Advocate for Your Pet: Misdiagnosis Happens!

Let me start by saying that my dog, Maddie, is the picture of health, except for some environmental allergies that manifest as itching. But in the past seven months Maddie was misdiagnosed twice with two different serious health problems, by two different well-meaning veterinarians.

Maddie's allergies were bad last summer and fall, and I was trying to avoid giving her Prednisone. In addition to diet changes, I took her to the Dermatology department at Colorado State University and reluctantly began Maddie on allergy shots, which I gave under the skin in the back of her neck.

Now one lesson I learned the hard way with Maggie, our previous black lab, was to always bring my intuition to the table when obtaining the advice of an expert, such as a veterinarian, regarding her health. With each allergy injection I gave Maddie, I noticed my incongruence. I didn't feel this was the way for her. But I wasn't sure what else to do right then.

About one month into the allergy injection regime, Maddie barked one day and immediately screamed in pain. I was shocked and frightened. I thought she must have a stick lodged in the back of her throat, or an infected tooth. I also noticed her hesitancy to yawn fully. To our vet we went, a man I really like. When I explained her symptoms, he nodded, told me I wouldn't like what he was about to do, and opened Maddie's mouth wide. Of course, she wailed, and I held her close to comfort her.

"Maddie has immune-mediated masticular myositis, an inflammation in the muscles of the jaw that go up into her head," he told us apologetically. "That's why opening her mouth is so painful. Her response to my opening her mouth is classic for this disease. We can also do a blood test which will be positive if she has it."

I ached to hear this. "How do you treat it? Will it return?" I asked anxiously.

"With massive doses of prednisone, tapering over 6 months." Her best chance to be out of pain was to get the inflammation down. Our vet wouldn't say it would definitely return even if brought under control, but indicated it sure was a likely possibility, and I knew chances were it would if it were truly an immune-mediated disease.

He knew how I'd resisted treating Maddie's allergies with Prednisone, and how much I'd hate this treatment plan. But I couldn't let her be in pain.

"Is there any chance this was brought on by the allergy shots?" My feeling was that this is what had precipitated this "attack" on Maddie's muscles.

"No," he said without a trace of doubt.

My gut told me otherwise. My gut knew we needed to stop the allergy injections. We left with the dreaded Prednisone & began it immediately. I also made an appointment with another vet who does an energy treatment called Bicom, and left for Texas soon after Maddie was treated. This vet did think, as I did, that it was likely that Maddie's myositis was due to the allergy injections.

The bottom line is that Maddie was only on Prednisone for 12 days in total, including the wean. I threw the injection vials in the garabage & Maddie never received another shot. (I never heard back from CSU when I left a message in the Dermatology department asking if this reaction ever occurred with allergy injections). I believe the Bicom helped Maddie's allergies and her rapid healing from the myositis tremendously, (the climate change helped alleviate her itching, too).

Oh, and Maddie's test for immune mediated masticular myositis came back negative.

Please don't think I'm advocating to not give your dog allergy injections. They do work for some dogs, and most dogs will probably never have the reaction Maddie did. What I am encouraging is that you tune in to your intuition regarding your own pets, and whether a diagnosis and/or treatment feels right to you for that pet at that point in time.

Life continues to show me with my animals how important it is to advocate for our pets with their veterinarians, especially when our gut tell us something different is happening. Our animals can't talk, which makes a veterinarian's job tough. Vets are human, and we need to keep in mind that our close bond with our animals may allow for information to pass between us at a sixth sense level that the vet may not have access to. If a diagnosis regarding your pet doesn't make sense or feel right to you, don't hesitate to speak up and ask questions. Let your vet be yours and your animal's partner in health, while you remain your animal's top advocate. Remember, no one knows your precious animal souls like you do!

Stay tuned for Maddie misdiagnosis #2 in an upcoming blog post.


Posted By:

Dawn Kairns
Author of MAGGIE: the dog who changed my life
www.dawnkairns.com
www.maggiethedogwhochangedmylife.blogspot.com
www.twitter.com/themaggiebook

Lack of Language Doesn't Mean Dogs Don't Communicate & Understand

Today is a continuation of dog guardians discussing the question:

Have you had experiences with your dogs, past or present, where they seem to understand you or read what you're thinking where you can't attribute it to training?

I do think we give off cues at times that we may not be aware of that our dogs read in our behavior. I want to distinguish between those cues we exhibit and when our dogs just "know" without any outward signs from us. Certainly our dogs learn certain words if we use
them regularly. One possibility I raise in my book is, "did Maggie somehow receive the vision I had in my mind of what I was about to do, or what I wanted her to do?" Do your dogs do the same?

Bonnie from DogRead shared her special story about her black lab, Ruby, who Bonnie felt recognized her deep desire for a black female puppy:

"Oh so many times this has happened to me, but I will speak of only one. We raise/train Labrador Retrievers... After 10 years, I decided to breed a wonderful girl I had purchased four years before. She is known as my girl, Ruby... I finally decided with some nudging from Ruby to take the plunge and let her become a mother. My intention, of course, was to get another Ruby - YES - silly I know as that just cant be, of course, but our minds work in funny ways sometimes. We did the breeding and waited with baited breath for the day of delivery. My husband and I assisted all through the night but, alas, in the wee hours of the morning, I finally spoke the words out loud. 'We are not meant to keep any of these puppies as there is no little black girl.' We had black boys, yellow girls, and yellow boys, but no little special girl for me to wrap my arms around and once more feel the joy of being a Mom.

No sooner than I spoke the words -- Ruby got up and looked at me -- tired from her night of labor... She turned around, actually hunched over in front of me and delivered a little black girl into my hands. To say the roof came off the house is minimal. How did she know? She seemed to be done with her birthing. No one will ever tell me she didn't understand the ache my heart was feeling. To this day all of us, including Ruby, cherish the presence of our 'new' little girl, ... Cabot."

Sometimes I think our dogs try to make a point of communicating to us in ways we can't miss, as Ruby did by plopping Cabot in Bonnie's lap, that tell us "yes, I understand what you're saying. I get the ache in your heart and what it is you want. I KNOW!" And all they want at that moment is for us to get it that they know. Sometimes our canines make it so obvious, as Ruby did, that we can't miss it. Or like my Maggie did when I sadly said, towards the end of her life, "I haven't heard her bark today..." -- and she turned around and barked, then looked at me as if to say, "I get it! I do understand you! Please get this before I have to leave you!"

I did get it with Maggie at that point, and wished I'd realized it much earlier in her life. How is it that they know? Perhaps they do receive images we have in our minds. Or perhaps they receive information from us energetically, in a way humans can't yet understand. The important thing is for us to recognize that just because our animals can't speak doesn't mean they don't understand us -- our words, thoughts, and emotions. Maybe we can enhance our dog's lives by tuning in to the ways they are communicating to us in their own language.

Dawn Kairns
Author of MAGGIE: the dog who changed my life
www.dawnkairns.com
www.maggiethedogwhochangedmylife.blogspot.com

"There are only two ways to live your life: As if nothing is a miracle, or as if everything is a miracle." -- Albert Einstein