CaseyKay

Hi all, I hope all our epi-pups are behaving! Mine is :rolleyes: I have just finished reading a book called "for the love of a dog: a memoir" by Elisabeth Rose. I picked it up from the library because it has a border collie on the front. As it turns out it is about her border collie, Kierney, who has some behavioural problems. At age 2, she has her first grand mal and the vet says some of the "strange behaviour" was petite mals. Goes through a familar roller coaster. I totally identified with the author when it first happened and she kept thinking what is causing it? The landlord spraying herbicide? The vegetarian dog food? Her husbands maybe too rough wrestling matches with the dog? I do that, I know with KC what caused the problem in the first place (trauma) but what triggers a cluster? She likens the seizure episodes to her dog drowning in the ocean and she can't help. She worries that Kierney is aware of what is happening to her. Interesting book for epi dog owners, warning though no happy ending. It doesn't say anything on the dust jacket about the dog having epilepsy, as I said I just picked it up due to BC on the front.

That is a good point about not hitting things really hard. I haven't actually seen KC do that even though she is moving really fast, and she has had the frantic stage inside. During the pacing stage of post-ictal I have twice seen her walk into a corner of the room and seem unable to back up and get out of the corner by herself Yes, the temperature thing is a big worry, both time at the vet after the clusters KC's temp has been just over 40 degrees. The dog run has a shade sail so I hope she would not get caught in the full sun. Do you know anything about what happens if the cluster goes on too long? Will they just get closer and closer and turn into status?

Clustering when alone is something I worry about too. When she has clustered badly KC has a lot of seizures and they get closer together until stopped with valium. Both times she clustered she was not on Pb however, (the first time in 2004, and again after a 2 year med-free streak late last year). SO FAR (fingers crossed) the seizures while on Pb have been singles. So when my husband said in December last year "hey I have a good promotion opportunity at work but it means going on afternoon shift 3pm to 11pm, what do you think?", I said "excellent"!! So KC is only alone for around 2 hours a day weekdays and not at all on weekends. Especially over Xmas/early Jan when she was still having some seizures and we were adjusting her meds. It was really important to me to know exactly how many she was having. Also with the different hours we have options of meds being given every 8 hours. It was such a relief to me that my husbands hours changed. I'm out three nights per week during doggy club things anyway. Puggles, you said could tell when you came home he had had a seizure...I presume it was a grand mal. Are his clusters always grand mals? Does he always drool etc? KC both foams and urinates on herself so unless it was a very mild seizure I think we would know if she had one. I also worry she will run into the fence during the blind/frantic phase of post-ictal if we are not there. They are left in fenced in dog run about 20x 20m in the backyard if we go out and they are not with us. If husband is not home and she has had a seizure that night or morning I leave her in her crate. This wouldn't be longer than 4 hours, as I am only 10 minutes away and can go home at lunchtime etc to let her out. In winter she will often come to work and stay in the car, get 2 short breaks and a longer walk at lunchtime. I know I am lucky...but I am still a major worrier! I hope Monte did not have any more.

Staffy-lover. I hope your boy hasn't seized again since your last post on the 25th? And Varicool, Harvey made it past the one month mark no seizures? KC is now 3 weeks s-free since we upped her dose to 37.5mg and co-ordinated her meds and feeding. I'm very pleased with that. I also managed to be away from home for a week with my other dog and didn't worry too much about KC!

KC is now 11 days seizure-free on her new dose of 37.5 mg. Yay! No seizures and no sign of any seizure type activity at all. She is more thirsty than hungry. Occasionally I have to let her out in the early morning to pee but I don't want to restrict her water access at all. We will get more bloods done in a month or so to see what her new levels are at the trough. We have adjusted her food/meds so she gets them the same time morning and night so that may have made a difference too. It seems that summer has forgotten to visit new zealand this year, so we haven't had any heat related problems, couple of days ago we got to 28 but that is really unusual this year, it is struggling to get above 20. We go swimming every couple of days anyway. KCs eyesight is not flash so her swimming toy is a squishy yellow platypus about the size of her head... It sits above the water and god help any dog that looks sideways at it! I have to go away for 5 days on Friday and hope Husband looks after my girl and remembers her meds on time (he will be getting text reminders!), I am taking my competition dog away for a training seminar so it will be nice for her to get one on one time.

