1. Wilson, 4 years old, male
2. intact, not neutered
3. Pembroke Welsh Corgi
4. 27.1 lbs
5. He is acting normal, full of energy and interested in what we're doing, excited for a car ride etc. Slight occasional loss of appetite it seems, may just be that he isn't fond of sharing the sensitive stomach dog food that our other dog has been eating. Generally seems normal and happy.
6. Part of what I need help with is figuring out his new diet. As of now we have always fed dry dog food, we have switched brands over time based off of vet recommendations but for the last couple years we've been feeding them is the 4health wholesome grains beef and rice formula. Within the last month we switched over to a sensitive stomach one as our older Great Dane has been getting very gassy, and in the last week I ran out of the normal food and began feeding our Corgi the sensitive stomach one as well. However, I would like to now switch him to a raw food diet. I have been watching a lot of the webinars about nutrients and how to do raw food diets, but I need a bit of help with this. Do I slowly introduce him to raw food? Do I just begin? I've read he should have lower carbs and higher fats, and screenshot the %s. I've seen a lot of supplements and things to add or rotate etc. but don't feel confident enough to create the diet on my own at this time.
7. We have always gone to a regular vet up until this point. He has had all his regular yearly vaccinations, and he has been on flea/tick and preventative heart worm medication, different ones over time. He has also had the seresto collar years ago, for about a year. I believe he also had the frontline flea and tick spray a few times as well. The last few year they have been on Advantix and interceptor plus. They have had their Rabies, distemper, heartworm, lyme, ana, ehr, leptospirosis vaccines (years ago kennel cough) etc. as recommended by the vet. Wilson did get diagnosed with Lyme disease in the beginning of 2019 and had 2 or 3 rounds of lyme vaccines. At the end of it, they said his levels were normal and that we would just continue to monitor him. He has had all vaccines up until now, he is due for them in October but we obviously will not be getting them. 2 months ago I ran out of the Advantix and Interceptor so they have not have that for 2 months.
I believe in the beginning of last year is when we started noticing him having a hard time pooping. He would yelp and run sometimes when he pooped. Or he would seem constipated and trying to poop constantly and nothing came out. A few times he would pee and poop in the house, which is incredibly unlike him. He would stand there making eye contact while peeing, as though it was unsafe to do it outside. We brought this to our vets attention and did some blood work at the time. Everything was coming back normal and ended up having us put him on miralax indefinitely. They believed he had an issue with his colon but advised it would be pretty expensive and potentially dangerous to biopsy it and may result in being unable to do anything. At the time we decided against further testing and to just monitor him and keep him on miralax. He has seemingly been fine since then. We feed him 2x a day, 1 tsp of miralax powder with each meal, and a bit watered down, in a slow feeder bowl as he would sometimes randomly throw up that I believe was due to him eating too fast at times.
8. Late last week my husband was petting him and happened to notice his lymph nodes were swollen on his neck (both). We called the vet and he had an appointment yesterday 9/12. We went into the vet and they did a physical exam and said that all lymph nodes on the body they could feel, were swollen. They brought him upstairs to do a "Lymph node cytology - standard" blood test I believe, and said we would get the results back probably around 9/18. He said he looked on the microscope (I think?) quickly and said he was almost certain it was Lymphoma but the tests would come back to confirm and if we needed further testing. I am distraught at the thought of losing our 4 year old dog, and am willing to change anything and try everything we need to give him a good quality of life, and extend his life as long as possible. We are just at the beginning of this journey and I am overwhelmed by the amount of information and things to try/do and need some assistance with a care plan and action plan. What testing we should or shouldn't do. Where we should go etc. We are located in Colebrook, CT but happy to travel to Westport to see Dr. Jeff if that is an option.
9. Aside from the swollen lymph nodes, we have noticed no real difference in him. Maybe a slightly harder time breathing when he's really pulling on his leash (we usually walk him off leash on our property, so don't see this very often)
10. The diagnostic work done is the physical exam and blood work mentioned about, the lymph node cytology standard test, waiting on results.
11. No current treatment yet, trying to figure this out now.
12. The other health concerns are his Lyme disease (if he still has it, I'm confused about whether its just dormant or gone) and his issue with going to the bathroom, and potentially his colon? I watched the western medicine webinar, and it sounds like he has a problem with "the damps" which kind of make sense and maybe this "colon" issue is related?
In advance, thank you so much for you insight hard work and knowledge. We are distraught over this and appreciate any and all feedback and help.
