Husdon GSD and new EPI diagnosis
Posted: 22 Jun 2022, 17:04
Today we received confirmation of our suspicion that our German Shepherd puppy, Hudson, has EPI. He’s now 8 months old, and two months ago he weighed 85 pounds at his last vet visit (to get the last of his puppy shots) before he started exhibiting the worst loose stools we’ve ever seen in any of our dogs. He was going 10-12 times a day with loose, watery, yellow stools, ranging from pure liquid to cow plops. And eating 4 cups of Purina ProPlan Puppy at each meal, 3x a day. We quickly got our vet involved, and after 4 weeks of fecal test (negative), probiotics, Royal Canin Gastrointestinal and Purina Hydrolyzed, and a week of Metronidazole with no effect, I purchased some frozen ground beef pancreas. In three days we started to see some improvement. A week ago, we convinced our vet to test for EPI and got the results today: TLI < 1; B12 = 306; and folate = 29.8.
We estimate that he probably lost about 9-10 pounds in the four weeks before we started the beef pancreas, and has already regained 5 pounds in a week. He is now eating a more normal 3 cups of kibble with 4 ounces of beef pancreas in each meal- twice a day and having only 3 or 4 poops a day with much less volume. The last few days he is actually sleeping 6 or 7 hours! Stool is still light color and of the cow plop variety. Today I ordered Pantenex which should get here in a few days and we’ll switch from raw pancreas to the powder and also switch him from the Royal Canin to a low fiber, grain free dog food. He has always been a great eater, takes medication easily so we’re hopeful we can make these changes without him rebelling too much. I do have a couple of questions since our vet has only suggested starting the enzyme supplements and no B12 injections or antimicrobial such as Tylosin. Since his B12 is in normal range (but low), does he need B12 injections, or possibly oral B12? And should we wait to see if the enzyme powder improves his stool consistency and color before going back to the vet to try Tylosin?
Thank you so much for the vast amount of information on this site, and it really helped us to understand what was going on with Hudson, and relatively quickly get to this stage where we can start to manage his condition. Any reply or further information would be immensely appreciated, or if there are any other things we can do to make this process better for him.
John and Mary Kay
We estimate that he probably lost about 9-10 pounds in the four weeks before we started the beef pancreas, and has already regained 5 pounds in a week. He is now eating a more normal 3 cups of kibble with 4 ounces of beef pancreas in each meal- twice a day and having only 3 or 4 poops a day with much less volume. The last few days he is actually sleeping 6 or 7 hours! Stool is still light color and of the cow plop variety. Today I ordered Pantenex which should get here in a few days and we’ll switch from raw pancreas to the powder and also switch him from the Royal Canin to a low fiber, grain free dog food. He has always been a great eater, takes medication easily so we’re hopeful we can make these changes without him rebelling too much. I do have a couple of questions since our vet has only suggested starting the enzyme supplements and no B12 injections or antimicrobial such as Tylosin. Since his B12 is in normal range (but low), does he need B12 injections, or possibly oral B12? And should we wait to see if the enzyme powder improves his stool consistency and color before going back to the vet to try Tylosin?
Thank you so much for the vast amount of information on this site, and it really helped us to understand what was going on with Hudson, and relatively quickly get to this stage where we can start to manage his condition. Any reply or further information would be immensely appreciated, or if there are any other things we can do to make this process better for him.
John and Mary Kay