Hmmm, husband training...always so much harder than dog training. My competitive obedience dog does a very nice retrieve and it is an exercise we very rarely lose any marks on. What my husband used to do with her when she was a baby (she is a BC) was to "fake throw" all over the place and try and trick her, or to take it from her and then throw it before she could see where it went. I read something once that made me laugh "The fake throw: wow, you fooled a dog, what a proud moment for the top of the food chain"! She learnt to hurl the toy at him and leap back far enough to get ready for the next throw before he could pick it up. I taught her "dumbells are different" and also "mum is different to dad". She is 6 years now and definately my dog. Even playing with a toy she knows better than to take it to him, she presents it to my hand (doesn't sit when just playing) and knows she has plenty of time to get in position by the time I throw to him. When I'm not there she does the toy hurl, he does the fake throw (fooling her about 0% of the time) and both of them seem happy with this. Not the best in terms of being consistent with her! I taught her with the dumbell the way most people have mentioned in this thread...working from holding in front and moving further. To btoh my dogs, "retrieve" is something different to "playing fetch". Both will correctly "retrieve" any object given the right set up.

The last three seizures she had were during exercise but also during the hour before her pill was due and the levels were too low then (I think). The vet said we should keep her calm for a few days due to having a pretty bad seizure and then upping her dose. Especially around the time she was having them. Just to make sure. And then presume she is fine to resume all normal activity. I don't think it would be possible to keep her quiet ALL the time! Last night we did some agility and she was fine and then she went chase-zoomies with a 5 month old blue heeler puppy. She doesn't usually like puppies because they tend to jump on her, but this one liked non-contact playing. She still has a lot of puppy like tendancies herself. That is about what I was thinking with the meds/food timing. I will adjust things a bit so we have food & meds, then a hour rest before any walkies.

Quick question: Do you give their pills around when you feed them? KC currently pills 7:30am/walk/breakfast at 8:30am. Dinner: 5-6pm/walk/pills 7:30pm. Wondering if it makes a difference and food and pill time should be closer together. We are now 4 days no seizures. I had a worry-related meltdown yesterday even though KC was fine all weekend and spent Saturday hooning around our friends hill farm and sleeping very well all night, and yesterday hanging out with me and having a good beach walk with friends...poor husband but he was really good and says he will try and share the "worrying" !

Hi varicool. Sorry, I hijacked your thread Sounds like Harvey hasn't had any seizures since he has been on his meds? If so that is fantastic. Kc is not acting sedated at all much to my relief since I had to up her meds....but the vet said I should be making sure she "stays quiet". Hmmm. (I want a lazy bum dog next time).

I got it from the people pharmacy (had to ask and they were behind the counter, it was $9). You put the pill in the v shaped bit and it cuts with the razor blade AND doesn't fly away and get lost. I have previously split 30mg ones, but only one of the halves was usable and the other all smashed (or lost!), that was with a naked razor blade. The 15mg ones just crumbled. She has had 37.5 tonight. My husband said he took them for a walk at lunchtime and she was "nuts" trying to get him and my other dog to play and was spinning** much more than usual He said HOW am I supposed to "keep her calm"?? When she started back on the pills again in Nov she was bit OTT for a couple of days, so I guess this increase is doing the same thing, I would have thought it would have the opposite effect. **...if I had a dollar for everytime someone asked me "why is your dog going in circles".... but if I explain the whole thing about head trauma and being blind on one side so it's a mix of vision and neuro things, people feel so sorry for her which annoys me because she is a happy girl. So now I just say "why is she spinning? because she likes to".

Right ok, I have a pill splitter and we will do 37.5 and see how we go. Fingers crossed! Kc always loves zoomies but under her terms, if Maddie tries to start it she gets charged and snapped at. Poor Madd. She is older and bigger than KC but no doubt who is the boss there. Puggles, is that Monte in your Avatar?? Very cute photo!

She weighs 12kg, is 48cm at the shoulder (she is underweight but extremely fit and muscly). I can only get 30mg and 15 mg pills at my vet, so maybe I should be splitting the 15mg ones. This is what the vet originally suggested when her bloods were low. I thought it would be hard to split the smaller pills which is now I think about it, why the vet suggested the 30/45 morning/night things that Puggles said your neuro didn't think made a difference. So I guess the vet was saying however you do it, go up 15mg a day, not 30. She had 45 last night and 45 this morning so maybe i will go to the pharmacy today and buy a pill splitter. That will make 37.5 twice a day, from 60 total to 75. She doesn't seem any different this morning but she did sleep very soundly from about 8pm-7am. Got up and we were *supposed* to be having a sedate off-lead walk, we live next-door to a park, and she goaded the other dog into high speed game of "chase me while I go zoomies" which I let go for a minute before calling a halt (uh-oh, I'm the fun police!). Trying not to get her too worked up at the moment so no fetch, agility, or anything like that.

