Heads up on Whipworm ; symptom - chronic diarrhea

Please please PLEASE if your dog has chronic diarrhea (and throws up) please insist that your vet makes sure to check for whipworm. It may take up to four fecal exams to find the eggs.

Me getting Koli, her getting sick, and her ever supportive network may have saved many dogs lives. (I would have learned none of this if not for her or everyone else. The next dog i adopted could have died. I probably would have been devastated and given up on having a dog until we moved.)

She may or may not have picked it up from our yard. There were many places she's been in the past month or so.

The thing is though (and no i'm not going to beat myself up over this*, but i do have to use it as a potential warning for others...) is that King had the same symptoms. His stool looked almost identical. And not either one of them have obvious blood in their stool (besides last night Koli did but she had eaten some really sharp grass.) King only had been given a few fecal exams in his time with us, but never consecutively. He had been given wormer, but nothing that covered whipworm. Looking back I think the vets may have missed the obvious. They chalked his condition up to old age, but i think they came to that conclusion long before they said it to us. Yes he was old, but his symptoms were nearly identical to what Koli is going through. Other than the symptoms of what whipworms would have caused (chronic diarrhea, increasing throwing up and eventually not being able to hold any food down.,) his only major problem was arthritis and that was taken care of with the Elk Velvet Antler. (I'll never know, but it IS a possibility.) I mean our vet was always telling us how incredibly healthy King was and we got discounts just because of what great care we took of him (and because we're not well off.) He was amazed that King was more healthy than half the six year old patients he had. ...up until that last year when King just faded away. He never stopped being happy though and had a will to live until the injection took him.

Check what worm preventives your dogs are on. It could save your dog's life.

*There is going to be an adjustment period though while i deal with these thoughts. I'll just need a bit of time. It's like grieving the loss all over again... knowing there was a possible inexpensive solution to save King right under my nose the whole time. It hurts.

other keywords: senior elderly

I'm so sorry to hear there might have been a way to save your King. :( My RB Mandy had whipworms once, discovered from a routine fecal exam. She showed no symtoms at the time. We switched our heartworm meds to Interceptor as it kills whipworms. If I understand correctly whipworms can live in your soil for years.

Sentinel heartworm medication will also hit whipworms.

Some useful links i forgot to include. (I had put them in with the rest of the conversation on another message board.)

http://www.marvistavet.com/html/body_ivermectin.html (I had been talking about how i had heard of the dangers of these others and why we had kept King on Heartgard. After reading this link i can understand why people had bad experiences. The chemical reactions. People need to be armed with information on how to safely uses these medications.)

http://www.veterinarypartner.com/Con...8&S=1&EVetID=0 (just general all around useful information)

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Thank you for the kind words.

Yes, whipworm eggs can last in the soil for years. I think i read generally from two to seven years on average.

Yes, we're picking up Interceptor on Monday. (And giving the rest of the Heartgard to a rescue :-D They said they use Interceptor on their dogs, but can always use donations.)