Oh Yoda, I just saw this. Hope everything will be ok! *fingers crossed!*

Hugs and love to Yoda and the whole Fam :)! Hang in there Yoders! We're all pullin' for ya.

Oh boy....well...it's good that you're getting somewhere in terms of specifics w/ the diagnoses, bc that helps w/ some of the fears (in my experience anywho :rolleyes:). With stones in 2 spots like that (not to mention the pain to pass them, like you said), I wouldn't be surprised if surgery was the best option. I'm sorry you guys have to consider that, but I am glad that you're getting some answers for the little fella.

Thanks for the update. :)

here is some info on pancreatitis

Don?t Let This Organ Ruin Your Pet?s Life

ok that is why the liver was of concern as there are stones. You are correct getting the pancreas under control is key as that is more critical. Stones usually come from a high protein diet :( and why dogs with liver disease have stones as they cannot process proteins very well and why they are on a low protein diet. Pepcid ac is used (famotidine) is another name to control the stomach acids in the stomach. Are they putting him on an iv all day with antibiotics as the wbc is high as there is infection that goes along with this disease. I really think the diet was the culprit :( especially since stones and pancreatitis :( I hope he feels better real soon

i will say that i have not used digestive enzymes with mine as the food has worked fine for 4 years but i wanted you to have the information on pancreas and saw this on another group so thought i would share it :)

Prayers and good thoughts for Yoda.

I would think that the liver was a concern because of the elevated enzymes which occurs often with pancreatitis.

Here is an exerpt from just one website...it actually is on many as it is very common for this to occur.

Diagnosing and Treatment for Pancreatitis in Dogs

Canine pancreatitis is diagnosed by performing a physical exam, blood work, sonograms (ultrasound) and radiographs (x-rays). Enlarged pancreas and elevated pancreatic enzymes are the most common findings in a dog with pancreatitis. Liver problems, including liver enlargement and elevated liver enzymes, also seen in many pancreatitis patients, according to Dr. Levine.

How to Avoid Holiday Pancreatitis in Dogs: Tips to Prevent Pancreas Inflammation, Holiday Hazard to Dogs | Suite101.com

As for a diet, I would be very careful and follow your vet's recommendations closely. The problem with looking for a diet that is good for the pancreas, is that it may not be good for renal issues. Most likely you will be putting him on a diet that is low fat and low protein which is not an easy diet to find. The diet for pancreas is low fat...diet for kidneys is low protein. Seems that most foods only focus on one. I know this from experience and have consulted with A&M for a home cooked diet in the past.

i have an mvd yorkie and a pancreatitis yorkie and they are on purina ha that is low in fat and low in protein so both eat this.

The stones are not from pancreatitis those are most likely related to the liver issue - if no stones then i would say yes it is tied to the pancreatitis but pancreatitis does not trigger stones but liver disease does so I think the two are unrelated due to stones being present and why liver values are off. Dex almost died of pancreatitis and he did not have high numbers like yoda on those other things associated to liver he only had high amylase, lipase, cpli, triglycerides and white blood cell count. The other things on yoda's blood work are tied to the stones present i believe

I also have had many dogs with illnesses.

I stand by one thing : Best to listen to the vet in most cases.

key word most cases as my dog would have died had i not gotten him to an internal medicine specialist with this disease as the vet basically told me he was going to die so i think these groups are very helpful to gain knowledge and understanding so you can work with the vet and specialists and get the best care but you can learn alot from other pet owners and gain knowledge. I have learned sadly a vet does not know everything about everything and why there are specialists that have further education in organs etc. Also vets do not know hardly anything about nutrition only prescribe vet diets based on food companies pitch. They only take one class in nutrition in vet school and many do not further their education after college on nutrition. Luckily my dog has done well on purina ha for 4 years but some are not so lucky and why many use a board certified nutritionist from ucdavis on here.

