Betty Boop at ER vet - bloody poop

[ladyjane]

Oh boy, what a scare! Sounds like she is going to be fine, though!

Many years ago I had something similar happen. My Maxwell, who has since passed, woke me up in the middle of the night and he was passing straight blood! I rushed him to the vet and they did labs and xrays and found nothing wrong. He spent the rest of the night there. The next day he was sent home after the bleeding had stopped. The vet speculated that possibly he had eaten a blade of grass and I told him that was impossible since I would have seen it as he was always walked by me. I was so puzzled because it had stopped as suddenly it seemed as it had started. Well, a couple of days later it hit me what had happened when I saw Maxwell under the bird cage. He had a habit of eating sunflower seeds that my bird dropped out of the cage...so I was quite sure that was what had caused this bleeding. It does not take but a tiny little tear in the intestines for this amount of blood...it looks a LOT worse than what it is.

Sounds like perhaps something similar happened with your little Betty Boop. The fact that her labs were ok is a good sign. I will keep her, and you, in my thoughts and prayers.

[ladyjane]

Oh, and as for the ticket: the only thing I know of here in TX is Defensive Driving. You could try to go to court with an explanation. If it's a nice judge, then things might go well. That is a shame that happened.

[JERSEY BOY]

Hope Betty Boop is better today

[enchilila]

Originally Posted by Woogie Man

Problems like this can have so many causes. I recently went through the same thing with 4 of my dogs....bright red bloody poop and, in one case, bloody vomit. It seem to happen to one dog one day and then another a couple of days later.

In my case, the cause was so simple that I'm embarrassed to say. But if it helps anyone, here goes.

My wife had begun helping me with feeding the dogs. In the evening, we feed them dry with a little canned and warm water mixed in. She had been stacking the dishes as she carried them. What was happening was that the bottom of one dish was touching the food in the one below it. My habit was to wash out the dishes daily, but not the undersides particularly. So, even though the dish was clean, there was obviously bacteria from the food that had stuck to the bottom of the dish from earlier. So, with the next feeding that bacteria was introduced into the food by stacking the dishes. The result was bloody poop.

Once it dawned on me what was happening, I cleaned all the dishes thoroughly and had my wife quit stacking the dishes. I haven't had a problem since.

I'm glad you figured out what the problem was. I would never have thought about that being a cause. I've been racking my brain trying to figure this out. She will get into anything if there is anything to get into. I watch her like a hawk. But, when we go outside, she likes to chew on things. Thanks for sharing. I'm going to start giving her a clean dish EACH time I feed her, because I don't normally. Who knows, this might be the culprit. Thank you.

Originally Posted by ladyjane

Oh boy, what a scare! Sounds like she is going to be fine, though!

Many years ago I had something similar happen. My Maxwell, who has since passed, woke me up in the middle of the night and he was passing straight blood! I rushed him to the vet and they did labs and xrays and found nothing wrong. He spent the rest of the night there. The next day he was sent home after the bleeding had stopped. The vet speculated that possibly he had eaten a blade of grass and I told him that was impossible since I would have seen it as he was always walked by me. I was so puzzled because it had stopped as suddenly it seemed as it had started. Well, a couple of days later it hit me what had happened when I saw Maxwell under the bird cage. He had a habit of eating sunflower seeds that my bird dropped out of the cage...so I was quite sure that was what had caused this bleeding. It does not take but a tiny little tear in the intestines for this amount of blood...it looks a LOT worse than what it is.

Sounds like perhaps something similar happened with your little Betty Boop. The fact that her labs were ok is a good sign. I will keep her, and you, in my thoughts and prayers.

I sure hope whatever it is clears up today and she begins to feel better. I know we went to bed about 4 hours later than normal. Maybe this has just thrown off her clock a little. Usually, when I get up (no matter when) she will get up with me OR move closer to me to sleep. She is just lying in her Yorkie Haven Love bed and just looks up at me (I have it on top of my bed).

Actually, from what I could tell last night when she pooped outside, it was ALL just bright red blood with no poop. Blood was covering her backside! Why do things like this happen on weekends?????

I'm just going to hold her close to me today if she'll let me and watch her. She will definitely be making a trip to her own vet tomorrow morning. Rest assured, though, if she doesn't seem better today, I'm calling the ER vet.

I'm glad you figured out what was causing your little one's problem. I just can't come up with anything on this end......yet.

[enchilila]

What part of the bloodwork was the ER vet looking at to see if she had pancreatitis? I know I've read what numbers to look at on the blood panel, but don't remember.

Betty Boop is being lethargic this morning, and not moving around much...keeping her body curled up. I feel so sorry for her.

[enchilila]

Boop has developed the chills. Doesn't this mean pain? She just drank a ton of water, but doesn't want anything to do with going outside. She vomited up her supper from last night (she ate before having her bloody poop) sometime during the middle of the night. I thought I was keeping a closer watch on her.

Does anyone think it could be the Blue Buffalo? She is at the bottom of a bag, and it has taken some time to do that. Her kind wasn't on the recall list.

[ladyjane]

It is so true it always happens on weekends!

The point of Maxwell's story was that sometimes it really looks worse than it is. Since they did labs on Betty Boop, and I am assuming a complete blood count, I am thinking that is the case with her. At least I really hope so!

