Urinalysis...
 

Daisy is going in for a urinalysis tomorrow but the vet tech didn't tell me how long I should keep her from urinating before bringing her in. She has a bladder infection so shes been going every half an hour and Im a little worried she wont have enough urine in there. Also does anyone know if this is painful??

I'm sorry your little girl is sick, was she recently spayed? Sometimes they get a UTI after they are spayed. I don't know how you would keep her from peeing and I don't think you should try, I've had plenty of bladder infections, and they are painful and its especially painful to try and hold it. Sometimes they just give a generic antibiotic that wipes out most bladder infections, but your vet wants to take a sample to see exactly what type of bacteria is causing the infection, so that he can give an antibiotic that will for sure kill the bacteria. I don't think she needs much urine in the bladder for him to get a sample, he could always give her water and wait a few minutes. Hope your little girl recovers fast.

Thanks! She's been on clavamox since June which caused a lot of struvite stones to come out but I haven't seen a stone in a month a half and she still is frequent urinating, blood in urine, and her urine smells. I also have her on a cranberry supplement. We want to see if the antibiotic is not working and if there are any crystals in her urine. Just a little worried because she only weighs three pounds so the amount of urine she has with a full bladder is probably a small amount so with her going every half hour it's probably a super small amount. It's a half an hour car trip there. I'm just not sure if having her drink a lot before we leave will help her bladder be full by the time we get there.

Someone here once said that while the cranberry supplement is good for humans, it can cause stones in dogs for some reason. Not sure if this is true, but you might want to ask your vet about it. Poor little thing, sending prayers your way.

Cystos are not anymore difficult on them than a blood draw.
I'd pick her up about 1/2 hour before leaving and kennel or hold her til you get there.

She was peeing stones? Were they analyzed?
Did the vet change her diet?
She was xrayed, right?
She needs to be ultrasounded.

Assuming vet already sent urine for culture before?

The stones were analyzed and came back as struvite stones. They started her on clavamox in June and a bunch of stones started coming out so they didnt X-ray her since they knew she had stones. Her final stone came out August fourth. I think I read too much cranberry can cause oxalate (sp?) stones but can help acidify the urine to get rid of stuvite. I've seen no stones since but still frequent and sometimes bloody smelly urine. So now we are going in to make sure she is on the right antibiotic and make sure there are no more crystals. She can't change foods do to allergies and food intolerances. I have her on canine caviar venison and split pea and I've been adding equal parts distilled water. I've also had her on a probiotic.

Oh, that's interesting, I wasn't sure of the details, I recommended it once and was informed it was bad for them, but I didn't do any research.

Because there is still blood they need to xray and it would be best to ultrasound. This has been going on way too long for vet to not get more aggressive. She is probably in a fair amount of discomfort. Any remaining stones may be too big to pee out.

The urine needs to be cultured.

Cranberry juice will not be much of a benefit in a case like this.

I feel so sorry for you and her.:(

Ill talk with the vet tomorrow and see what he says about X-rays. I think they have to do an ultrasound to perform the urinalysis?? I don't know how else they would find the bladder but I know nothing about how they perform it so I could be wrong. At first she was only having blood in the urine and frequent peeing after a stone would come out but the last month no stones have come out out and the frequent peeing seems to be getting worse. She's puppy pad trained so luckily I've found all the stones on there or on our hardwood floors. The last stone passed was by far the biggest so I was hoping it was the last. She's three years old and this is the first uti. She was spayed when she was 7 months. Does anyone know how fast the results from the urinalysis come back?

Cystocentesis can be ultrasound guided or done by palation. U/S guided is always nice.

In-house urinalysis - 30 minutes
Outside lab - less than 24 hours
Culture - about 5 days

A urinalysis, is simply analyzing the urine, sometimes they do a culture on it to see what bacteria is present and that might take over 24 hours. Did he mention an ultrasound? That would be something entirely different, but maybe it's to look for stones, I not sure though.

I'm almost positive they are doing a culture since we are thinking clavamox is not working. They said the fee is 90 dollars so I'm hoping that would include ultrasound. Ill ask tomorrow. I asked if they would have to sedate her and they said no but she's so tiny and wiggly I don't know how else they could do it. Does anyone know if they are usually sedated. She gets stress colitis very easily so I'm guessing she's going to have a flare up... = (

Cultures are around $90. If they have ultrasound on site they will use it (which is good because it is a quick look for stones). If they don't have the machine that is okay. If culturing, $90 would not include the price of a full ultrasound. If they are just taking a quick look to get urie it will probably be free.

