Heather200

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Jul 13, 2017
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Franklin
History:

7 month old male
Diarrhea started June 22nd
Started bland diet of chicken and rice. Stools firmed up on this diet.
Tried adding dry food(Orijen)back in, 1/4th cup mixed in with bland diet. Diarrhea started again. Went back to just bland diet. After a couple of days, again tried adding Orijen back in. Diarrhea again came back.
Took him to the vet. Fecal smear revealed clostridium overgrowth.
Started giving metronidazole and bland diet. This time the bland diet didn't produce firm stool, very wet and mushy. After 2 days, tried adding Orijen back in. Diarrhea came back. At that point I decided maybe the food is too rich for him right now. So I switched him to a new food with a single protein source, turkey. Went okay the first day; couple of poops. Very soft but had some form. Day 2 of adding 1/4th cup new food to each meal yealded two very wet poops and a third of pudding like consistency. Back to the bland diet.
So my question...he has been on metro for 6 days now and still having issues. Shouldn't we be seeing marked improvement by now? Should I try another protein source in his food?
 

Dollys Owner

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You need to treat the clostridia with metronidazole for 7-28 days, so you should definitely continue treatment for at least 14 days. You should start seeing some improvement after a few days, but it takes a while for a full cure. You should feed approximately 1 tablespoon of plain canned pumpkin ( not the one meant for cakes ) daily to dog. If dog is still symptomatic after a couple of weeks on metronidazole you may want to try giving tylosin instead for 3-12 months. Testing positive for clostridia is not the problem, since 80% of dogs test positive, it's just the symptoms that are an issue. After a few more days of bland diet (boiled chicken and rice) try giving something you know the dog won't be allergic to to see if that helps, eg. Zignature kangaroo. Switch to that over a 7-10 day period. Also start dog on a good probiotic such as Proviable DC or Herbsmith Microflora Plus ( give the probiotics at least 2 hours apart from the antibiotic ) .
 
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Heather200

Heather200

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We've been doing the canned pumpkin as well as the probiotic. However, I will try a different probiotic to see if that gets better results. Have you ever tried Pro-Pectalin?

Thanks
 

Dollys Owner

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I haven't but I remember one person on the group posting that they had tried it for their dog with diarrhea and found it helped. That one is good for dogs with giardia, since it has probiotic and the pectin fibre. You may not need pumpkin if you are using Pro-Pectalin

We've been doing the canned pumpkin as well as the probiotic. However, I will try a different probiotic to see if that gets better results. Have you ever tried Pro-Pectalin?

Thanks
 

Lalaloopsie

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Unfortunately, clostridium overgrowth is not so easy to treat. As Clostridia are present in every healthy dogs intestine, overgrowth means that there are some predisposing conditions for this. That means that your dog may need long term therapy to overpower them. Metronidazole is great medicine, but may be it is not enough in your case. Sometimes it is called Tylosin-responsive chronic canine diarrhoea. May be you should ask your vet about Tylosin administration. It is antibacterial medicine.
Btw, did they make a test for amount of clostridial toxin? This is also important data to confirm clostridium as a cause of diarrhoea.
Dont bother too much with food now, just do bland diet, rice with chicken or beef, doesn't matter. What is important, you must slowly introduce fibre and increase amount (not abruptly, as it can worsen diarrhoea). Big amount of fiber helps to create uncomfortable for Clostridium conditions. That means, you slowly add pumpkin, may be cooked green beans, even oat bran.
But at the moment seems like diarrhoea with 99% probability is caused by Clostridium overgrowth. Food allergy you can dismiss at the moment. Until your overpower Clostridiu, diarrhoea will persist. So, keep with bland diet, add pumpkin, and give medicine that your vet recommends. Also, great thing this Pro-pectalin as Dollys Owner says. Probiotics (beneficial bacteria) will also help. It takes months sometimes to get it right.
Also, some dogs will need life long therapy- once in 3 days dose of Tylosin.
 

Lalaloopsie

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Btw, ask vet which Clostridium overgrowth he has, if it's C. difficile type, be careful with hygiene, it causes extremely unpleasant and dangerous diarrhoea in humans.
 
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Heather200

Heather200

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I honestly don't think it's an allergy to chicken and/or turkey as his original food had both of those proteins and he was doing great. I think this is caused by the excessive clostridium. He does better when on the bland diet which includes boiled chicken.

He's got an appointment today; I was going to ask about tylan as well as pectalin.

With it being 24 days he's lost a bunch of weight.

His hydration is good.
 

Cbrugs

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I personally wouldn't give a bland diet for an extended period of time as there really are no nutrients included.
 

Dollys Owner

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If the metronidazole hasn't worked after 14 days, I would suggest trying tylosin for 10 more days. This whole time you should be giving probiotics. If it still hasn't resolved after the tylosin treatment there are better treatments- oral vancomycin 5-10mg/kg every 12 hours for 10 days or a fecal transplant. A fecal transplant is really messy- basically get some stool from a healthy dog, blend it up in a blender and give it via rectal enema, or put the stool into capsules and have dog swallow the capsules.
 
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Heather200

Heather200

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Jul 13, 2017
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Franklin
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Switched to Tylan, giving a different probiotic and trying a prescription food.
Hopefully this helps.
Thanks for all of the advice!
 

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