Dr’s cell phone number and said we can text him if there is anything happened to him during that time.

Rimadyl (carprofen) is a non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drug (NSAID)

 

I don’t know if this is what Big Steve has, but maybe he has osteoarthritis(骨関節炎).

Explanation about osteoarthritis. Really good. : http://www.osteoarthritisindogs.com/

Video about osteoarthritis: http://www.petmd.com/dog/conditions/musculoskeletal/c_multi_arthritis_osteoarthritis

Video about osteoarthritis(骨関節炎) in Japanese. Really good. :  http://movie.petful-life.jp/Jj45W

 

At first, my husband and I mentioned to the Dr that he might got pancreatitis back again. I think that is why Dr also took blood sample to make sure nothing is wrong. Result for his blood test will be informed tomorrow.

We were still worried about him not eating food much. Dr told us that he will probably get his appetite back even tonight. After the visit, Big Steve looks better a bit and ate his food. 🙂 We just hope he gets well soon.

 

 August 12th 2014

So, Dr. called us and let us know that Big Steve’s blood test came out really good. There is nothing wrong. So we are relieved that he didn’t get pancreatitis again.

 

August 16th 2014

During the time we gave him Rimadyl, he sometimes lost his appetite, but I was clearly able to see that his condition has gotten better.

We always carried him and never let him jump on to the sofa or stairs. I also brought a dog stroller whenever I took him for walk so that I can put him in the stroller when he seems tired. One day, a guy saw me walking with Steve in a stroller and he laughed at Big Steve so hard. I explained why Steve was in a stroller, but he totally ignored what I was saying and just laughed at him forever. His friend came and asked him what he was laughing about. He was like, “pug in a stroller!” I somehow I felt offended and left there. But those guys kept laughing for a while even after we left.

I don’t mind when people just gave him a smile and ask why he is in a stroller. But that guy was so rude. I hope he gets laughed at just because he looked ridiculous. 😛 Too bad some people doesn’t know dog is a living creature, like humans. 

 

August 18th 2014

Big Steve’s re-exam.

Dr. asked me how Steve was doing. So I told him that Steve is definitely getting better. I can say that just by looking at him. Dr. palpated his hip area and told me that he can say Steve is better just by touching the area. Dr. didn’t want to take medicine off at this point, so recommended another week of Rimadyl. Steve needs to go through another week of Rimadyl again.

 

August 23rd 2014

Steve can walk like the way he used to and is looking a lot more energetic, so we took him to the dog park. We still worried about his hip, so I just kept him with leash. There were many dogs at the park, Steve was so excited to see them and chasing after a bigger dog. 🙂 I just kept my eyes on him, so whenever he start getting on another dog to hump, I can stop him.  He had a good time at the park. 🙂

 

Depression? New Canned food

2014 Aug. 4th

Big Steve seems depressed lately.  I see him licking his paw and chewing. He also refuses to eat sometimes.

My husband and I are on summer vacation and there were times we needed to board him to dog sitters. It works well with some cases, but there are cases it won’t work. The day before we leave home, Big Steve already knows we are going somewhere, but he just doesn’t know if we are taking him with us. So he must be so stressed out.

This summer, we visited my family in Japan for the first time in 6 or 7 years. We needed to board Big Steve to one of our dog sitters during the trip. It worked pretty good! He loved being there. She, the sitter, always has many dogs boarding at her house, so Big Steve can play with them. He was a happy dog when we came back from Japan.

Now there are other times we needed to board him with other sitters. When we pick Big Steve up from these sitters, he doesn’t seem so happy. Even the day we took him to one of my sitter’s house, he throw up.

So we try to take him to dog park often so that he can social with other dogs. He seems like having a good time at the dog park, but he seems not so happy after returning home.

As his owners, we think what we can do to make him happy. I realized how he is probably bored of his prescribed canned food. Vet told us only give him that prescribed canned food, GI Low fat, but I asked vet if we could give him other food. Usually, vet seems like not so sure what’s okay and what’s not. Well, I can understand why that is so because every dog is different, and we just don’t want to take any risk. However we know about Big Steve better than vet, and there are some time we, owner, need to decide what to give to make our dog happy.

Today, I found this new canned food called “Chopped Lamb & Rice Dinner – Premium dog food with vegetables” at Trader Joe’s.  Ingredients are good and contains only 4% min of crude fat. It’s kind of difficult to find a good low fat canned food, but I though this may be good for Big Steve, so we bought it.

We added some of this canned food to his prescribed canned food, and he loved it so much! He seems happier!! 🙂 We need to keep an eye on his diet, but I hope this helps his stress.

The following picture is the new canned food we are giving to Big Steve. It’s good!

 

ear infection

Aug. 3rd, 2014

Yesterday, we took Big Steve for a Pug Meetup at the dog park nearby. They do a pug meetup every first Saturday of the month. There will be 30 or more pugs at its peak! It’s just so therapeutic for pug owners. 🙂

There was a cute pug coming to me and scratching her ear so badly. I suspected that she may have an ear infection when I saw that. The reason is because Big Steve had an ear infection and he did the same thing. So I checked her ear and found black discharge in her ear. That’s it. That’s ear infection. (We told her owner about it, so don’t worry!)

*Click here to check the image of ear infection.

The ear infection Big Steve had looked like black discharge and it smelled bad.

Big Steve had this for a long time. He scratched his ear, and after he would scratch his ear, he even smelled his paw and acted like “ewwww!” Because it smells bad. However, we didn’t know that was an ear infection and vet never told us about it, so I was just cleaning his ear with cotton bud every day.

Anyway, the vet gave us otomax, liquid ointment for ear infection, that I can apply in both ears. In less than 10 days,  his ear infection was gone.

I don’t use otomax now, and I check his ear everyday. However, I don’t see any black discharge in his ear since then.

The photo below, left one is Big Steve and the right one is Arnold. I think Arnold likes Big Steve. He always comes to Big Steve. 🙂