No, they are never sedated for cystos.
I've wathed many and my girl as had probably ten or more.
I promise it is no big thing,

We do cystos all the time. My Teddy has had repeat issues w/ struvite crystals and at one point had a very small stone. Because of that, we check him from time to time to make sure that no other crystals are becoming a problem. Struvite stones are almost always caused by an infection but in some cases like my Teddy, there is no infection. It does not surprise me that clavamox isn't working because it wont cover all strains of e. coli that could cause a bladder infection. My dog Daisy had an infection that was like this -- clavamox had to be changed and she had an infection up in the kidney that required six weeks of another antibiotic to clear it. Please keep us posted. By the way, we usually get preliminary culture results at 24 hours and a final reading at 48 hours.

48 hours??
Speedy lab!

Thanks so much! Ill keep everyone posted. This one has been through so much in her young age and wish she would feel better. She's had five bloody diarrhea episodes with vomiting. Her last one was two weeks ago. She's had a million tests done and even exploratory surgery and everything has come back negative. I've kept a journal on her for almost two years now and the only thing I can think of is maybe stress is causing it. I'm tempted to test for addisons and whatever all these dogs are dying of. I live in the area where a bunch of dogs are dying from bloody diarrhea. Right now I have her long term on cerenia and tylan plus the bladder infection medicine. Hopefully I can figure out this bladder infection so I can focus on her flare ups.

I hope your kiddo feels better soon. I agree with all the advice given by EllieMay - she definitely knows what she's talking about, so I wouldn't hesitate to follow her advice. :)

urinalysis came back they didn't see any bacteria under the microscope and they did see a few crystals but no calcium crystals. We are waiting for the culture to come back. They said it should be back by Saturday. If there isn't any bacteria in the culture we will go ahead with the xray. They recommended that I order some uro-eze to help with the crystals and to continue the cranberry supplement and clavamox. Im very anxious to hear the results of the culture. I hope shes been on the right antibiotics and we are just dealing with crystals at this point...

Thanks for the update, it sounds like a good plan, hope she's on the road to recovery!

It could just be an infection. However, with blood and a history of stones it is very important to do imaging. An xray should have been done when they felt the stones were gone to make sure.

Even if a culture turns up positive for bacteria, stones still need to be ruled out.

The culture came back no bacteria grew so far. She passed her biggest stone yet yesterday. I'm hoping that is the last of them since he said there wasn't very many struvite crystals in the sample he took. I'm thinking since bigger chunks are coming out that there was one big that's been dissolving. Does anyone know if this could be caused from a food allergy. She's allergic to chicken and grains so I have her on venison and split pea. If like to keep her on a food with no potatos and something low fiber and fat. The low fat is the hard part when looking at grain free foods. She's been having a lot of flare ups in the last couple months so I'm wondering if maybe the foods not helping.

I really don't know much about this, but I was wondering if the new foods could be helping to break down the stones so that she's passing them? Does she drink much water?

Glad that stone passed, it was the cause for bleeding...was an xray done to see if there's any more stones? That's the protocol @ our new vet's, x-ray 1st, then ultrasound if needed. It's a good idea to get an xray done bc it gives an idea of how many stones she has & if they're small enough to pass on their own. Struvites are disolvable, so it might not be of great concern.

As for food, my guys are eating Canine Caviar Duck & Chickpeas (Open Sky). The food gives off a urine pH of 7. They can't have any potatoes (yeast) or grains (allergic) either, it's hard finding a food w/out those ingredients! Struvites form when the pH is too high, @ 8 or higher, could be in conjunction w/or w/out an infection. Stones develop when there's an infection.
My 2 didn't have an infection, but their pH was 8 & they both had struvites. My other guy didn't have any struvites, but his urine pH was also high @ 8. I purchased pH strips from Solid Gold, tested the water I give them & it was high @ 7.5, so I'm giving them only bottled water which is 7. You can also use the strips to test their urine pH, best to do it in the morning.
Also read that high protein foods makes the urine more acidic, so I give them premade raw for 1 meal. Princess had a vet visit for her colitis recently & her urine pH came back as 6, where it should be & no struvites. I moisten the kibble w/warm water for her other meal & she drinks a lot of water b4 we go out for their walks.
You might want to try premade raw for her if you feel comfortable enough, it has done wonders for my guys. Has she had a bile acids test? (BATs)

