sudden blindness and deafness from diabetes?

[patricia2017]

My dog Tash suddenly went blind and deaf four weeks ago. He's 18 years old, a poodle mutt, in good health. He's had cataracts for many years, but was able to move everywhere, run and play with my other dog, and never bump into things. A month ago I left him inside the car for two hours, when I went back to the car and took him for a walk he appeared disoriented, began bumping into things and wouldn't respond when called. He's been like this ever since. His sense of smell doesn´t appear to be working well either. Tash often bumps into my legs. I would think even if he´s blind he would recognize me by smell. He walks all the time and doesn't stop wondering around. I took Tash to the vet, they took an x-ray and found a broken spinal disk on his neck. The vet said the disk had been broken for many years, and that maybe when my daughter's dog attacked my dog a week earlier could have bitten him in the neck and trigger the blindness and deafness a week later. Is that possible? My vet recommended acupuncture but says probably he won´t recover sight or hearing. Then last week Tash began to lose weight, sleep all the time, be very hungry but eat little, vomit often and to urinate and drink a lot. Yesterday he was diagnosed with diabetes and is hospitalized right now. Could these two problems be related? For how long could he have had diabetes? Any suggestions?

[CraigM]

Re: sudden blindness and deafness from diabetes?

I believe one of the early symptoms of diabetes is uncontrollable urination, but I suppose every dog is different.

My Annie had lots of eye problems, after being diagnosed, over about 7 years before going blind. Then about a year after that, she went deaf. To make things even worse, she developed some sort of dementia around the same time. Of course, there's no definite path, some don't develop other problems other than diabetes.

Craig

[jesse girl]

Re: sudden blindness and deafness from diabetes?

the sudden blindness is quite expected especially since your dog already had cataracts the high sugar can quickly move the process . for some it was overnight

i have not heard of the other senses affected by diabetes but even with your dog being in good health before the diagnosis he is a senior dog and its maybe just a process of age but could be accelerated from diabetes .your tash is the oldest dog i have heard of with diabetes

with my jesse i know when she was diagnosed with diabetes. i just dont know when it started. who knows maybe months or longer . by the time we figured it out jesse was very sick .

i think your priority is to regulate tash and get sugar into an adequate range that she is comfortable with . i recommend testing blood sugar at home that will help to keep tash safe and move regulation process a bit faster . its definitely a disease a care taker can have a big impact on for the positive if you want to put the work into it

[patricia2017]

Re: sudden blindness and deafness from diabetes?

I believe one of the early symptoms of diabetes is uncontrollable urination, but I suppose every dog is different.

My Annie had lots of eye problems, after being diagnosed, over about 7 years before going blind. Then about a year after that, she went deaf. To make things even worse, she developed some sort of dementia around the same time. Of course, there's no definite path, some don't develop other problems other than diabetes.

Craig

Thanks for your kind response. How is your Annie doing?

[patricia2017]

Re: sudden blindness and deafness from diabetes?

the sudden blindness is quite expected especially since your dog already had cataracts the high sugar can quickly move the process . for some it was overnight

i have not heard of the other senses affected by diabetes but even with your dog being in good health before the diagnosis he is a senior dog and its maybe just a process of age but could be accelerated from diabetes .your tash is the oldest dog i have heard of with diabetes

with my jesse i know when she was diagnosed with diabetes. i just dont know when it started. who knows maybe months or longer . by the time we figured it out jesse was very sick .

i think your priority is to regulate tash and get sugar into an adequate range that she is comfortable with . i recommend testing blood sugar at home that will help to keep tash safe and move regulation process a bit faster . its definitely a disease a care taker can have a big impact on for the positive if you want to put the work into it

Thanks for your quick and thoughtful response. It´s been overwhelming. I´ll do anything and everything to improve the life of my beautiful dog.

[CraigM]

Re: sudden blindness and deafness from diabetes?

Thanks for your kind response. How is your Annie doing?

Unfortunately, my Annie passed away yesterday (Tuesday). She was just shy of her 17th birthday and had been diabetic for 9½ years. For most of her 9 years as a diabetic she had a fairly normal life: went for walks, played ball, etc.. Of course there was a schedule: blood test, feed, and inject 12 hours apart everyday.

