My mini schnauzer Sophie, 6 years old, was recently diagnosed with Pancreatitis. I wanted to share how the vet and I got her back to good health – she’s back to her stubborn, cuddly, sweet self now. Its long, but I put a short version at the top in case you dont want to read it all :) /*********************************/ SHORT VERSION: About three months ago Sophie started throwing up and peeing in the house almost daily I kept my eye on her for a week or so, she got worse and worse. She wasn’t keeping any food down, she was shaking, lethargic, and just not herself. Off to the vet we went. All tests came back negative, so we treated for pancreatitus because of her symptoms. I was lucky, I caught the pancreatitis early and during a mild attack. If I hadn’t noticed her changes in behavior she could have gotten a full blown attack and it could have killed her. She got some meds (which she is now done with) and is on vet food. I bought a little auto-feeder from the cat section of PetSmart, figured out a feeding schedule that would work for both Sophie and I and implemented it: she now gets fed 1/6 of a cup of kibble and a teaspoon of wet food per meal, 6 times a day. Her feeding times are 7am, 11am, 3pm, 7pm, 11pm, 3am. The little auto feeder is so awesome, when it gets near her meal time Sophie sits in front of it waiting for it to open. I feed her breakfast in her normal dish, get the 11am & 3pm meals into the feeder and go to work, feed her supper at 7pm, and her bedtime meal at 11pm, then set the feeder to open for 3am. It took 2 nights of me setting an alarm, waking her up, and showing her that the Food God had opened for her to learn the new schedule. The only problem was that the feeder is totally silent when it opens. I didn’t want to set an alarm every night for 3am so I put a little bell on each lid of the feeder so Sophie would hear it open (I don’t even hear it anymore, but Sophie seems hard-wired to hear that little tinkle sound now). /*********************************/ LONG VERSION: I have two dogs, Sophie (stubborn, food-obsessed, Schnauzer) and Abby (sweet, silly, Shephard/Rotti cross), they each got fed 3 times a day – breakfast (around 7am), supper (around 5pm), and bedtime (smaller portion, around 11pm). In total Sophie would get 1 cup of kibble per day (that’s what the brand recommended and she was healthy, prior to all this, on it). About three months ago one of the dogs started throwing up and peeing in the house almost daily but I wasn’t sure which one it was. I separated them into different areas of the house when I went to work to determine who, it was Sophie. I kept my eye on her for a week or so, she got worse and worse. She wasn’t keeping any food down, she was shaking, lethargic, and just not herself. I took her to the vet, they ran a bunch of tests to help us determine what was wrong with her. I was 99% sure it wasn’t an obstruction (she doesn’t chew toys or bones, or anything really, she loves food, but if it doesn’t smell like food she won’t even lick it, so it was really unlikely that she had ate a non-food thing) so we didn’t do x-rays (to save some money). I was at the vet for over 3 hours, Sophie in & out for tests, the vet checked in on us lots and kept us informed through each step. The tests came back – everything was normal. WHAT? All that money for tests and the vet couldn’t tell me what was wrong!? I was at a loss, now what? The vet said it could be one of two things, mild pancreatitis attack or a food allergy, she suggested we treat her for pancreatitis for now, since the symptoms were telling us that’s what it was, even if the tests weren’t. So we switched her to a low-fat gastrointestinal vet food (Royal Canin brand, kibble). I kept her on it for a while but she didn’t seem to like it, she still threw up occasionally, she kept peeing in the house (not like her at all) and wasn’t herself, so I found a low-fat, limited ingredient food at a pet store (thinking maybe it’s a food allergy) and slowly switched her to that mistake. She got worse. She wasn’t keeping ANYTHING down anymore and she was shaking so bad almost all the time, I felt awful. Back to the vet we went… more tests… more normal results, negative for everything. Shoot. Vet said, ‘let’s put her back on the pancreatitis treatment’, but first we had to get her hydrated. She spent 2 days at the vet (evenings at my Mum’s house since my Mum is retired she could drive Sophie back & forth to the vet and it would be less stress on Sophie). Two days of IV fluids to get her hydrated, wet food through the day (same type, Royal Canin, gastrointestinal low fat) and slowly introduced to the kibble as she felt better. Within a day or two she started peeing & pooping like normal (yay!) and was feeling a little better, but definitely not quite herself yet. Finally she came home from my mum’s and the vet to me. She was on 3 meds (all liquids, fed orally with a plastic syringe): 1. A pain killer to help her tummy (only for a few days) – once a day 2. An esophagus/ulcer medication because she had been throwing up so much before the second vet visit –twice a day for 14 days, an hour before eating or two hours after (had to be given on an empty stomach), and 3. An antacid, to help her tummy keep the food in – twice a day with or without food (but not with the esophagus/ulcer med) –they gave me 2 months’ worth of prescription, this could be a long term med for her if she doesn’t get better. She was slowly starting to feel better, except first thing in the morning she would shake and not want to eat (really not like her). I wondered if it was because she was hungry because once I could convince her to eat she seemed to feel okay for the rest of the day. So I started feeding her smaller portions of food at a time. 6 small portions of food through the day. That seemed to help a bit, except that I have a job that takes me out of the house from 7:30-4:30 each day, and I really didn’t want to get up in the middle of the night to feed her. What could I do? I thought maybe I could feed her in the night so she doesn’t have an empty stomach for long, but that wasn’t a great plan if I ever wanted a decent nights sleep. I bought a little auto-feeder from the cat section of PetSmart, figured out a schedule that would work for both Sophie and I and implemented it: she now gets fed 1/6 of a cup of kibble and a teaspoon of wet food per meal, 6 times a day. Her feeding times are 7am, 11am, 3pm, 7pm, 11pm, 3am. The little auto feeder is so awesome, I call it the “Food God” – when it gets near her meal time Sophie sits in front of it waiting for it to open, it’s really cute. I feed her breakfast in her normal dish, get the 11am & 3pm meals into the feeder and go to work, feed her supper at 7pm, and her bedtime meal at 11pm, then set the feeder to open for 3am. It took 2 nights of me setting an alarm, waking her up, and showing her that the Food God had opened for her to learn the new schedule (I told you, she’s food obsessed). I didn’t want to set an alarm every night for 3am and I had to block my big dog from getting to the feeder too… The only problem was that the feeder is totally silent when it opens so I put a little bell on each lid of the feeder so Sophie would hear it open (I don’t even hear it anymore, but Sophie seems hard-wired to hear that little tinkle sound now, haha). I set up the bottom half of my big dog crate with a Sophie sized entrance made of cardboard so my big dog, Abby, couldn’t get to the feeder (she’s big but she doesn’t know she can jump so a little cardboard wall stops her ). Now if I’m going to be out or the house or late or sleeping, I set the Food God and she gets fed! Sophie hasn’t had a single bad day since I got her feeding schedule figured out. She’s off the antacid medication now (weaned her off slowly a couple weeks ago). She’ll be on this vet food forever now, it’s expensive, but she should live a happy, healthy life now! I hope this helps someone who may have a similar issue since pancreatitis can be a problem for schnauzers. Now if I could only convince my big dog to stop feeding Sophie her kibbles! Abby can eat an entire dish of kibble without dropping a single morsel of food; however, Abby, the big softie, when she feels like Sophie is hungry she drops a few kibbles on the floor for Sophie to eat… except Sophie is not allowed to eat anything except her vet food. So now they are fed in separate rooms (separated with a baby gate) so that Abby can’t feed Sophie anymore.
Posted on: Fri, 21 Nov 2014 20:55:41 +0000
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