I'm posting this to see if anyone has any ideas. I've been to the vet 4 times in the past week with my 2 year old Pointer, Satchmo. He has always been healthy and is up to date on all his vaccinations. We boarded him in last August and shortly after he came home it looked like he had a case of Kennel Cough. The vet thought so too, gave me some cough medicine, told me to look for signs of secondary infections and to give him Clavamox if it looks like a secondary infection is developing. He looked better so I didn't give him the anitbiotic.
Last Sunday, he started coughing again and looking lethargic. By Monday night, he was in really bad shape and I took him to the vet on Tuesday morning. He had a 105 degree fever, but his chest x-ray didn't indicate pneumonia. The vet ran some blood tests (checking for Lymes, heartworms, etc.). All tests came back normal except an elevated white blood cell count. He gave me some high-powered antibiotics and gave him a shot to bring his temp down. His temp finally came down Wednesday night, but he stopped eating completely. We took him in on Friday b/c he was weak and wouldn't eat -- more x-rays, more blood tests -- nothing. The vet decided to send in a sample to test for Canine Influenza (we're on Long Island and there have been no reports of outbreaks, though). Vet gave him IV fluids -- Satchmo looked bettter, but was running a 103 degree fever on Saturday morning, we gave him more fluids and IV antibiotics (the vet switched his antibiotics, he's now on Dioxicyline and Antirobe). OK, Sunday fever up to 104 degrees -- back to vet. Vet takes a blood sample to test for Addison's disease (we should have results today), gives him a shot to bring down fever. Sunday night, Satchmo's finally looking a little better -- he ate 2 1/2 cans of food and drank a bowel of water -- temp down to 102.5. Monday morning, temp down to 100.6 -- but Monday night temp back up to 103.3 -- I got him to eat 2 cans of food. This morning temp back down to 100.7 -- he's refusing the canned dog food, but will take string cheese and chicken breast.
That's the basic run down. He's also still coughing despite all this treatment. This has been terrible for all of us and I'm wondering if anyone has any thoughts on what could be going on here. He's young and has always been healthy, so we don't understand how he could be so sick.