My puppy is going to be 5 months old on 10/05/09. On Monday we noticed she was moving slower and not eating much. Today she didn't get up like normal to go outside to potty, we had to intise her to move to go outside, she wouldn't eat, she wouldn't drink, she was extremly lethargic. So we took her to the vet. The vet kept her for an hour to do some blood work b/c he said her gums were pale. An hour later the vet called and said she was very anemic and her red blood count was very low at 14, and he recommended that we take Kira to the Hospital for a blood transfussion. We immediately took Kira to the Hospital. There they did an x-ray to make sure nothing was inside her and re-did blood tests. The x-rays came back clean. The blood tests reconfirmed everything our vet told us. The Hospital said she did not need a tranfusion at the moment, but recommended they keep her so in case she needs one they can administer the transfussion asap. They started her on aggressive treatment in the ICU with predistone and 2 other drugs to help with the side effects, like clotting. The Hospital told us Kira would probably have to stay there for at least 5 days if not more until her red blood cell count gets higher. We were told she has a 50/50 chance. Does anyone know if it is better that she is young? Also the dr just called to tell us that her blood appears to be regenerating still, which means she is still making more red blood cells.
Once she makes it past this stage, Advice from the vet was to possibly remove the spleen and space out her immuizations one at a time.
We have been told this disease is very rare in puppies. Has anyone had a puppy with this disease that could share with us?
Any advice or recommendations are much appreciated.
Thank you!