-Bri & Todd Michaud
@Dr. Christina @Dr. Jeff @Dr. Sara
2. intact, not neutered
3. Pembroke Welsh Corgi
4. 27.1 lbs
5. He is acting normal, full of energy and interested in what we're doing, excited for a car ride etc. Slight occasional loss of appetite it seems, may just be that he isn't fond of sharing the sensitive stomach dog food that our other dog has been eating. Generally seems normal and happy.
6. Part of what I need help with is figuring out his new diet. As of now we have always fed dry dog food, we have switched brands over time based off of vet recommendations but for the last couple years we've been feeding them is the 4health wholesome grains beef and rice formula. Within the last month we switched over to a sensitive stomach one as our older Great Dane has been getting very gassy, and in the last week I ran out of the normal food and began feeding our Corgi the sensitive stomach one as well. However, I would like to now switch him to a raw food diet. I have been watching a lot of the webinars about nutrients and how to do raw food diets, but I need a bit of help with this. Do I slowly introduce him to raw food? Do I just begin? I've read he should have lower carbs and higher fats, and screenshot the %s. I've seen a lot of supplements and things to add or rotate etc. but don't feel confident enough to create the diet on my own at this time.
7. We have always gone to a regular vet up until this point. He has had all his regular yearly vaccinations, and he has been on flea/tick and preventative heart worm medication, different ones over time. He has also had the seresto collar years ago, for about a year. I believe he also had the frontline flea and tick spray a few times as well. The last few year they have been on Advantix and interceptor plus. They have had their Rabies, distemper, heartworm, lyme, ana, ehr, leptospirosis vaccines (years ago kennel cough) etc. as recommended by the vet. Wilson did get diagnosed with Lyme disease in the beginning of 2019 and had 2 or 3 rounds of lyme vaccines. At the end of it, they said his levels were normal and that we would just continue to monitor him. He has had all vaccines up until now, he is due for them in October but we obviously will not be getting them. 2 months ago I ran out of the Advantix and Interceptor so they have not have that for 2 months.
I believe in the beginning of last year is when we started noticing him having a hard time pooping. He would yelp and run sometimes when he pooped. Or he would seem constipated and trying to poop constantly and nothing came out. A few times he would pee and poop in the house, which is incredibly unlike him. He would stand there making eye contact while peeing, as though it was unsafe to do it outside. We brought this to our vets attention and did some blood work at the time. Everything was coming back normal and ended up having us put him on miralax indefinitely. They believed he had an issue with his colon but advised it would be pretty expensive and potentially dangerous to biopsy it and may result in being unable to do anything. At the time we decided against further testing and to just monitor him and keep him on miralax. He has seemingly been fine since then. We feed him 2x a day, 1 tsp of miralax powder with each meal, and a bit watered down, in a slow feeder bowl as he would sometimes randomly throw up that I believe was due to him eating too fast at times.
8. Late last week my husband was petting him and happened to notice his lymph nodes were swollen on his neck (both). We called the vet and he had an appointment yesterday 9/12. We went into the vet and they did a physical exam and said that all lymph nodes on the body they could feel, were swollen. They brought him upstairs to do a "Lymph node cytology - standard" blood test I believe, and said we would get the results back probably around 9/18. He said he looked on the microscope (I think?) quickly and said he was almost certain it was Lymphoma but the tests would come back to confirm and if we needed further testing. I am distraught at the thought of losing our 4 year old dog, and am willing to change anything and try everything we need to give him a good quality of life, and extend his life as long as possible. We are just at the beginning of this journey and I am overwhelmed by the amount of information and things to try/do and need some assistance with a care plan and action plan. What testing we should or shouldn't do. Where we should go etc. We are located in Colebrook, CT but happy to travel to Westport to see Dr. Jeff if that is an option.
9. Aside from the swollen lymph nodes, we have noticed no real difference in him. Maybe a slightly harder time breathing when he's really pulling on his leash (we usually walk him off leash on our property, so don't see this very often)
10. The diagnostic work done is the physical exam and blood work mentioned about, the lymph node cytology standard test, waiting on results.
11. No current treatment yet, trying to figure this out now.
12. The other health concerns are his Lyme disease (if he still has it, I'm confused about whether its just dormant or gone) and his issue with going to the bathroom, and potentially his colon? I watched the western medicine webinar, and it sounds like he has a problem with "the damps" which kind of make sense and maybe this "colon" issue is related?
In advance, thank you so much for you insight hard work and knowledge. We are distraught over this and appreciate any and all feedback and help.
-Bri & Todd Michaud
@Dr. Christina @Dr. Jeff @Dr. Sara
Not only is the amount of information crazy, but is also often contradictatory.
