Pancreatitis

[Charlotte]

I'm almost scared to ask this, but how serious is pancreatitis? My Pug has it and is on a special diet at the moment of Hills Prescription Canine I/D but after another visit to the vet today she appears to be worse.

Why do they get it and how is it treated, is it purely through diet?

These are all questions i will go into in detail with the Vet tonight but would love some feedback from fellow owners with dogs suffering the same complaint.

[dougal]

Charlotte, my terrier lived with pancreatitis for over 13 years (passing away at 15.5 yrs). His was so serious he couldn't digest any food at all and required medication to digest the food for him. He had two attacks - unfortunately, the vet was unable to diagnose the problem after the first attack, and he had another some time later, which destroyed whatever remained of his pancreas after the first event.

It is quite manageable, although can become expensive depending upon whether you need medication or not and the type of medication.

I put his down to giving him some sausage.

[mita]

Our Sheltie, Danny, developed pancreatitis...& I had to watch his diet like a hawk until he died at 14 yrs of age.

No fat...not even the lowest-fat mince. A uni vet even warned me against giving him bones. She said, just to show me why, boil a raw bone with no meat on it...then watch all the fat come to the surface.

Danny was managed with strict diet. Each time he got an attack....it was always because somehow he'd gotten a piece of food with fat.

[Dogsfevr]

It can be a killer & is something that must be taken very seriously by all family members.

The genearl cause is diet ,being feed something high in fat & the general start point is BBQ,s where everyone gives the dog the fat but any other continues inappropraite foods can lead to this outcome.

For some dogs schmackos & those types of treats can be all too much.

[gemibabe]

my first dog died from pancreatitus at the age of 4 she was a cross between a corgie/collie

[~Anne~]

I had a Weimaraner with pancreatitis. She was medicated for her entire (short) life as it was a chronic condition. She died from complications after bloat though so I am not sure how long she would have lived. She was always a very skinny and sick little dog until she was diagnosed but once she started treatment and her diet was altered she fattened up and was not in pain and was happy.

Please let us know what happens with your Vet visit. Poor little thing has kept you on your toes with problems. *hugs* to both of you.

[Ellie]

I lost my darling almost 10 year old Cocker to pancreatitis in March this year.

I miss him terribly

Ellie

[speckymagee]

I have a sheltie with pancreatitis. He developed it about a year ago and very nearly died. However a year later he is pretty good. He is on a low fat diet with mainly fresh chicken or lean meat, rice and vegies supplemented with i/d from the vet.

His breeder felt I was to blame but all his vets said not - it was one of those things. She said he was overweight and therfore it was my fault. He is now less than 10kg but was up to 14kg back then. Nobody had ever told me to watch his weight at all.

One thing we did learn was how loved he was. He is a top little fellow, very outgoing and friendly but will have this condition for life.

I still love to give him a bone but even with all of the fat cut off he will sometimes vomit within 12-14 hours or so. But he loves them so much I just have to give him one every month or two.

I did receive a lot of support from one sheltie breeder who was most reassuring. She really understood my predicament and helped me a lot. Not many other people could tell me much about pancreatitis at all.

[Charlotte]

Hi everyone, thanks for all your responses, i really appreciate it.

The vet has switched her on to Eukanuba dry food which apparently has the lowest fat content so i'll try her on that for a couple of weeks and then we got back for more blood tests to see if it has improved.

I thought i'd lost her yesterday, but today she is a different dog and was being naughty this morning so i know she's on the mend. I've always been really strict with her diet and she is considered lean for a Pug, but it's probably the case of a few too many fatty human treats here and there - but no more!

Puggles - she sure has!

[Roguedog]

I recently watched a beautiful 12 month old GSD pass from pancreatitis, he recovered and then got it again and basically his body shut down on him, poor guy....

[Nekhbet]

Our cat has it. He also has feline AIDS so the poor bugger really copped it.

Yup we know when he has tucked into the dogs food because he vomits everywhere! He gets some EaglePack dog kibble, chicken necks, BBQ chicken (meat only) and boiled chicken meat which I sprinkle with vitamin powder. I also put him on kitty vitamin treats to keep up the goodies.

[Guest kitakins]

is there a reason why not all animals are put on pancreatic enzymes when diagnosed with pancreatitis? having cystic fibrosis, it makes sense to me to just put them on enzymes and feed them their normal diet. it would certainly make their quality of life a whole heap better and live longer.

[dougal]

I suspect it depends upon the amount of digestive enzymes being produced by the pancreas. Some may still have sufficient to not need medication.

Also .....very expensive depending upon the quality of medication. The medication my boy was worth $165.00 every three months. Even with that, he still couldn't have a "normal" diet, fat content etc had to watched very closely.

