Injured Husky Needs Help

This message is posted on behalf of Paws to the Rescue. Do not contact the blog for more information, please contact Paws to the Rescue with inquiries, donations, and assistance:

On Tuesday we received a call about a dog hit by a car lying in the highway - he is a beautiful male husky with blue eyes. He had on a very nice leather collar and flea collar but no ID and is not microchipped. Initial vet services were done (he was fortunate to "only" have a compound fracture to his right front leg) but no owner has come forward and tomorrow his stray hold is up.

He is a bit thin but very sweet and just barely a year old. He cannot come to the shelter with his injury so is in boarding at the vet's office right now. We need donations to cover his vetting so far and a rescue to take in this beautiful boy. Please spread the word and consider making a donation via paypal to jen@pawstotherescue.com or mail to the address below:

Paws to the Rescue
123 Dog & Cat Court
Mullins, SC 29574

If interested in rescuing this boy, please e-mail me at jennaluv2@yahoo.com.

Thank you for helping this boy!!!

Jen Nall, Executive Director
Paws to the Rescue / Animal Shelter of Marion County
www.petfinder.com/shelters/SC41.html
www.myspace.com/pawstotherescue
www.magfundraising.com/Paws_to_the_Rescue
Waiting at the bridge - Nakita "Kita Girl" 03/10/93 - 01/05/08

Canine Renal Failure (A personal story) February 2009

Poutin’ Grace (first posted 2/6/2009)

On Sunday afternoon it was pleasant enough to sit out on the Hawksbill Cabin’s brick terrace and read. At first, I had Gracie and Sofie outside with me, but they kept wandering off in opposite directions and I had to track them down in the side or backyards, so I put them back inside.

About 20 minutes later, I looked over at the windows and caught site of Gracie in pout mode. She actually had fallen asleep with this disgruntled look on her face.

Gracie seems to be coming around these days. Mary has found the secret for getting her to eat the special diet, and Gracie has gained back the pounds she lost. We haven't been to the vet in a few weeks, but things seem to be going well just now.


February 27 Vet Visit (from Mary’s journal, first posted to Hawksbill Cabin blog on 5/22/2009)

Another follow-up visit to the vet for blood and urine testing today.

Gracie’s been shivering and she’s still not eating enough. I’m trying hard to find prescription food that she will eat. She doesn’t like the Hill’s k/d or the Royal Canin Renal, canned or dry.

I’ve tried to incentivize with small amounts of regular dog food, boiled chicken, fresh chicken broth, but she’s not interested. I’m trying her now on a homemade diet based on Hill’s canine restricted protein diet (from our vet, via the internet): 



¼ lb ground beef, not lean

2 cups cooked white rice without salt

1 hard boiled egg, finely chopped

3 slices white bread crumbled

1 teaspoon (5grams) calcium carbonate (ended up grinding up eggs shells for this)


Cook beef in skillet until lightly brown, add rest of ingredients and a little water if too dry. Keep in refrigerator. Yields 1.25 lbs.

(Analysis: 6.9% protein, 5.5% fat, 21.1% carbohydrates, 65.5% moisture)


A 40 lb dog such as Gracie should eat 1.5 lbs of this mixture per day – one batch is slightly less than one day’s worth of food.

Daily amounts according to Hill’s:
5 lb. dog, ¼ lb of food;
10 lb dog, ½ lb of food;
20 lb dog, 1 lb food;
60 lb dog, 2 lbs food;
80 lb dog, 2 ½ lbs food;
100 lb dog, 3 lbs food

Wanted: Driver in Canada

I’ve received a plea for help from someone in Sudbury, Ontario that needs a safe driver/good samaritan who can drive this person and her dog to Toronto so that her dog can have knee surgery.

This person will pay for all expenses for someone that can provide transportation for possibly several trips.

If you can help out, please contact me and I can provide you with the person’s contact info. E-mail me at: gimpydogscom@gmail.com if you can help.

Thanks!

Canine Renal Failure (A personal story) January 2009

A friend of mine recently reached out about his dog, Gracie, who succumbed to renal failure.

Knowing that I hosted the gimpydogs site, he asked if it would be ok for him to post his experiences with the disease for others to learn from. I immediately said yes, because while its great to find out clinical and medical information, having insight on the actual care of a renal failure pup is not only comforting (knowing that others are going through what you have) but educational in not only how things are handled, but quite possibly giving someone an easier way to do things that hadn't been thought of.