Hi Puggles, I think I see what you are saying about having different doses in the morning and night not really making a difference. So my plan for now is: Go to 45 mg twice a day and if she is too sedated, try 30mg three times a day. This is possible for us due to someone either being at home or if they are not at work and go out, KC generally goes too. If that doesn't work, try adding KBr maybe. She had 60mg this morning and while she seems a bit quieter than average she was still happy enough to go for a 45 minute off-lead walk this afternoon. She doesn't seem ataxic. She definately has the munchies though!! If she put on 3kg I would be *happy* because she is always very thin...she is fit and very muscly but has minimal body fat under all the fluff. She will get her dose soon and then have a nap while I take my other BC, Maddie, out jogging! Poor Maddie I think she is a bit neglected at the moment... Thanks so much you guys, it's good to think these things through with people who understand.

Hmm yes that is what I was thinking, that it is probably ok to increase as her numbers are quite low. I mean technically it would be better for her to be in the therapeutic range, which I haven't bothered with before because she never used to seize on Pb at all. The vet said there are a lot of variables with epi dogs and also whether an owner can cope better with the occasional seizure or better with their dog being slightly more sedated than they would like. 6 weeks between is fine with me. 2 weeks or less I think is way too often. But I think I will try 45mg and see if that makes her too sedated, then get some more bloods done in 6-8 weeks time. On 30mg she is fine, which means she is extremely active as usual for a 4 year old BC! No ataxia judging by how often she does a 180 turn at full speed. Also leaping off the ground as high as my head every morning. I rang my husband who said she has been fine, no more seizures, and seems "perfectly normal" even though she had a double dose this morning (of 60mg), but then he said it was raining and so they hadn't been out again and she was sleeping on the couch! So hard to say if she is more sedated until I see her myself. I will give her 45 tonight I think and go from there. If she is too sedated on that we will try 30, 3 times a day.

Yes she currently gets 30mg Pb at 8am and 8pm. No KBr. She had fasting blood work done just before Christmas, one hour before her dose was due. The therapeutic range is (88-176) her reading was 79. In 2004 when she was on Pb she had two readings done that were around 70-75. Maybe we should get a peak level as well? Vet rang me just now to see if she had anymore yet (I'm at work and she is at home with hubby!) and said maybe try increasing the evening dose to 45mg and leave the morning as 30, as the morning before her dose seems to be the main problem. She gets fed in the morning as well as at night. She has no side-effects so I think we can increase a little?

Puggles and Staffy-lover. Quick question for you guys. KC had a seizure this morning, went about 2 minutes, copious foaming, zooming afterwards. This was about 1/2 hour before her pill was due. She is 12 kg and has been on 30mg BID for 6 weeks since a cluster. Her bloods show she is sub-therapeutic an hour before her dose is due. I went to the vet on the way to work and he gave me a couple of suggestions: 1) For a dog that clusters, a lone seizure is not too bad. If she has another one within 2 weeks, consider upping the drugs 2) If I would rather up them now or if she has another one, try 30mg 8 hours apart (this is possible because my husband works nights and I work days). 3) OR Give her 45mg BID. She has had a couple of "funny episodes", which looked sort of like seizures but more going blank sort of thing about 10 days apart over the holidays. These were also both just before her morning dose. So I am wondering about tryng the 8 hour thing as it seems to be the tail of the dose that is the problem. Also it might cause less side effects at the peak than 45mg?? What do you guys think? I am worried as she seems to be worse this time than last time we have seizures (2004). Last time she didn't have ANY seizure type activity on 30mg. I am thinking of getting an MRI to see if anything has changed with her head injury.

Staffy-lover, I didn't know any epi dogs until KC had it either. I know what you mean about little dogs Puggles. KC is little for a border collie (around 12kg), I don't know how people cope with bigger epi dogs. 10 minutes is a long time for the frantic stage (well it always seems like hours anyway, I guess). If KC is in her crate due to clustering, she spins in her crate during this part. I think I will have to buy some good ice cream then for future episodes...just have to re-package it "brocolli" or something so my husband doesn't eat it!

