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Good evening all,
My name is Simone and I'm glad I've found this place.
Cypher's story is fairly complicated - my vets are telling me he is a rather rare/uncommon diabetic dog.
I'll try and keep this brief.
Jan 2016 (age 11) - Diagnosed with Megaoesophagus (a secondary disease of Myasthenia Gravis), xrayed to confirm and ran bloods to check levels for anything else. All normal - sent home with a 30 day course of a specific AB designed to prevent any possible aspiration pneumonia occurring. All fine.
We started feeding smaller, easier to chew meals and fed him from a raised platform. Apart from a change in his bark and his breathing getting loud when excited and exercising he was our usual boy whose motto in life is Play, play play. He truly thinks he's a young dog still. Had a good year in managing this with only one flare up lasting 12 hours.
December 2016 - just before Xmas, noticed a bit wobbly on back legs, suspected maybe some arthritis was raising it's head. He is now 12 and did have an active agility career from 2 to 8 years. By Xmas eve I thought this is something more than arthritis. Of course we were away with him and didn't get him into the vet until Dec 31st. Vet took bloods, asked about his peeing and drinking. We'd noticed increase in peeing but with 3 other Border Collies in the house hadn't noticed how much more he was drinking. His BG was 13. Around 235 in US terms. We had to sent bloods off and as it was NYE we had to wait for results.
January 2017 - He was back on the 3rd of Jan for another check. Still 235. Plus ketones in blood and urine. Vet felt he was borderline - so put him on Caninsulin 5units once a day. Said to bring him back and leave him for a day on curves after a week. Fructosamine came in at 595. I said does he need to come in sooner/change his insulin? No we can keep him on the once a day till we do the curves. Ok. On the Friday he had a collapse in the back end. And struggled to walk. We were away but my mother in law took him in...vet simply checked his BG - it was 14/255. She checked him over. And then sent him home. Just keep monitoring. Saturday he picked up and could walk on his own steam again. Monday morning his back legs collapsed under him 3 times. He could no longer walk without a towel and us helping him. He was still peeing and drinking fine.
Long story short - we ended up in Emergency, he stayed in ICU over night and they worked him up in the medicine department this was last Tuesday. I brought him home Tuesday night. The specialist vets working him up, (MRI and CT and tests for Myasthenia gravis, toxoplasmosis, neosporosis) started him on a twice a day dose (after being baffled about the once a day protocol - yeah I'm still stewing on this one) and by Wednesday morning he got up off his own steam, wobbly and tiring quickly but without help and toileted and sniffed around. It seems it is diabetic neuropathy.
His dose got changed today after we inserted a sensor (Freestyle Libre) and I took his curves for the last 3 days. He's now on 7 units twice a day. I've just given him his 7unit dose tonight so I think I'll be staying up to make sure he doesn't go too low. He's still very wobbly and gets tired super fast, no improvement there but after seeing him looking half paralysed I'm still grateful for his mobility. I've been trying to read up on the Methylcobalamin B12 and seeing if that would make any difference even if it's established that his pancreas is doing ok. The specialist is still not convinced it's diabetic neuropathy - but the other theory Myasthenia Gravis or peripheral neuropathy involves electro diagnostics and nerve-muscle biopsies under General Anaesthetic. Pretty painful and invasive. We're going to see if we can get his levels regulated for a consistent amount of time to see if that helps first. This is Cy last Monday.
My name is Simone and I'm glad I've found this place.
Cypher's story is fairly complicated - my vets are telling me he is a rather rare/uncommon diabetic dog.
I'll try and keep this brief.
Jan 2016 (age 11) - Diagnosed with Megaoesophagus (a secondary disease of Myasthenia Gravis), xrayed to confirm and ran bloods to check levels for anything else. All normal - sent home with a 30 day course of a specific AB designed to prevent any possible aspiration pneumonia occurring. All fine.
We started feeding smaller, easier to chew meals and fed him from a raised platform. Apart from a change in his bark and his breathing getting loud when excited and exercising he was our usual boy whose motto in life is Play, play play. He truly thinks he's a young dog still. Had a good year in managing this with only one flare up lasting 12 hours.
December 2016 - just before Xmas, noticed a bit wobbly on back legs, suspected maybe some arthritis was raising it's head. He is now 12 and did have an active agility career from 2 to 8 years. By Xmas eve I thought this is something more than arthritis. Of course we were away with him and didn't get him into the vet until Dec 31st. Vet took bloods, asked about his peeing and drinking. We'd noticed increase in peeing but with 3 other Border Collies in the house hadn't noticed how much more he was drinking. His BG was 13. Around 235 in US terms. We had to sent bloods off and as it was NYE we had to wait for results.
January 2017 - He was back on the 3rd of Jan for another check. Still 235. Plus ketones in blood and urine. Vet felt he was borderline - so put him on Caninsulin 5units once a day. Said to bring him back and leave him for a day on curves after a week. Fructosamine came in at 595. I said does he need to come in sooner/change his insulin? No we can keep him on the once a day till we do the curves. Ok. On the Friday he had a collapse in the back end. And struggled to walk. We were away but my mother in law took him in...vet simply checked his BG - it was 14/255. She checked him over. And then sent him home. Just keep monitoring. Saturday he picked up and could walk on his own steam again. Monday morning his back legs collapsed under him 3 times. He could no longer walk without a towel and us helping him. He was still peeing and drinking fine.
Long story short - we ended up in Emergency, he stayed in ICU over night and they worked him up in the medicine department this was last Tuesday. I brought him home Tuesday night. The specialist vets working him up, (MRI and CT and tests for Myasthenia gravis, toxoplasmosis, neosporosis) started him on a twice a day dose (after being baffled about the once a day protocol - yeah I'm still stewing on this one) and by Wednesday morning he got up off his own steam, wobbly and tiring quickly but without help and toileted and sniffed around. It seems it is diabetic neuropathy.
His dose got changed today after we inserted a sensor (Freestyle Libre) and I took his curves for the last 3 days. He's now on 7 units twice a day. I've just given him his 7unit dose tonight so I think I'll be staying up to make sure he doesn't go too low. He's still very wobbly and gets tired super fast, no improvement there but after seeing him looking half paralysed I'm still grateful for his mobility. I've been trying to read up on the Methylcobalamin B12 and seeing if that would make any difference even if it's established that his pancreas is doing ok. The specialist is still not convinced it's diabetic neuropathy - but the other theory Myasthenia Gravis or peripheral neuropathy involves electro diagnostics and nerve-muscle biopsies under General Anaesthetic. Pretty painful and invasive. We're going to see if we can get his levels regulated for a consistent amount of time to see if that helps first. This is Cy last Monday.