Daisy sounds a lot like your princess! I bought the strips but haven't used them lately. Last time I used them her ph was really high. It was an 8 I think. I feed her canine caviar venison and split pea. It was the only grain and potato free food that I could find that was somewhat low in fat and fiber. I've been giving her equal parts distilled water with her food and crunch it up for her so its like canned food. Hoping it makes it easier for her to digest. They think she has stress colitis along with food allergies. She had bile acid tests done when her flare ups first started but its been a while. I would like to do a tli test next and check her vitamin b levels. I would also like to test for Addison's disease. The initial tests she had done had something that tested high that could indicate addisons but since she was stressed the vet didnt think so. Right now I'm trying to keep the vomiting and diarrhea under control. I think the vet visit on Wednesday and the huge stone yesterday may have messed up her belly really bad. At first when she started passing stones they were all very small and long. The last three have been pretty thick but not as long. They are by far bigger then what she was passing in June. When I started her on clavamox in June I was seeing them come out once if not more a week. The last couple have taken a couple weeks to pass. I'm hoping this means that it was one big and it's dissolving the bigger chunks now. We haven't done X-rays since they have been coming out. But I guess that would be the next step. I'm hoping since there's no infection that I can take her off clavamox and just give her the cranberry supplement. I've been looking into vitamin c for her but I can't find one for dogs that have nothing extra in it. I like solid gold berry balance but it had beef something in it I think.

Yeah, they have a lot of not so good similarities loll! I just feel so bad for you bc Princess is 5 #'s & Daisy is so much smaller...you must get so worried for her. I hope you'll find answers soon & all her stones are gone. If her BATs are w/in normal range, I really think you should consider trying premade raw for Daisy. It's so much easier on their digestive system. I wasn't sure about the high percentage of fat (bc of colitis), but they burn it off & Princess does so well on it, small firm poopies. She does best w/Primal & OC Raw Dog Rabbit, she loves it.

Dogs can have struvite crystals with pH lower than 8. My dog Teddy currently has them AGAIN and his pH is 6.5 and no other abnormalities.

Really? So sorry to hear that Teddy has them again, how often do you check? Princess' last urinalysis was 4 months ago, but since we were @ the vet, did it anyway. I did read that some dogs & cats just have them, that it's normal to see some struvites in the urine, as long as there's no bacteria.

I'm so sorry that he has them again. That has to be horrible to watch him continue to have issues even with his ph level around 6. I feel so horrible for my little one. It's too the point where I don't even leave her home alone any more. I always try to find a sitter. If I leave her longer then 3 hours she gets extremely sick and it takes her a few days to recover. It's been really hard. We just got married and we are in our early thirties. I've pretty much have been stuck at home with her for the last year trying to keep her healthy. We were really active before we got her and I grew up with dogs that never had any issues. I had no idea dogs could have stomach problems the way she does. I'm just so confused because the tylan and cerenia that she's on long term doesn't prevent anything. It just helps make the flare up not as bad as it would be if she wasn't on them. I often wonder what others do when they have a dog with stomach issues like ours does. It's to the point where I want to cry every time her stomach gurgles and this bladder infection on top of everything else has just made me sick to my stomach. = (

107barnry and I do have dogs with those kinds of stomach issues - so severe that a lot of food can cause life threatening illness. Tylan did nothing here. It was about finding the exact right food.

I have another dig with a bladder abnormalty (thought to be a birth defect). An rx diet prevents crysas for him, thankfully.

I don't know why your vet is not doing imaging. Somebody needs to make sure there isn't a stone in there that dan't oass. And she couod have different types. She will never feel good until the get gets to the bottom of this. Have they referred you to an internist?

107barney's dog teddy has had more ultrasounds and cultures than 107barney can count. These crystals are incidental lab findings for teddy and he has zero symptoms. We are keeping an eye on his bladder every couple of months, I'm talking to my vet Thursday and coming up with a long term plan.

Daisy211's dog needs an ultrasound, along with a new vet.