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Originally Posted by lucyliu  Well, unfortunately her BAT numbers came back as 4.3 and 85, substantially higher than a month ago and she was on denasyl for a month. Looks like we will consider a liver biopsy and spay at the specialist. Advice? I am very sad as I hate to think of this procedure. I will still talk to specialist and vet one more time before making this decision. |
has your dog had any symptoms at all of liver shunt? If not personally I would not do the biopsy if it was my dog as all they are going to say is yep she has mvd so low protein diet. A dog with mvd will always test high on bats every time but if no symptoms at all and below 100 i would just do 18-22% protein diet and if you want to supplement then denomarin which is milk thistle and sam-e or do them separately to support the liver and juicing zucchine and celery will help. Why did vet only supplement with sam-e and not milk thistle as milk thistle is actually more beneficial. Personally i would have just fed low protein diet prior to testing to see if that affected it as denosyl is just going to support the liver not cure it or lower the bats - the low protein diet would lower the bats so was your dog on low protein diet of 22% or lower?
Denosyl - Pet Liver Medication For Cats & Dogs - 1800PetMeds
here are all the meds for liver support - denamarin has the two things or you can do denosyl (same) and and marin (milk thistle) separately.
1800PetMeds - Search Results
my dog had a post of 73 and with low protein diet went down to a post of 26 after 6 months on 18% protein soy diet. She never had symptoms at all and she was 3 years old when bile acid tested and only reason we did it was because she was going on a drug atopica which affects the liver
she does not get any liver support at this time as our bigger issue is allergies and hypothyroid as the low protein diet solved the high numbers
so the key is here - is the dog having symptoms? also how old is your dog?
i would also approach it this way - if she starts having symptoms at say 1 years old which many do then i would just go straight to scintigraphy to see if a shunt which i doubt yours has and mvd even if liver biopsy there is nothing they can really do other than diet and supplements
keep in mind many vets do not have a clue about liver shunt and mvd and many panic when numbers are abnormal thus freaking out the owner thinking it is a shunt as my vet did this too and i went home read everything i could on it for 24 hrs all nighter like college lol then joined the liver shunt groups and decided no scintigraphy as my dog had NO SYMPTOMS other than skin issues due to liver not cleansing properly but she also has allergies and hypothyroid which are skin related