Snow, not eating

Eleanor Pomerat

Guest

Firstly, I’ve been so grateful to find this website and forum with such a wealth of information about IMHA.

My dog, Snow, a golden retriver and labrador mix, was diagnosed with IMHA on 7/4/22 and was hospitalized for 6 days. He received two blood transfusions and we had the roller coaster of finding out his PCV and total solids every 8 hours during that week. He was admitted with a PCV of 15, got as low as 22 and he was discharged on last Sunday with a PCV of 19 and a total solids of 6.2. He was eating well and drinking while he was hospitalized.

Now that he is home, his gums are stayinh pinkish and he’s had his PCV rechecked, it held at 19! However, he’s not really eaten. The first day or two, he wasn’t hungry much, but would eat a little bit. Now, he won’t eat at all.

Let me give some details here. He’s lost lots of weight, so he was 83 lbs pre-IMHA, but now he weighs around 71 lbs. He’s taking 500 mg of Mycophenolate twice a day, 200mg of Doxycycline twice a day, 60 mg of prednisone a day twice a day, 1 tablet of Proviable-DC a day, and 20 mg Famotidine twice a day. I was advised to only feed him boiled chicken and rice or boiled hamburger and rice due to his liver needing time to heal from dealing with the IMHA.

Snow was not interested in the rice, but would each some chicken. I noticed that he wanted tiny little pieces that he didn’t have to chew. He has stopped being interested in any good. I’ve offered boiled chicken, rotisserie chicken, beef liver, a poached egg, GI-diet wet food, etc.

I told the vert of my concerns on Wednesday when he went back for his PCV and I was advised to see how things went and come back on Sunday or Monday for a PCV recheck and we would see about the eating piece.

He stopped drinking water yesterday, so I called the vet up and Snow has now been prescribed Entyce 3.2 ml per day and ondansetron 16 mg twice a day. I gave him these medications at 4 pm and he started drinking water again, but still won’t eat.

He’s really experiencing the side effects of the prednisone and has so much muscle wasting and he now has difficulty getting up. I’m sure this has been made worse by his lack of food intake.

I asked if he could take sucralfate, but the vet doesn’t want to add that in. I’m worried he has pancreatitis or at least that his stomach is the reason that he won’t eat anything.
I’m wondering if he should stay on the mycophenolate instead of another immune-suppressant?

Snow doesn’t have a primary vet because we moved across the country several months ago and haven’t established care with someone yet so we’ve just been dealing with the emergency vet, since he’s been discharged I’ve only heard from the vets secondhand from the techs that have taken my phone calls or spoken with him. I did get an appointment with a local vet, but I couldn’t get it until this coming Wednesday and I know that Snow cannot wait that long for help..

This whole disease has been so horrible. My husband and I are so stressed and worried and while we thought we would be able to weather this financially, we’re starting to get strapped. We want to do everything we can, but dealing only with the emergency vet every time has been so expensive.

We’re thinking we will take him back to the emergency vet in the morning since he still isn’t eating. We’re really hoping for the best.

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