I just took my dog in to check for uti and vet almost gave her a antibiotic shot and i said no not until we know if she has an infection and i told him remember she got hives from simplicef and he said good thing we did not give the shot as it is in the same family as the simplicef so she good have had a horrible reaction and she turned out not to have a uti after all so sorry I think you need to educate yourself as he could have made my dog real sick had i allowed him to give her that shot

Some vets are not good with diets...I agree. I just think that sometimes when people start advising people online they don't always have the full picture of what is going on. I believe a vet knows more about how organs work together and how lab results are interpreted. There are many gray areas...nothing is black and white. I much prefer to listen to my vet about what I need to feed....not necessarily what FOOD, but certainly what I should be feeding in terms of calories, fat, and protein, etc. I see people advising people what to feed based on a diagnosis and how they interpret lab studies and I don't agree with that. I believe that the vet should tell the person...low fat or whatever....then, I can see advising them on different foods.

I had my vet do a telephone consult with the vet who is the head of Clinical Nutrition at Texas A&M Small Animal Services. Anyone can do that...they do not have to physically go there. If a pup has had a full workup, no need to go physically...records can be faxed.

more info on pancreas

Pancreatitis (Inflammation) in Dogs

Exactly...as stated on the website:

The diagnosis of pancreatitis is made through information obtained from the history, the physical exam, and laboratory testing. Dogs with pancreatitis generally have an increased blood levels of the pancreatic enzymes called amylase and lipase. If the liver also becomes inflamed, liver enzymes as measured in the blood may be increased. A rather new test, serum cPLI (pancreatic lipase immunoreactivity), may prove to be a valuable diagnostic aid. The white blood cell count is generally increased in acute pancreatitis. Radiography (x-rays) and ultrasound can also help in making the diagnosis. biopsy can result in a conclusive diagnosis, but is not commonly performed.


The liver and pancreas are both part of the digestive system.

I agree but i have to say i was not impressed with ucdavis Welcome to the Balance IT® Web Site from everything i have read :( also i had a client come to me and tell me her dog was to give like 10 tums a day for calcium and she was furious she paid so much for a diet and so she used bone meal as she did not want to use tums so i still have a question mark myself on the diets. It is a very complicated thing. I do say if it works stick with it and do not vary with a sick dog as dex it took me a year after his pancreatic attack to figure what caused it and it came down to potato in diet inflaming small intestines triggering the attacks. He has been great for 4 years on purina ha now do i think it is the best diet ever NO WAY but it works so he will eat that for life lollll i have people that say that is a bad diet etc but i am not taking any chances after 10,000 i spent to get him right. Pancreatitis is extremely expensive to treat and can lead to other diseases and i will not take any chances with dex EVER he gets purina ha and that is it and he gets it as a treat and he gets just as excited as he did with treats prior so if it is not broke do not fix it i say

correct BUT that does not explain the STONES that is a whole other issue going

also wanted to state lipase breaks down fat and amylase breaks down starch so in evaluating those numbers keep that in mind as that can help narrow things down as well

and the reason i am concerned about liver issue is because there are stones present so again i stated before if no stones present then i would just attribute liver values elevated was due to pancreatitis BUT since stones as well then liver needs to be addressed with bile acid testing obviously once yoda is out of the woods with pancreatitis as that is very hard on the system so he has to get through that first. A sign of liver disease is stones

info on stones so it is important to know which type of stones which they will advise once removed

high protein diets in yorkies can cause this

Bladder Stones (Urinary Calculi) in Dogs

here is something to think about and consult with vet as it happened to my mom - she had gallstones and it triggered a gallbladder attack and she ended up with pancreatitis from it SO i am now thinking maybe the stones triggered the attack on the pancreas so you may want to read this and ask the vet if this could have been the cause. Ultimately it all comes down to diet too high in fat and protein BUT this may be the culprit as you said you have been feeding this for years so maybe once the stones developed it triggered the pancreatic attack


Diseases of the Gallbladder & Bile Duct in Dogs

This could be why the liver values were high and my dogs were not as he did not have stones and the stones can be attributed to liver issue as liver, gallbladder, small intestines and pancreas are all working together - the liver could be functioning bad due to not able to break down proteins thus causing stones then stopping up system triggering a pancreatic attack

Continuing prayers and best wishes...

