IBD - any advice appreciated!

Hi all,

Thank you for reading this & apologies for the lenght of it!

Basically, approx 7 weeks ago our 1 year old wolfdog became very ill with serious diarrhea & sickness. Over the course of 3 weeks he lost a lot of weight and became very tired and had no energy. We were at the vets constantly. We pushed and got him a referrel to an animal hospital where they did all kinds of tests.

As a result of a endoscopy, he was diagnoised with IBD. We were told all the indications pointed towards this being caused by an allergy or parasite. His treatment was as follows:

25mg prednicare for 2 weeks
A strong wormer
ONLY Purina HA food (we have been very strict and he has had NOTHING else!)
10mg of prednicare for 3 days after the original 2 weeks
5mg of prednicare every other days for 6 days there after.

He has now been off the prednicare for 4 whole days. We have notied some fresh poo in his stool last night and this morning. He seems absolutely fine in himself though but obviusly will take him back to the vets tomorrow.

I was wondering if anybody had any advice out there. I apologise if this is repeatly lots of other threads. What are your opinions of Purina HA food for a dog with possible allergies?

Has anyone tried an homemade diet for a dog with IBD?

Thank you so much in advance.

Sorry your dog is unwell

Have they discussed also giving him gastric protectants to prevent ulcer formation risk from the steroid use?

What food suits him will depend precisely what he is allergic to.

Did he have a biopsy when they did the endoscopy?

Hi there,

Thanks for your reply.

No, they haven't mentioned anything like that. He is off the steriods at the mo but am guessing will be back on them as there is fresh blood in his stool.

Yes, he had a biopsy as well (luckily we are insured!). All we were told is that it all points towards to IBD but this could be caused by allergies or parasite.

His case report states ' the first & last parts of the small intestine were abnormal with spontaneous bleeding in the ileum and the colon was abnormal with a grossly thickened lining'.

One thing we can't figure out is that Jake went into the hosital so unwell, very under weight, not eating and couldn't even keep water down. 3 days later we pick him up and he is ravernous (he had absolutely no medication apart from a laxative & a B12 injection). The amount of chicken he went through in one week was insane! A week later, the same symptons start to return?? Any ideas on why this could have been?

Thanks again

First thread should say 'fresh blood in his stool'!!

Hi fellow wolfdog owner lol

Has he been treated for giardia or bacterial overgrowth as these are the most likliest culprits?

IBD (Inflammatory Bowel Disease) is sometimes more of a description than a diagnosis i.e the bowel is inflamed, but that doesn't say why .

Aside from parasitic worms and food allergies it can also be due to bacterial infections, toxins, physical trauma or even genetic predisposition. There is some disagreement as to whether or not it can also be stress-related.

However if it becomes chronic this can cause temporary or permanent changes within the bowel which can make it more likely to recur and presumably in some cases it can be a combination of causes.

It is not unusual for it to (re)occur episodically. Did he not have steriods while hospitalised?

Has he had any antibiotics?

Did the symptoms return after he went from chicken (for dogs who are not allergic to it chicken is very easily digestible) to the HA diet?

I would keep a very details diary of everything. Meds, defecation times and quality, food, appetite, behaviour, when and where and how exercised etc and see if you can establish a pattern

Hi there,

Thanks again for the replies.

Tupacs2leg - Hi! I could easily turn this thread into the joys of wolf dogs but will try my hardest not to, he he!

I'm not aware of him being tested for Giarida but he did supposedly get tested for most things whilst in hospital so I wonder if this would have picked that up? In regards to bacterial overgrowth, please see below...

Tass - no, he wasn't given any steroids in hosptial, they wanted to wait until all the results can back which is why we were so surprised how well he did with no medication.

We were told to include rice with the chicken and we are pretty sure that when we saw the change. He then went on all the medications as above and responded well. The only sign we have is this fresh blood in the stool at present.

I feel I should have included this in my original thread - at six months Jake had sickness and diarrhoea. Not terrible but bad enough and always happened at night. He was VERY picky with food and would often nit eat until 10.00pm. He was put on antibiotics (5 a day, went down to 1 a day). We tried to take him of them but the same symptoms returned and we were told by the vets to keep him on antibiotics indefinitely. He was on the 1 antibiotic a day when the more serious symptoms occurred 7 weeks ago. He has not been put back on any though.

I will definitely keep a diary from today, thanks for the suggestion.

So the answer is no,they don't seemed to of ruled giardia out...I would ask why they havnt,treatment is panacur over a number of days...I defo would enquire

As the owner of a puppy who had recurrent diarrhoea for months, I can only say that when I changed her to Orijen fish she was a different dog. She no longer suffers from gastric problems.

I would say try different proteins and you may find the one that your dog is not allergic to.

I agree, it could very well be this, and it's almost impossible to detect this from poo samples, even if you took a sample in every day. Don't know which ab's he's on, but only Metronodazole would help with the giardia, it wouldn't cure it because only the 3 day course of Panacur would do that.

The B12 injections helps with the SIBO (the overgrowth of bacteria) so it's all helping.

I think my dog might have this (been like yours as a puppy for the first year) but I haven't done the endescopy route yet, because she seems to have settled down now. There are two different types of bowel disease and I get both of them mixed up, one being the irritable bowel and the other I have forgotten I spoke to a vet nurse at the hospital when I took mine in for her endoscopy which had to be cancelled, and she said her dog had the endoscopy, nothing untoward was found except one of these bowel diseases, either irritable or that other one. The vet put her dog on Hill's D/D which is venison based and she said she's never looked back, it's so gentle on the tum and so easily digested.

I'd definitely as your vet about giardia, but he might be reluctant to do the 3 day Panacur until your dog's system has settled down, as I know my own vet was, so I waited.

All the best, hope you get to the root of this and it doesn't go on forever.

ETA: the word I was looking for is inflammatory bowel, as opposed to irritable because they are different (thanks Google!)