[ScoobyDoo]

Hi, Our ScoobyDoo, a 12 year old male Shihtzu, has been very ill since November last year. The vet has been of no help whatsoever and even, at one stage, said he had helicobactor pilori for which he prescribed massive doses of antibiotics, and at times, other obscure medicines. Well, we figured, after that, there was no infection causing his problem. So we have had to experiment. All ScoobyDoo eats now, is cooked chicken and rice and canned tuna in springwater and rice, three times a day, in small doses. We give him a teaspoon of Slippery Elm paste with his morning meal. Since he has been on this, he has improved, out of sight. However, he has had two bouts recently, caused, we think, mainly from emotional stress and worry. We saw on the net, only yesterday, the symptoms for pancreatitis and they are the symptoms that ScoobyDoo suffers. Has anybody else tried slippery elm to relieve the symptoms of pancreatitis? I am worried we might be doing the wrong thing. Any comments would be appreciated.

[charliehotel]

My OH has a malamute who has had pancreatitis for about 4 years now. the Mal boy is around 13 years old, and the initial attack 4 years ago nearly killed him. The vets treating him seemed to think that it was brought on by a diet too high in fat, which fits in with the diet he was on at the time. my OH used to give him a marrow bone every day or two, sliced open down the middle so he could lick the marrow out easily.

Since his diagnosis, the Mal boy is on a strict no fat diet. He gets lean mince that has been cooked and then had the fat drained away, vegies, rice, and the lowest fat dry food on the market (can't remember off the top of my head what brand it is). But he's in fantastic health, especially considering his age. He still romps around like a puppy!!! So, while I'm sure some dogs will get it worse than others, it's not necessarily doom and gloom to have your dog diagnosed with pancreatitis. Find a no/low fat diet and stick to it, it will definitely make a difference. And talk to your vet to find out if there's medication that may help. Good luck!!!!!

[ScoobyDoo]

My OH has a malamute who has had pancreatitis for about 4 years now. the Mal boy is around 13 years old, and the initial attack 4 years ago nearly killed him. The vets treating him seemed to think that it was brought on by a diet too high in fat, which fits in with the diet he was on at the time. my OH used to give him a marrow bone every day or two, sliced open down the middle so he could lick the marrow out easily.

Since his diagnosis, the Mal boy is on a strict no fat diet. He gets lean mince that has been cooked and then had the fat drained away, vegies, rice, and the lowest fat dry food on the market (can't remember off the top of my head what brand it is). But he's in fantastic health, especially considering his age. He still romps around like a puppy!!! So, while I'm sure some dogs will get it worse than others, it's not necessarily doom and gloom to have your dog diagnosed with pancreatitis. Find a no/low fat diet and stick to it, it will definitely make a difference. And talk to your vet to find out if there's medication that may help. Good luck!!!!! Thanks again.

Thank you very much. We worked the non-fat diet thing out ourselves, just by seeing how much "grease" stain was left on the cement after cleaning up where ScoobyDoo threw up. As far as CAUSE is concerned, I am of the opinion that years of taking cortisone, for a dreadful skin rash he had, is the culprit. ScoobyDoo is 12 years old, but we fostered him only three years ago. Since then we have cleared his rash with a topical lotion that people use for psoriasis - worked wonders. I would still like some feedback about the Slippery Elm and it's effect on pancreatitis. I know it is great for everything else to do with the digestive system, but is the pancreas part of the digestive system??!!

Edited September 17, 2007 by ScoobyDoo

[TangerineDream]

My last GSP had pancreatitis (brought on by a piece of bacon rind ) He only every had 1 bout because from that point on I watched him like a hawk and no-one but me was allowed to feed him anything without asking my permission first.

Cadence was put on a diet of chicken mince (boiled in water then with all the fat skimmed off after it had set), rice, oatmeal and Supercoat. He could cope with food that 8% fat or less, and anything over that he could only deal with for about 3 days before he started to get the beginnings of symptoms. He never had another attack after the 1st at 18months and lived till nearly 11 before cancer claimed him.

Once you work out a diet that works, stick to it like glue, all dogs will have slightly different needs and its important to learn your dogs needs and triggers. Don't feel guilty about playing policeman with people and food weither...I just used to be blunt and say, "if you give that to my dog he will get very sick and may die, so please don't" (and some would still say..."oh, a little bit won't hurt" and I'd have to get really tough with them)

[ScoobyDoo]

ScoobyDoo isn't doing too well today. He showed signs of abdomen pain this morning on his walk and we had to carry him home, he just stopped and sat and wouldn't move, forward or back home. We will take him to the vet today, I think. It is awful, I wish dogs could talk and I wish they could understand what we say. We'd tell him that we love him.

[ScoobyDoo]

Everyone is probably going to think we are silly. The vet finally took some blood and urine to test. Scooby's pancreas is fine, his liver is fine. His kidneys showed some dehydration but the urine test showed no dehydration. When the vet called with the results, I said "OK, so what is wrong with ScoobyDoo?" Don't know. Probably just a tummy thing. What treatment? Same as what we are doing - low fat diet, slippery elm. The vet said that we can probably expect further bouts of vomiting in the future however. But all we can do is watch his diet. We are going to look at buying some special diet type canned food because he refuses dry food. He is a very emotional little dog and lots of things seem to upset him, and we have noticed when he has been upset (it can even be just hearing another dog barking), that he will probably be sick later. So back to the drawing board.