Craig

[patricia2017]

Re: sudden blindness and deafness from diabetes?

Unfortunately, my Annie passed away yesterday (Tuesday). She was just shy of her 17th birthday and had been diabetic for 9½ years. For most of her 9 years as a diabetic she had a fairly normal life: went for walks, played ball, etc.. Of course there was a schedule: blood test, feed, and inject 12 hours apart everyday.

Craig

I´m so sorry to hear about her passing, glad to know she lived well despite her diabetes. I can´t imagine how sad you feel. My heart goes out to you.

[LizE]

Re: sudden blindness and deafness from diabetes?

Welcome to the forum, I hope your dog has started to feel better.
I too have an older dog (she turns 17 in December) that is blind and deaf. She had lost much of her vision before her diagnosis almost two years ago but now is totally blind. Both the vision and hearing declines seemed to happen almost overnight but I think dogs are very good at hiding their weaknesses so it probably wasn't as sudden as I think.

Looking back I think my dog had been diabetic a while until she was diagnosed - I attributed some of her symptoms to getting old. It's hard to say how long your dog has had a problem but now it really doesn't matter. Canine diabetes is not preventable. You have a new normal to adjust to.

Like others, I would recommend home testing. I use an inexpensive human meter that I got when she was first diagnosed. My focus is to keep her blood glucose numbers fairly stable, with minimal swings between high and low so a human meter works fine for that strategy. Many on this forum work very hard to keep their dog's numbers in a safe, low range and I think the pet meters work best for this, but the pet meters and testing strips are more expensive.

I don't know what to tell you about the loss of smell other than I notice my dog seems to "turn on" her sense of smell if she feels like it and ignore smells if she can't be bothered with it. If she is off leash I usually approach Snickers from the side and put my leg close to her face so when she turns her head she brushes against me. It doesn't startle her as much as petting or touching the top of her and we have done it so often she knows it's me (or another family member) and that its ok to move forward. I don't see her sniffing to navigate. She only sniffs on her daily walk at her usual places, or if she drops food and really wants to find it.

It sounds like your dog is fairly adaptable and that you've done a good job of caring for him so far. Hopefully Tash's only problem is diabetes and not something else. Canine diabetes does not really shorten their life and is very treatable. You just need to learn a lot of new stuff!

Good luck.

[patricia2017]

Re: sudden blindness and deafness from diabetes?

Welcome to the forum, I hope your dog has started to feel better.
I too have an older dog (she turns 17 in December) that is blind and deaf. She had lost much of her vision before her diagnosis almost two years ago but now is totally blind. Both the vision and hearing declines seemed to happen almost overnight but I think dogs are very good at hiding their weaknesses so it probably wasn't as sudden as I think.

Looking back I think my dog had been diabetic a while until she was diagnosed - I attributed some of her symptoms to getting old. It's hard to say how long your dog has had a problem but now it really doesn't matter. Canine diabetes is not preventable. You have a new normal to adjust to.

Like others, I would recommend home testing. I use an inexpensive human meter that I got when she was first diagnosed. My focus is to keep her blood glucose numbers fairly stable, with minimal swings between high and low so a human meter works fine for that strategy. Many on this forum work very hard to keep their dog's numbers in a safe, low range and I think the pet meters work best for this, but the pet meters and testing strips are more expensive.

I don't know what to tell you about the loss of smell other than I notice my dog seems to "turn on" her sense of smell if she feels like it and ignore smells if she can't be bothered with it. If she is off leash I usually approach Snickers from the side and put my leg close to her face so when she turns her head she brushes against me. It doesn't startle her as much as petting or touching the top of her and we have done it so often she knows it's me (or another family member) and that its ok to move forward. I don't see her sniffing to navigate. She only sniffs on her daily walk at her usual places, or if she drops food and really wants to find it.

It sounds like your dog is fairly adaptable and that you've done a good job of caring for him so far. Hopefully Tash's only problem is diabetes and not something else. Canine diabetes does not really shorten their life and is very treatable. You just need to learn a lot of new stuff!

Good luck.

Thanks so much for sharing your experience with Snickers. It helps me a lot to hear about it and have the guidance.