German shepherd epi

ARGINITE

Looking for a good vet in the Galway or Mayo area that I could bring a German shepherd with suspected EPI to.

Local vet has proven to be rubbish.

Living in the Headford/Shurle area but willing to travel within the Galway/Mayo area for a good vet that can help.

Can anyone make a recommendation?

Ikinos

Hi Arginite,

I can't recommend a vet anywhere near you as I don't live in that part of the country. However I fully understand your concern regarding your suspicions of your shepherd having EPI.

Exocrine pancreatic insufficiency (EPI) as you may know, is the inability to properly digest food due to a lack of digestive enzymes made by the pancreas. I lost my shepherd only two weeks ago, having found him dead in his kennel on Friday the 14th August last. He was diagnosed as having EPI.

However, I don't attribute his death to his EPI condition nor does my vet. My dog was only 6 and a half years old when he died, and had lived a full active and happy life, albeit too short. I had him from when he was 9 weeks of age and he was diagnosed with EPI at about two year old. I had him to four different vet practices in my area, before he was brought to UCD veterinary hospitable where they ran all sorts of test on him before diagnosis.

They prescribed a tablet supplement for him to help get the nutrients from his diet, and although a very fussy eater he seemed to maintain his weight in and around 38kg. He had a fabulous temperament and as mentioned lived a very active and happy life and is sadly missed by all. I was disappointed when advised not to breed him given the risk of spreading this hereditary gene disease, but that is the only disappointment I ever had from my dog and one which was not of his choosing.

Given time, I will resume the process of looking for a good litter to choose from. The only advice I can offer you is not to give up on him/her, but rather put some extra effort into seeking out a good vet to help you and your dog, best wishes.

scarepanda

Hey! Sorry for hijacking the thread, just wondering at what age did your dogs start suffering from EPI? What age were they when they were diagnosed? What were the main symptoms that you noticed?

Stheno

scarepanda wrote: »

Hey! Sorry for hijacking the thread, just wondering at what age did your dogs start suffering from EPI? What age were they when they were diagnosed? What were the main symptoms that you noticed?

I'd two dogs with it, one a shepherd, and one a wolfhound bizarrely enough.

Both showed symptoms about the age of two.

Losing weight, and severe diarrhoeaa couple with a ferocious appetite were the main symptoms in both.

I found an alternative to the vet prescribed medication (tryplase I think it was called) in Holland and Barrett for humans with the same condition, and my vet reviewed it and gave it the ok, it saved me a fortune.

I also found that feeding a raw diet helped hugely.

DBB

As my vet says, if your dog has a pancreas, he stands a chance of developing EPI! That said, it is certainly a known problem in GSDs. I remember Stheno describing the diarrhoea before many moons ago.. isn't is a very distinctive yellow/green colour Stheno? And seriously projectile too?
I'm loving Stheno's idea of getting the human enzymes at a lower price! She also mentions the raw diet... My vet recommends sourcing whole pancreas from meat factories if you can at all, so that the dog gets his/her pancreatic enzymes via the diet. It doesn't matter that they're from a different species, they all do the same job, and I rather like the thoughts of getting the enzymes into the dog via a relatively natural route.

tk123

Mark at Slanetpetfoods.ie might be able to source pancreas for you - he had some last year that he'd ordered for somebody.

Stheno

DBB wrote: »

As my vet says, if your dog has a pancreas, he stands a chance of developing EPI! That said, it is certainly a known problem in GSDs. I remember Stheno describing the diarrhoea before many moons ago.. isn't is a very distinctive yellow/green colour Stheno? And seriously projectile too?
I'm loving Stheno's idea of getting the human enzymes at a lower price! She also mentions the raw diet... My vet recommends sourcing whole pancreas from meat factories if you can at all, so that the dog gets his/her pancreatic enzymes via the diet. It doesn't matter that they're from a different species, they all do the same job, and I rather like the thoughts of getting the enzymes into the dog via a relatively natural route.

Yeah DBB it was seriously projectile, and tended to be a nasty shade of yellowy green, it was also extremely watery,and it absolutely stank, I literally threw up one time having to deal with an accident.

I used get whole raw green tripe as part of the raw diet for my dogs, not the same as pancreas, but it could be got, butchers/abbatoirs have clamped down these days, I was also lucky that I had a turkey farmer near me, so used buy 20kg of wings from him a week!

If you do source pancreas and it's pig pancreas, you need to be careful if feeding it raw to treat it as all pork and freeze it first to remove the threat of trichnosis (think that's what it's called)

If anyone wants the link to the holland and barrett stuff let me know.

Very funny story now that the trauma has passed, my wolfhound was always a dog with a scuttery tummy.

At the time, I had one of those range type cookers, with eight rings and two ovens and all that jazz.

One night I came home, put a casserole in the bottom oven and left the kitchen.

About 15 minutes later, there was a resounding crash throughout the house.

The poor dog in his hunger, ripped the door of the oven off it's hinges, took out the casserole and was eating away. The cooker was destroyed.