close call after rabies vaccine

[dipdip]

First post on here. Just wanted to give everyone a heads up with my experience. I'll give y'all a little background. I have a 4 year old yorkie (dipdip). I got him in the divorce (I was with my ex for 12 years, but never married because she was absolutely nuts). I have always owned golden retrievers. The ex started bugging me that she wanted a yorkie. I absolutely refused. No way was I going to have a yapping lap dog. So, in order to make me mad, her parents paid $700 for this little dog for her birthday in '08. When the relationship ended I left and purchased my own place. 4 days after I left she called me and told me to come get the dog. He had laid on the floor for 4 days, shaking and throwing up. Apparently, he missed me. He chose me, I didn't choose him. For that reason I am very protective of my boy. He is my little amigo.

Anyway, I took him to the vet the first week of July for his annual check up, 3 year rabies, and bordetella vaccines. I should add that he tips the scales at 5 lbs. but thinks he is a great dane. He was checked out, got a clean bill of health, and got his vaccines. This was on a Thursday. Friday and Saturday go by and he was completelly normal. Sunday he got up and went outside. I noticed he was pulling to the right when he was running. It looked really odd but, in fairness, he does stuff that is odd. He is also a drama queen so it is hard to get a good draw on him when something could be wrong. As the following week went on he got progressively worse. Missing jumps, pacing in circles, running into walls. I called the vet back and told her what was going on. I brought up the rabies vaccine and she said it wasn't possible that he, more than likely, had an ear infection. She asked me to ride it through the weekend and see if he got better. Monday came and he went back to the vet. She gave him some drops for his ears and said he had some inflammation in his ear. He was due back at the vet in 2 weeks for his teeth cleaning so we agreed to see what happened & check him out in 2 weeks.

2 weeks went by and he went in the tank. He was horrible. So confused. It was odd, though. He never lost his appetite, nor had any accidents in the house. He went outside like normal. We have a 2 story deck, though. Towards the end of this journey he missed the location of the stairs and fell down them. It was a really sad situation. He went back to the vet and they gave him a complete going over. They diagnosed him with encephalitis in the frontal lobe. He was blind in his right eye and he had lost function of his left hind leg (the reason he was pulling to the right when he was running). They put him on prednisone orally along with an injection at the vet along with some fluids. He was in bad shape. He started the oral prednisone and it was like flipping a switch. Within 2 weeks he was completely back to normal. No lingering effects at all.

When we went back to the vet she said she had no doubt that this was brought on by the vaccine. She said she could only find one case of this ever happening. We are going to petition the county to get him exempted from having to get any more rabies vaccines, That should be an interesting journey.

By no means am I suggesting not to get your friends vaccinated. I just want to lay my story out so if it should happen to someone else you can use this as justification with your friends health care provider. I wish that I had been more forceful in having my vet not dismiss his symptoms as an ear infection. I know that we were really close to losing him & I feel a good bit of guilt for that

[TxVicki]

Welcome to YT. I am so sorry that DipDip had a horrible reaction to his Vac. But I am happy to hear that he is doing OK now.
Good luck with getting your exemption for his Rabies Vac.

[Britster]

Thanks for sharing your story! So scary.

I am all for minimal vaccines. My boy tends to be a tad sensitive as well. He also gets a Benadryl injection first, just to be safe. But like you said, getting around the law w/ rabies is difficult, so we'll just continue to do every 3 years as per the law. But he won't be getting any other vaccines as far as I know at this point.

So glad he's okay.

[MY OSCAR]

i am going to continue with the 3 year rabies but before giving any other vax i am going to get the vaccine titer for each dog....

[Yorkiemom1]

If you can not get...let me start over, as I can not encourage lawlessness in other people....IF IT WAS ME AND MY DOG HAD ALMOST DIED FROM A RABIES VACCINATION, WAIVER OR NOT, MY DOG WOULD NEVER GET ANOTHER RABIES SHOT. You can not possible subject that baby to that again, and the first reaction is usually the most minor reaction....the subsequent reactions are much worse. JUST SAY NO!!
As for feeling guilty, no need to do that either...we all gain knowledge about everything to do with our pets, through trial and error and experiences, both ours as well as others. We depend on vets and most people have NO idea that some vets are more "up to date" or more concerned or even possibly "over react" more than the next one...all vetsd are just like all doctors...you have some you completely trust and others not so much....when you have a good vet, and you trust that vet and that vet's knowledge base, you do as they say....if they have not ever experienced a particular incident, as yours had never seen a rabies shot affect a pup like it did yours, they wont know what they are looking at. She too has now learned from someone elses experience...and she will utilize that knowledge in the future....others will benefit from this incident. And now YOU know about this! and you will react accordingly to keep your little amigo safe! Review vaccination protocols...and I wouldnt care what anyone said, I would never give that baby another rabies shot again......

[dipdip]

Oh, I agree with you. He is not getting another vaccine. Come hell or high water he is not getting vaccinated for rabies again. I am going to go through the process with the county but if they say no then we are still walking away smiling. I plan on this kid sticking with me for a long, long time and I am not going to put him in a position where he risks being hurt. No way that is happening.

[kjc]

Hi and Welcome to YT! Sorry your little guy went through this. Is he off the prednisone now? Hoping he continues to do well.

[dipdip]

He is off the prednisone. No lingering effects after the prednisone therapy other than he continues to eat like a horse. He put on about .75 lbs. with the prednisone. Other than that, he is my normal, everyday boy. I really feel like we got lucky on this deal.

[kjc]

Originally Posted by dipdip

He is off the prednisone. No lingering effects after the prednisone therapy other than he continues to eat like a horse. He put on about .75 lbs. with the prednisone. Other than that, he is my normal, everyday boy. I really feel like we got lucky on this deal.

Hoping he stays that way!

[mamaj]

Do you think this happened because he got the bordatella with the rabies shot? My vet will only give my baby one shot at a time. She only weighs 3 pounds

[chachi]

Ive never heard of vaccines causing encephalitus I thought that was genetic. Im sorry and Ill be praying for your little one

[Lil Sis]

Originally Posted by mamaj

Do you think this happened because he got the bordatella with the rabies shot? My vet will only give my baby one shot at a time. She only weighs 3 pounds

That is what I was thinking too.

I have such mixed feelings about the rabies shots. I have small dogs that are not a danger.. so I feel it is over inforced. I guess I would feel different if one of mine was bitten by a larger dog.

I do have one dog that I adopted from a family member and he has never been tagged. The vet knows because he has been treated and altered etc. I have been told if I get "caught" say I just found the dog and I have 30 days to tag him. Of course this also limits which groomer I can go to and traveling with him also. The thing is the other two are.. I just don't know why I don't do him.. maybe because his sister died..and I am not so sure it wasn't from vac.?

[msyorktown]

Hi and welcome to YT. I am so sorry this happened to you...glad he is ok now. Really makes you wonder sometimes...scary stuff.

[dipdip]

I can't say whether or not the multiple vaccines caused the issue. The thing that bothers me about small dogs is the window of dosage. They use the same dosage for a 5 lb. dog that they use for a 25 lb. dog. That makes no sense to me. Regardless, those dosages will not change without some in depth studies.

[shelimcallister]

Welcome to YT! I am so glad Dipdip is okay! You're a great Yorkie dad!