[ladyjane]

Originally Posted by enchilila

What part of the bloodwork was the ER vet looking at to see if she had pancreatitis? I know I've read what numbers to look at on the blood panel, but don't remember.

Betty Boop is being lethargic this morning, and not moving around much...keeping her body curled up. I feel so sorry for her.

They would be looking at the lipase and amylase to look for possible pancreatitis.

The other important numbers are the hemoglobin and hematocrit. Those numbers are altered when there is blood loss.

[AllDogBoots]

Just seeing this and am glad she is home and the tests came back ok. Keeping you both in my prayers. Hopefully she'll start feeling better shortly.

[Perrella]

Oh Lila, just saw this....and praying for Betty Boop to start doing better. I'm so sorry this all is happening to you and your sweet baby....bless her little heart.

I feed BB and is th Salmon, but I checked the bag and it wasn't the recall dates. Mine is also the end of the bag. I ran up to the specialty store and bought a bag of TOTW and started mixing with the little bit I had left. It's also a fish flavor so I'm hoping Zhoie can tolerate it and will like it.

I hated to change her, she was doing so well on BB, but I couldn't get a past the fact and was worried about the next bag I need to buy, so I'm transitioning now.

Hug & kisses to you and Betty Boop! XXOOXXOO

[margaritaville]

Last year, Bubba, had the bloody poops and spent three days in the hospital. He poops outside in the yard so it had gotten to the point that it squirted out in the house before I got to see it. He spent three days in the animal hospital on IV's and received a transfusion. I felt so bad for him they shaved his neck and had an IV in it. We have no idea what caused it. Our vet went thru the usual questions- poison, something he ate, obstruction etc. They finally diagnosed him with HGE (hemmoragic gastroenteritis). He is fine now but I watch him closely. I hope Betty Boop is feeling better. If she has the chills, I would be worried she has a fever and is becoming dehydrated. You may need to get her back to the vet.

[lisaly]

I am so sorry that your sweet little girl is sick. Her belly probably needs to settle down a bit. Sometimes it just takes a little time, and then she probably will be feeling fine. Kiwi sometimes had problems with colitis, and once her stomach would settle down, then she'd begin to eat again. Ashley sometimes had problems like this too, but not as often as Kiwi did. You had the blood work done at the vet. I'd check the color of her gums and to see if they are sticky . You can also check for dehydration by seeing if her skin bounces back when you pull on it. As long as she isn't continuing to vomit or to have diarrhea, she should be fine based upon what the er vet said. Have you taken her temperature? How does her body feel? Is it cold or hot? That could be a reason why she is shaking (low body temperature or fever), or she can be scared because she isn't feeling well. I know how worried you are, and I totally understand. I will be praying for Betty Boop. I hope your little doll gets better very quickly.

[Lolasmom1211]

I have just gone through this same sort of thing with my baby boy...He woke up Wednesday morning 4:00 am with loose stools. I stayed up with him trying to decide if I wanted to take him to the vet or "wait it out" to see if he got better. At 8:55 am, he threw up and I decided to call the vet when they opened at 9:00 am. They said to bring him in at 10:00, so at 9:45 we left the house. He threw up 4-5 times in the car and at 9:55 am he started to go to the bathroom in the car - VERY unusual for him. I called my husband on the cell phone and told him that he would need to come help me because I was having a hard time driving with all of this going on. As soon as I put the phone down, I realized that it was all mucusy blood that was coming out and it was everywhere! Thank goodness I was 2 minutes from the vet at that point because I was in a panic. They immediately took him back when they saw him and drew blood. They suspected HGE. They gave him an injection of cerenia for the nausea and antibiotics. His bloodwork came back normal so they sent us home and told me to watch him carefully. ABout 1 hr later he was becoming a little more lethargic and less responsive. I called the vet back and took him back in. They started IV's and redid his blood work. It had changed in the hour that I had him home. They left him on the IV until closing at 6:00 pm and I brought him home, kept him quiet and took him back Thursday morning and they ran the IV's all day Thursday. He was finally back to normal yesterday....we have had these minor cases of bloody stools before that we treated with antibiotics, but this time he started to go down really fast. We still don't know the cause or how to prevent it in the future. I'm certainly not suggesting that this is what your sweet baby has, but if she continues to worsen, please be careful and DO NOT let her dehydrate. We are very grateful that our boy is ok and we are sending big yorkie hugs your way!

[Woogie Man]

Originally Posted by enchilila

Boop has developed the chills. Doesn't this mean pain? She just drank a ton of water, but doesn't want anything to do with going outside. She vomited up her supper from last night (she ate before having her bloody poop) sometime during the middle of the night. I thought I was keeping a closer watch on her.

Does anyone think it could be the Blue Buffalo? She is at the bottom of a bag, and it has taken some time to do that. Her kind wasn't on the recall list.

I would guess it's not the food...since you say it has taken a while for her to get to the bottom of the bag, unless the food got damp somehow and bacteria grew on it.

I rested my babies stomachs and gave them kaopectate while they were going through this and with all of them it passed within a day to a day and a half. Not recommending this for you, but it worked for mine with what they had.

Hope B.B. is on the mend soon.

[yorkieusa]

I hope she will be well soon.