Diet & AI

[Jo CIMDA]

Hi Rachel

The best referral would be to go to Cambridge Vet School.  It's just over an hour away from Rutland.  Cambridge is a state of the art vet school with the best clinicians.   https://www.vet.cam.ac.uk/

The other option is The Willows at Birmingham     https://www.willows.uk.net/   This is another good referral practice.

If I lived in Rutland I would choose either of these.

Good luck
Jo

[Rachel Penfold]

Thank u jo, we really do appreciate ur help & advice.
Off to vets shortly so we shall see
Rachel

[Rachel Penfold]

Hi all, it's been a while since I posted about our Mexican.. He is still fighting on bless him although we have come to a stand still again. We did see a specialist as suggested but they didn't really come up with anything different to what our original vet was doing.
We have recently been to see a holistic vet too & although he said there were no guarantees he thought there was a good chance of success with Taco so we have been going down that route as we weren't really seeing any improvement with conventional treatment. So we have weaned him off all meds except for some painkillers & low steroid dose which we are reducing to hopefully nothing.
He was doing really well & we thought we had finally turned the corner but 2weeks ago had another episode of pancreatitis& was very poorly.. Vet sent him home on a drip as didn't think he'd make it thro the night! But he did & had started to improve slightly but then yesterday came down with pancreatitis again so is back at vets on drip again. We are so worried as obviously he can't continue like this. Vet has said its not diet related but could poss be due to his A.I.. Does anyone have any thoughts on this please?
Sorry for long post again but we are running out of faith that he will ever recover from this & are wondering if it's fair to keep putting him thro this if there's no chance of recovery. 😥
Many thanks in advance for any advice

[Jo CIMDA]

Hi

I am sorry Taco has another bout of pancreatitis.  It is such an unpredictable condition and can be a nightmare. 

There seems to be autoimmune pancreatitis in humans but I am not sure that this has been described in dogs.  Usually if a dog gets pancreatitis it is because they have a genetic predisposition or in a case of a dog being treated for an AI disease it is steroid/drug induced.  There is also chronic pancreatitis and acute pancreatitis.  The former can usually be managed with diet but the latter can be very serious and difficult to bring under control. I do hope Taco is responding to treatment.

My daughter had a cocker spaniel that used to get a lot of pancreatitis - it is rife in this breed.  One occasion he had to go into the Royal Vet College for a few weeks and was fed through a tube in his neck.  Eventually they managed to get him off the tube and he ate normally again but because of his genetic predisposition it was always a concern for my daughter. How about calling the homoeopathic vet and asking him for help?  There is a good homoeopathic remedy for pancreatitis called Iris Versicolor.  I got this for Woody from Ainsworths, the homoeopathic pharmacy,  and my daughter swears that it really helped.  When she could see an attack brewing she would give Iris V and she was able to stop the progression.  This is a good article.   

https://www.dogsnaturallymagazine.com/dog-pancreatitis-11-steps-for-natural-healing/

And another:

https://www.chagrinfallspetclinic.com/2010/02/16/pancreatic-problems-for-dogs-and-cats/

A telephone conversation with one of Ainsworth's staff costs nothing. They only charge for what you have.  On Wednesdays, Thurs and Fridays, there is a really helpful guy called Christian but there is always someone who can help.

Good luck with Taco.

Jo