The next blog posts will be the Gracie series on experiences with renal failure. We dedicate these posts to Jim and Mary, and to Gracie, who lives whole and free across the Rainbow Bridge until she meets her caring owners once again.

Gracie's Story

My wife Mary and I lost our Border Collie, Gracie, to Chronic Renal Failure in September 2009. She had been diagnosed with the condition early in 2008, and our vet told us she entered the final stage of the disease in January 2009. Like many pet owners, we immediately went to the web for insight on the disease, and to learn about other owners’ experience treating their pets. We found some comfort there, and I decided to keep a little track record on my blog.

Penny also offered to put these posts up here on gimpy dogs; we very much appreciate the opportunity to honor our pet this way, and hope that our experience can help other owners prepare for the experience.

Thoughts on …Canine Renal Disease (first posted 1/15/09)

I hesitate to write this post - while the Hawksbill Cabin blog is meant to journalize experiences, and is certainly personal, once I make this entry I'll have started down a path revisiting this topic until a final post sometime.

This week our vet diagnosed Gracie as having entered the final stage of chronic renal failure, which means her kidneys aren't clearing all the toxins from her body. She has progressed from a mild stage of the disease which was diagnosed last year. About three weeks ago, she started boycotting her food, and we thought, okay - she really doesn't like the food (a special diet, recommended by the vet, which we were using to treat the early stage with), and the battle to try and get her to eat it isn't worth it.

So last week we went to the vet for alternatives. In the meantime they tested her progress with the disease again, and found that she had lost five pounds over the last month, since our last visit. It was an abrupt weight loss and concerned us.

 We found another version of the special food, wet this time, and a second vet visit yesterday confirmed that her condition had improved. Gracie is still a nut, driven like the Border collie she is, constantly trying to tempt us with her toys, as always. She even tried to convince a Page County Deputy to play football with her over the weekend!

But the simple matter is she is 14, and her body is starting to wear out. The vet told us that some dogs only live a few weeks with final stage renal failure – given the spirits Gracie is in, we don’t think this is the case for her – but it could be months until the end. In any case, the news was that it is likely that we'll lose her this year.
Canine Renal Failure – update 1 (first posted 1/26/2009)

Since I posted on Gracie’s diagnosis of canine renal failure on January 15, we have some updates. We did some web research on the situation. The first thing we learned from other owners is that the disease upsets the stomach so the dog won’t eat. This is what results in food boycotting, which we had been attributing to her not liking the food.

The advice we got on this was that it is most important to get her to eat – even if it’s not necessarily the (expensive) prescription diet. So Mary has begun looking into alternatives, starting with the idea that we might be able to incentivize the food, and she’d checking protein levels on candidate incentives.

Also, we read on another blog that additives such as B- vitamins and safflower oil may be a help (readers finding this blog from a search on Chronic or Canine Renal Failure – please be sure to do your own due diligence, and check with your vet!). Our vet confirmed that these things can be helpful, but she wants to check the dosages the next time we are in. We look forward to that welcome advice.

We got her some Pepcid, and that seems to have quieted the stomach issues. Mary is taking some extra care to make the food more attractive – it’s quite a project. Now mealtimes attract quite a bit of canine attention as both dogs (Gracie and her sister Sofie, the Chow mix) stand patiently in the door of the kitchen, patiently as they can, that is. Mary says, "I'm just glad they're domesticated!" when they finally charge in to the food bowls.

Gracie’s appetite has returned, and she is gaining some of the lost weight back…her energy is back – even during the stomach issues and weight loss period she still wanted to play. She's almost her pesky border collie self again.

January 9 Vet Visit (posted by Mary, added to the Hawksbill Cabin blog 5/21/2009)

Gracie, our 14 year-old Border Collie, has been diagnosed with canine renal failure. Her kidneys have been weakening for about a year. In retrospect, one of the first signs was weakness in her legs; she wouldn’t stand for any length of time, preferring to lie down even if we stopped for a short time on our walks.

She’s also lost a lot of weight. She’s not eating, and really hates the renal prescription dry and wet foods. (And, it’s very difficult to get this special food, too. It either has to be ordered through a vet or bought on line – a big waste of money if the dog won’t eat it. Petsmart sells canned Hill’s k/d and Royal Canin, but a prescription card is needed.)

Loss of appetite is another symptom of the disease. Apparently, the toxins built up in the blood by failing kidneys makes the dog nauseous and can even lead to stomach ulcers.