Puggles, do you think the jam with bread helps with Monte's post-ictal? KC seems very frantic after a seizure, I am not sure if she is temporially blind? She runs into things and and that is about another 2 minutes and then pacing for another 15-30 minutes. I think the post-ictal is worse than the seizure because she seems distressed (and we get foaming and urinating during seizures!). We have used a cold towel after the frantic bit is over as she heats up but haven't tried feeding her anything after one. She had a focal (?i think) boxing day, stress related I'm sure, but nothing major since the cluster in late November. She seems to be dealing with her meds a lot better than she did last time she was on them. Wonder if this is the difference between her being 18 months and 4.5 years. She can still do agility on 30mg bid and when she was younger she just slept a lot and looked woozy on the same dose. KC sends kisses to all the epi-pups and their mums and dads!

Hopefully the drugs will mean he doesn't have any more or they are reduced in severity. I have a border collie girl on pheno, she is back on it after 2 years with no drugs and no seizures (she is a bit different as the seizures have a cause: brain injury). We had some bloods just back today and at the lowest point...just before her next pill is due... she is *just* below the "correct range". On this dose she is still her normal self and went tracking yesterday and did agility practice today. Previously she was on a higher dose and this made her woozy and lethargic and she didn't want to go for a walk, let alone anything more strenuous than that. So it appears for now we have things right (fingers crossed). If she has more actual seizures we will try and add a different drug. Even on the drugs if she gets over-excited she will start doing some "seizurey-type things" which are really subtle unless you know her well, but not actually have a seizure so we try and not let her get over-excited, or too hot, or stressed in any way. Puggles suggested some very good websites, read as much as you can! Wondering why your vet suggested one dose a day? All dogs i know on Pb have it 12 hours apart...kc has hers 8am and 8pm. With her morning biscuit and her dinner. I watched the video of your wee guy, poor thing, it is scary, isn't it? Sending a hug for Harvey!

We decided to reduce KC's Pb to 15 mg twice a day (half dose), although the vet said if I was going to do this I may as well take her off it completely. Although she did say KC is more sedated and lethargic than what she would expect on what is really not a "high" dose of Pb. So we finally decided between vet and me she will get 15mg for now and if she seizes again we will try adding KBr instead of more Pb and see how we go with that. She has been on 15mg for a few days now and is pretty much back to her normal self which I am very happy with. I think you are right Staffy-lover, and we will tweak the meds etc as we go and made further decisions as we need to. That is I guess all anyone can do.

Great, I just wrote this long reply and it went and disappeared on me. I really hate this seizure thing, so many unknowns. So scary, the 3 vets at my clinic seem to disagree on what to do. And if they can't agree...no specialist neurologists in NZ to help me either After 2.5 years reading and learning as much as I could, just last month I signed off an epi-dog email list because I figured we were "safe" now. I guess I thought no seizures for 2 1/2 years they must be gone, right? WRONG. I feel cheated! Hey, this wasn't to happen again! But yes, Staffy-lover what you said about not using any medication but having Pb and Valium (which is the injectable stuff in a syringe with the end cut off to be given rectally) on hand in case of future seizures is what I have been wondering. Because we have done it before (under veterinary advice and weaned off slowly). So now I don't know what to do but we have blood tests in a month and go from there I guess. She has never had a grand mal. She shakes, snaps and foams, and loses bladder control but she doesn't fall down or lose consciousness. The foaming is a LOT and dries all over her face and head and she is, umm, very fluffy underneath and needs a wash after she has one! So I am pretty sure she wouldn't have a seizure I don't know about. Right now she is snoozing beside the computer and she looks so normal sleeping, it is when she wakes up I wonder where my best mate went and got replaced with this dog that only looks like mine. I know people with dogs of a similar size on twice the dose of Pb/weight and you would never know they were on it. I wonder if this sub-theraputic thing is not a constant for all dogs and she could be on a lower dose. Anyway thanks for your suggestions etc, and I hope your dogs are currently doing well Staffy-lover and Puggles. Interesting to see both your dogs on Pb and KBr. Did they start on only Pb? Was KBr added on top or with the Pb lowered a bit?

