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Have a 3 year old collie mix.. She normally is outside during the day and spends nights inside.. Up to date on all vaccinations.. Rabies, Distemper, Kennel Cough.
Got home Thursday evening and, as usual, she was laying in the driveway waiting on me.. Got out of the car and she's bouncing around, glad to see me.. But.. Was just.. Off.. We went through our ritual of rubbing her belly and then we both would normally go inside.. but she was jumping and bouncing all over.. And I noticed that she was unsteady.
I tried to corral her but she kept thinking we were playing (Not unusual).. got a few treats and she wouldn't take them from me.. Which is also not unusual.. She's learned that i'll try to bribe her to come close to grab her and bring her inside, and.. Sometimes she just doesn't want to come in. I set them down on the porch step, she went to pick them up and it was like she couldn't find them right.. Missed a couple of times trying to pick them up.
She was very unsteady on her feet, even to the point that if the railing hadn't been there, she'd have toppled over.
Finally got to her and put her in the car and took her to the emergency vet.. They immediately did an antifreeze test, which was negative.. We noticed a very small smudge on her head.. Less than pencil thin, but, vet seemed to think perhaps she had been hit by a car, which is very unlikely, as i'm at the end of my road, and am pretty much the only car that comes down my way.
They did bloodwork, which all came back normal. A CBC ProCyte is what it's listed as.. A Chem profile and Electrolyte profile (LYTE 4). Only things out of normal range on it were BASO, which was at .15 (0 to .1 normal), GGT which was at 10 (normal 0 to 7) and Cl which was at 124 (Normal 109 to 122)
Kept her overnight, and according to their notes.. On initial observation, she was "Lethargic, ataxia - wobble/unsteady when trying to walk. cp 0 to all limbs".. Abdomen, Cardio, Ears, Eyes, Gastro.. Everything normal, short of the unsteadiness.
Notes given as..
at first concern for ethylene glycol toxicity - test negative and bloodwork normal
Given grease on head, possible trauma from car - concussion but also discussed possible rat poison/bromethalin ingestion which can cause similar findings (My note here.. Again, way in the country, and I have no rat poison laying around)
to monitor overnight, starting steroid therapy
by 5am - able to walk, no real ataxia. Strongly suspect head trauma
send home with strict monitoring and place on low dose steroid
Now, while I don't just discount what the vet says.. I did mention to him that I suspected a possible ear infection or similar, because I had noticed her 'favoring' an ear.. Shaking her head.. MILD tilt of the head.. Which, reading up on vestibular disorder.. Seems to fit.. I didn't know to check the eyes, which apparently will dart around.
It's 2 nights since the episode.. And Friday during the day, I left her inside while I went to work.. Webcam monitoring my living room with motion detect.. She went into my bedroom right after I left and didn't come out all day. Drank an entire bowl of water Friday night/saturday morning. I felt good enough to let her out today off leash.. She wasn't overly active.. But didn't want to come back inside (She LOVES the outside) until it got dark, and she came in on her own.
She's still quite lethargic.. Appetite is suppressed, but she is eating some. Mostly steady on her feet, but I did notice her butt swaying today.. You know how a dog will wag its tail and the butt sways from side to side with it? Just like that but without the tail wagging.
She has taken over my bed. Literally, i'm sleeping on the couch. She came in about 2.5 hours ago, pretty much went right in and hopped on my bed and has been there. I can actually walk in and start petting her which wakes her.. A little odd, because normally she wakes up if a flea farts. And she gets on the bed on her own.. And my bed is a good 2.5 feet up, so.. She jumps right up there.
Does anyone have experience with vestibular, and have you ever seen it in a 3 year old dog? I thought it was more a problem in very young or very old dogs. I'm not ruling out head trauma.. Because, while there are no cars.. There are a couple of horses up the road.. Possible she got kicked by one.. And she loves to chase rabbits, which are around here in abundance.. So, it's possible she was hauling off after one and slammed into a tree branch or similar. What's the timeframe on them getting back to normal? I am certainly seeing improvement... But she's certainly not herself yet.
Anyway.. really.. Anyone who reads.. thanks for reading.. Typing this out is really more for me than actually finding out if someone knows anything, though, i'd love to hear any similar experiences if you have them. I will, however, smack the first person who replies saying that maybe she drank antifreeze because that will prove that they read absolutely nothing of this.
Here's a link to a thread where I typed about my dog's experiences with it.
The motion sickness my dog experienced from her head twitching and her nystagmus (random eye movement) caused her appetite to decrease until I gave her motion sickness meds. My dog's symptoms disappeared whenever she received prednisone via injection or pill form.
I never did find out what caused it. I thought maybe she got into some slug/snail bait on the grounds at work when I brought her to work once.
Her head tilt and inability to walk were very minor compared to some cases.
My 11 year old Boston Terrier has had three episodes with it so far (starting about 3 years ago). The 1st and 3rd times were the worst, it took about 2 weeks for her to recover each time. Molly's vestibular attacks seem to occur suddenly, she'll be fine one minute and unable to get up and walk the next. It causes her to have a panic attack so now I keep a sedative injection on hand just in case it happens again. There's really no cure for it, but dogs do recover with time. I also keep motion sickness medicine (meclizine) on hand and it seems to help. I always keep her in a crate when I'm not at home because she can easily injure herself by falling off of the furniture when it happens.
Well.. Faith is doing much better. Thursday night is when the problems started (Whatever they were).. Friday was a lot better, but still not right. Saturday was much the same.. Sunday she was much more chipper, but still spent most of the day sleeping.. Though she did eat a big meal that night. Yesterday (Monday) she was pretty much back to her old self.. Ate very well. This morning.. Woke me up at 6am wanting to go out and was dancing around out in the yard having a good old time.
Hopefully, it doesn't happen again. Perhaps it was an ear infection or maybe even vestibular. Maybe it was a concussion. Scared the hell out of me when it happened, though.
Glad she is doing better.
I have had one type of human vestibular disorder = benign paroxysmal positional vertigo (BPPV). It is characterized by the involuntary eye movements/nystagmus when changing position- the remedy is for the doctor or a tech to put the patient through a series of postural exercises to realign the crystals in the inner ear. I don't know if there is a similar technique that vets can do for animals- assuming of course that is what your girl has.
Yes, I imagine it would have been frightening to see your pup in that state.
Well.. Faith is doing much better. Thursday night is when the problems started (Whatever they were).. Friday was a lot better, but still not right. Saturday was much the same.. Sunday she was much more chipper, but still spent most of the day sleeping.. Though she did eat a big meal that night. Yesterday (Monday) she was pretty much back to her old self.. Ate very well. This morning.. Woke me up at 6am wanting to go out and was dancing around out in the yard having a good old time.
Hopefully, it doesn't happen again. Perhaps it was an ear infection or maybe even vestibular. Maybe it was a concussion. Scared the hell out of me when it happened, though.
Glad she's doing better. I don't want to sound negative, but most likely it will happen again eventually, the good thing is now you're prepared and know what to do. Like I mentioned, the biggest thing is keeping them from injuring themselves if it happens again.
The first time it happened to Molly she was home alone, and I came home to find blood on the living room floor where she had been hitting her mouth on the floor trying to get up. Just imagine if they were on a high bed and fell off onto their head, it could seriously injure them. When I'm not at home I keep Molly in a large crate with some soft blankets in it.
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