Cassiopaean Sandbox > Our 2D Friends
Surgery for 10 and a Half Year Old Pug
April:
My ten and a half year old female Pug, Ruby, has had a problem with her anal sacs since 2004. At that time, unbeknownst to me, they were impacted and infected. She was scooting her butt on the carpet and seemed to be grumpy so I took her in thinking she had worms.
The vet where I lived at the time said that she had too much fat around her bumhole :shock: so she was unable to express them herself when pooping. At the time, I chose to not do the surgery because I know I would not want to have surgery on my bum so did not want to put her through it.
During the allergy, season I have to take her to the vet once a month to have her anal glands expressed. During the winter months I can stretch it out to every two to three months. Since I have taken her in regularly to get them expressed for years she has not had anymore infections or full impactions...that is until now.
I took her in last week and the vet tech and the veterinarian were unable to express her left anal sac. Her left anal sac is always more full and harder to express than her right sac but usually they are able to express it by popping the crust on the gland by pressing down and massaging it. Last time it was pretty crusty and it blew out and all over the ceiling, the wall and on the vet's face and in her hair :scared: We were all pretty impressed!
The vet prescribed 5 mg of prednisone (yes I know, evil) for a week to reduce the inflammation in order to attempt to express them today.
The vet techs (both very experienced and excellent techs) were unsuccessfull in expressing the left sac today. The vet techs advised that the left gland had a lot of scar tissue so more than likely surgery to remove the sac will be necessary since the gland is fully impacted. So I am supposed to come back when the vet is back next week on Tuesday. At that time, the vet will attempt to express it then if not then surgically remove it.
Has anyone had an experience with this surgery with their dog?
I am nervous about the small chance that permanent fecal incontinence will occur. My vet is very experienced and has a good track record with this surgery but of course being the worry wort that I am, I am still nervous.
Also, the vet tech mentioned that since the sac was huge and impacted that it would be easy to remove since it pops out without having to search for it, therefore minimizing the risk of snipping the nerve(s) that control the sphincter.
ytain:
What is your dog's diet?
From my past research on appropiate diet for dogs and cats, the correct diet for dogs and cats are raw meat, organs and raw bones. Dogs can tolerate some steamed veggies, but cats no, since felines require higher protein intake than the dogs.
However, vaccination enters into the picture so your dog might have inherited vaccinosis from their parents etc., and the current vaccination shots your dog might have had (rabies shot etc., required by law in many areas) which could have compromised further the immune health generationally if you can consider the Pottenger's experiment with cat colonies.
Ytain
April:
Ruby eats organic grain-free wet dog food with a little bit of organic grain-free dry dog food. Both the wet and the dry food have organic human-grade chicken meat fit for human consumption as the first ingredient. No soy, wheat, fillers, etc.
I also make her plain browned hamburger and cooked chicken, without any grease or spices since she has a tendency for pancreatitis. I really wanted to put her on the raw diet. I tried switching her to the raw diet slowly by mixing it in with her regular food over a period of time. She kept on puking it up and seemed weirded out by the raw meat. I gave her a raw beef soup bone and she licked it once and was freaked out by the blood oozing out of the marrow in the middle and would not eat it.
That along with the fact that I only have a half-refridgerator made me go with the canned organic food, just a bit o' organic kibble for crunch and supplementing with cooked hamburger and chicken. I do feed her canned sardines in water about twice a month.
She is in really good shape physically due to being obsessed with fetching the tennis ball and daily walks.
Her skin allergies (and subsequent overproduction of anal gland juice and gummy ear goo) are due to a bad vaccine reaction she had when she was two or three years old. In the car on the ride home after the vaccination, her face was hugely swollen (looked like a Sharpei!), had hives all over her body and had trouble breathing.
She had been properly vaccinated in a series as a puppy and had one or two yearly boosters then had a severe reaction to her yearly booster the next year. Prior to that bad vaccine reaction, she did not have any allergies.
After the reaction, I did a bunch of research into vaccines and became aware of the danger of over-vaccination and how it causes allergies and cancer.
Since 2003 she has not had any yearly multi-vaccine boosters or bordetella. I have only vaccinated for Rabies every three years because it is the law. This year I am going to do a blood titer test for Rabies immunity and hope that the local government in charge of Rabies Licensing will accept that since she has had mast cell tumors removed twice.
More than likely the Rabies vaccine is good for life but since it is required by law, I have been doing it in case she is ever bitten by a wild animal or a dog with a questionable rabies immunity to avoid her being away from me in quarantine. I know the authorities would make her go into quarantine if I did not have proof of immunity.
I am sure the vaccines caused the mast cell tumors and the allergies (and the anal sac issue).
ytain:
Ok, thank you for telling the diet for your dog.
The problem of anal sacs not being expressed could be due to not enough calcium that could make the poops of specific consistency that could aid in expressing them the nature intended (think correct function of the machine). The wet food don't adequately provide enough calcium. And since you described your dog's experience to a bone, the only way to introduce more calcium is to get organic egg shells and dry them thoroughly in the oven and then pulverize in a grinder and sprinkle an amount in her wet food till you reach a balance. You have to determine/calculate how much calcium found in a sprinkle of powdered eggshell in relation to the amount of calcium contained in the wet food.
The commercially prepared only provides minimum guaranteed nutritional profile for a dog established by the organization who determined the nutritional profile of the pets.
Ytain
April:
Thank you, Ytain for the info!
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