I am wondering if anyone has a dog that has seizures and uses something other than phenobarbitone (Pb) to control them. Background: My girl KC (that cute bc in my avatar) has seizures caused by (we think) a head trauma as a puppy. Her skull is flatter on one side. The vet said possibly not trauma, possibly it just grew like that. She has had x-rays and MRI etc. Which don't seem to show anything. She is blind on the right side and circles/spins a lot towards the left which I think is more a visual thing than a neurological thing. When she was 20 months old, in early 2004, she began having seizures very suddenly and it became a cluster with seizures about every 30 minutes, and she had a lot of blood tests and then given valium and she was put on Pb 30 mg twice a day, she weighs 11-12kg. I did not like the dog she became on the Pb. She used to be happy, bouncy go-go-go little dog. On the drugs she became very lethargic and woozy, had some weakness in her hind end and generally slept a lot. After 8 months on the drugs, Dec 2004 she had not had any more seizures and we weaned her off. Her personality returned and we were happy to have her back. Fast forward 2 years to last week. She had not had any seizures since that cluster. Then she had one last Tuesday night, then Thursday afternoon, Thursday 3am and Thursday 6am so I took her to the vet and she had another two there (stress?). So she was given IV valium to stop the seizures. Which worked and then she was started back on Pb that night, same dose as last time. She was okay for a few days but yesterday she seems to be slipping back into the way she was last time, she is very clingy but doesn't do much but sleep and she looks a bit out of it. She is also starting to get wobbly. At the moment I am thinking I will take her off Pb after a month. I don't know what caused the last cluster and I don't know what caused this one. What I do know is I don't like her being on Pb. The vet said the other drug I can put her on is Potassium Bromide (KBr) but seems to have similar side effects. My plan is to keep valium supposatories at home after she goes off Pb and if she has another cluster in the future to use that and if that doesn't work to go to vet for IV valium. The vet said this is "risking it" as she is obviously prone to seizures. But she had two years no drugs/no seizures?? It seems to me to be cruel to put her on what my husband calls the "zombie dog" drugs if most of the time she is fine. If she had another cluster I am thinking that I would go with the valium and then NOT put her on the Pb and see if the valium alone stops them. If there is anyone out there that does this I would like to hear from them, or if you use other drugs, etc. Her blood levels of Pb when on it are not "therapeutic" which is another thing that makes me wonder if the Pb is really doing anything.

But what's the point of practicing in a situation where you can't reward and/or correct your dog? That just seems counterproductive to me. :D Well, it seem pretty pointless to me too. But some people ask the judge to correct their dog for them (if they are say a friend of the judge). Maybe they think that will help, these are stays facing away from your dog. Of course you can also get someone else to correct your dog OUTSIDE the ring. I worry about our younger girl in stays because she is blind on the right side and gets a fright if a dog touches her and she didn't see it coming.

Here (NZ) it is at the discretion of the judge, but re-runs would usually only be with physical interference by another dog. There is a dog in my level that whines/yelps etc in out of sight stays. This can be really annoying but it does stay and maybe 1 judge in ten will dock it a mark or two. I have seen judges allow re-runs for things I think should have remained as a broken stay, one was a chicken from the farm next door running across the ring! It is not fair to dogs who WILL stay under such distractions. But that is why judges discretion as to what is too much interference, I guess. In the lower classes you get things like young dogs breaking and doing zoomies etc in the ring. Other young dogs can't help themselves and break too and join in. They probably wouldn't get a re-run for that. But there are dogs that break stays time and time again in the ring, that physically interfere with other dogs every time and their owners know they will do this and keep entering anyway. Their reasoning seems to be that "he needs to practice in a ring situation" (yeah, at club maybe??) My BC obedience/tracking girl is 5 and very solid in stays... so many things have happened over the years and the only break she did was a thunderstorm that became VERY heavy rain in a down stay. But my younger girl (run by my husband) can lack confidence and is easily put off by dogs that come up and sniff her etc. People have said "just to warn you, my dog might break". He will say "I hope not because she might bite if they interfere" and they say "oh GOOD they will teach him a lesson". Argh, one of my pet peeves.

My 5 yo BC girl has just over 100 ribbons in obedience and agility (she's a very clever girl). I used to put them around the walls of my office at home, hanging from a string, then I had to add a lower string. Then we moved. And I never put all of them back up. Now I put the "firsts" up on the wall of the spare bedroom, as well as the special type ones: obedience dog of the year for our club, ribbons from the nationals etc. I also have the ones from the higher tests/classes as we have fewer of those, currently draped over the couch in there. The rest are in a box in the cupbaord, but I would like to have them out where I can see them. My 4yo BC has a mere two ribbons, one of which says "congratulations on your first agility run" but I am proud of her too. I know people who have made them into bedspreads etc and another one I quite like is a friend who has a wicker washing basket and has ribbons of different colours draped over the outside and the rest inside and trophies sitting on top. Because we rented for the first time ever this year, when I made my pet CV I took a photo of the dogs sitting with the ribbons piled all around them Property manager was impressed!