Dog Hepatitis?
I have a freind who's dog was just diagnoses with Hepatitis. Has anyone had any experience with this? |
|
|
It sounds like they need to get him in a 12 step program or lay off the tattoos.  |
| see thats part of the wierd thing; the vet wasn't able to tell my friend HOW the dog contacted it. And I've never heard of a dog having it before, and there's NO mention of it anywhere here on the board...
I googled it, and sure enough Dog Hepatitis exists. But I just can't seem to get much info on it. |
| I don't have much either: It occurs in other canines: wolves, voxes, coyotes, and skunks and bears....and is transmitted by contact with feces or urine and saliva of infected animals. Problem is the animal will still give off the virus up to 6 months after recovery. The virus can live outside the animal's body for months too.
Was the dog in a wild area? It is common in very young and old canines. Depending on severity, symptoms vary from somewhat mild to incresingly severe and causing death. There are many symptoms. There is no drug which will attack the virus. Supportive therapy only while the dog's own immune system fights the virus. In severe cases daily blood transfusions may be given to seriously ill dogs as well as high doses of IV fluids. Secondary infections are a major concern so the dog may be put on preentive antibiotics. Dogs do recover and will return to eating and gaining weight. A recovering dog will develop an opaqueness (is that a word?) to the eye that will eventually go away, but some dogs will experience eye pain and should be kept out of harsh sunlight until the eyes clear. The distemper vax also protects against hepatitis......was the dog properly vaccinated? Was his mother, the bitch, also properly vaxed? I know we don't like to over vaccinate our dogs, but if they are wandering around in the woods or areas where wild animals roam or a lot of other dogs, the suggested annual distemper/hepatitis vax is probably a good idea. |
| I think you are thinking of Leptospirosis which does occur in the wild and pets can get it and yes that is why we give the vaccine.
If it is the other hepatitis which is what I think that your vet means it is like what people get and it is liver disease as in sirosis of the liver. They can determine this by a blood panel or by doing a laparoscopy and getting a liver sample that way. At my clinic we have had a few hepatitis patients. Unfortunately their prognosis is never very good because it is irreversable unless it is acute onset hepatitis. We had a patient get acute hepatitis due to taking metacam but this was a very rare case. The usual hepatitis you see is liver sirosis. I am very sorry that your friends pet has this. No one really knows why it happens but it does in some dogs. I can look up more if you would like and talk to the internist I work with on Tuesday. |
| Nope, several sources have mentioned wild animals as a source for the disease and one even mentioned flea, tick and mosquitoes as carriers from the infected animals.......since I saw that just once, I didn't mention it. Any yes, there is the good old Idiopathic attachment in some references......meaning "who knows where it came from."
Canine Hepatitis is not the same as human in that it cannot pass between one and the other......they are totally different in that regard. Still they are diseases of the liver resulting in reduced liver function. There are other hepatic diseases as well, but ICH is the one most often first mentioned. I might add certain breeds have a protein malfunction that allows copper to accumulate in the dogs' livers thus causing another form of hepatitis. ICH is a virus. |
| I am a little late on this my savannah had chronic active hepatitis and was fully vaccinated as well as her parents. Had her since a pup and she never ran into the wilderness. We used medications to bring the liverenzymes down and non of my other dogs have shown any symptoms (she passed from hemangiosarcoma in feb) |
Didn't find exactly what you're looking for? Search again here:
Custom Search
|
|
| |
|
|
|
|
|