a yorkie owner on here i helped and we talked on phone his dog was 4 had no symptoms at all of liver shunt. He went in for diarhea they found stones and his bile acids were high as well as ALT so they did ultrasound and due to stones they wanted to check for shunt as they thought they saw a shunt. He went to ut to dr tobias and had the surgery and turned out he had 3 shunts so they could not do the constrictor on him so he has to be on low protein diet so it is not uncommon that shunts can show up later on in a dog with no symptoms. What happens is the body adapts and blows out more shunts so why this dog had more than on shunt as the body adapted. Now had this dog had seizures, etc and they found it early on then they could have repaired it and the other two shunts may not have appeared but the dog had NO symptoms until the stones showed up by the dog having some diarhea issues. I was shocked myself as i thought it would only be in dogs with seizures etc so i asked my internal medicine specialist and she said she sees it many times that they show up later in life. Once the liver is ruled out for yoda by bile acid testing then it could just be too high protein in diet that caused the stones.

No, I am not referring to stones. That is a different issue. I am simply saying that I doubt the liver caused the stones as you suggest.

I believe the enzymes were elevated because of the pancreas, but I am not a vet. I think he needs to ask the vet.

it could be liver or it could be high protein diet but if the liver cannot process the high protein it can cause stones. You are correct he needs to consult vet but these are all things and possibilities to ask the vet as many times when faced with these situations we do not know what to ask and why people outside of the situation can address things such as this so they can ask vet about the possibilities as i know i was clueless when this happened to my dog and i had no clue about these groups and why i joined was because my dog was so sick and others helped me and i educated myself thorougly on the pancreas after this incident as i did not ever want it to happen again and could not figure out what caused it etc so for 4 years i have read everything i could about it same with liver disease mvd as dee dee has that based on 3 bile acid tests over the course of a year so i belong to liver shunt and mvd groups and have thorougly educated myself on that as well and always wanting to learn. I do not one to soley rely on one person and want to understand what is going on and between me, ims and vet we all came to the same conclusion white potato diets. It took all 3 of us working together to figure the cause.

Sending prayers and positive thoughts

more info on liver

Symptoms and Diagnosis of Liver Disorders in Dogs

Prayers for Yoda will continue from my home. Hope he is on the mend soon.

more info on stones and liver - so you need to know if urate bladder stones or struvite which they will test the stones once removed- if urate then tied to liver

Portosystemic shunt - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Symptoms and diagnosis
Symptoms of congenital PSS usually appear by six months of age[1] and include failure to gain weight, vomiting, and signs of hepatic encephalopathy (a condition where toxins normally removed by the liver accumulate in the blood and impair the function of brain cells) such as seizures, depression, tremors, drooling, and head pressing. Urate bladder stones may form because of increased amounts of uric acid in circulation and excreted by the kidneys. Initial diagnosis of PSS is through laboratory bloodwork showing either elevated serum bile acids after eating or elevation of fasting blood ammonia levels, which has been shown to have a higher sensitivity and specificity than the bile acids test.[4] Rectal portal scintigraphy using 99mtechnetium pertechnetate, a technique of imaging involving detection of gamma rays emitted by radionuclides absorbed through the rectum and into the bloodstream, demonstrates the blood vessel bypassing the liver. Surgery definitively shows the shunt if it is extrahepatic.

these are the two types

Types of bladder stones in dogs - URATE and STRUVITE

There are several different types of bladder stones in dogs, depending on their chemical make-up. Struvite stones are composed of magnesium ammonium phosphate. Others are made of calcium oxalate, calcium phosphate, cystine, ammonium urate, or other chemical compounds. Some stones can actually be a combination of these. Each type of stone has its own different peculiarities as to which breed is most often affected and what factors affect the formation.

also if bile acid is high over 100 when they do surgery for stones you can have them see if there is a shunt

So sorry little Yoda is not doing well!!!!

Prayers going out for Yoda to bounce right back from this!

:hands::hands::hands::hands:

Oh, no, I'm stumbling on this late. Yoda, you have the best parents ever, and you're in the best hands. I know you're going to bounce back. Sending strength to FE and family and healthy thoughts to Yoda.

Thanks so much for keeping us informed.

Prayers for Yoda and his family tonight.

Just checking in and sending Yoda and family prayers and hugs.