The behavior you described is not one usually associated with liver disease, including Liver Shunt. The difference is with LS, toxins get to the brain in the blood. Her symptoms indicate pressure building in the brain (or around it) and as it increases, her symptoms may multiply and become worse. There are medications that can stop this from happening, but she needs to be diagnosed as to exactly why the fluid is building up, as there are different conditions that can cause this to occur, and different meds and dosages for each condition.
At this point, this dog needs to be seen by a neurologist ASAP. AAI, GME, NE, Chiari, and Syringomyelia all cause swelling in the skull and can present with the symptoms described.
These conditions can also throw off a BAT result. The owner will be wasting her money persuing treatment for the liver, as it will never resolve until the brain swelling is dealt with. She could very well spend thousands of dollars on liver testing and treatment that will have no effect on improving the health of her dog.
Many vets don't realize that something else is going on. They are at the point where they have found an abnormal result, and because 36% of Yorkies have LS, they truly think they are on the correct path. The aboved mentioned diseases are not as thoroughly documented, may be considered 'rare', bc in the past, there was no treatment for them and many dogs were PTS. As vet medicine has advanced, they now can treat these diseases, but this is done by neurologists. Dr. Sission in MA has developed the most current, successful protocol for treatment. He does phone consultations.
One last thing: If this dog's symptoms were from LS, her condition would be Hepatic Encephalopathy (a complication of LS). The treatment for HE is Lactulose, 2-5 cc (depending on weight) given every hour until blowout diarrhea is acheived, then back to a maintrnance dose given twice daily with a low protein meal. This is done to help get the toxins (which cause this condition) out of the body as rapidly as possible. Improvement (lessening to disappearance of symptoms) will occur within 24 hours of initiating Lactulose therapy. Lactulose has absolutely no effect whatsoever on spinal fluid that is accumulating in the brain, which is the basic cause of symptoms in dogs with AAI, GME, NE, Chiari, and Syringomyelia.
One other clue would be... has this dog been vaccinated in the past 1-2 months? If the answer is yes.. then most likely would be GME, as a recent finding indicates the vaccines can trigger this disease. |