Serious Doggie Illnesses
Seeing your pooch sick is no fun. You feel powerless. Fortunately, some of the most common and serious canine diseases can be avoided with vaccinations starting in the first few months of your pet's life, with updates as she grows. It also helps to know red-flag warning signs of some of the most life-threatening diseases -- cues that you should call your vet immediately:
Distemper
Caused by: Canine distemper virus (CDV)
Symptoms: Eye discharge, either watery or pus-like. Symptoms escalate to coughing, diarrhea, vomiting, lethargy, and fever. If virus spreads to nervous system, it can cause seizures and possible paralysis.
Parvovirus
Caused by: Canine parvovirus type 2 (CPV-2)
Symptoms: Vomiting, diarrhea (may be bloody), loss of appetite, dehydration, lethargy, and fever. Most infected dogs die within 2 to 3 days of the first signs of infection, so take immediate action.
Coronavirus (Corona)
Caused by: Canine coronavirus (CCV)
Symptoms: Diarrhea, vomiting, reduced appetite, increased thirst, and weight loss. Similar to parvovirus, but generally more treatable.
Leptospirosis
Caused by: Leptospira bacterium
Symptoms: Fever, diarrhea, vomiting, and jaundice. Dogs who recover may have permanent kidney damage.
Hepatitis
Caused by: Canine adenovirus 1 (CAV-1)
Symptoms: Fever, diarrhea, vomiting, abdominal pain; can also cause lasting kidney damage.
SUMMARY:
In another words, dogs who has serious health issue will have these symptoms:
(So if you wanted to buy a dog, or you see that your dog has these symptoms, do not hesitate to bring to the vet immediately!)
1. THE EYES : The eyes is not clear, but watery, and has dried water mark on the corner of the eyes.
Unless the dog is a white dog, which is common in white dog to have eye discharges just like human when we just wake up in the morning.
And if you see the dried water discharge on the corner of the eyes, it is not because the dog was sad and has been crying. But it is not healthy. Some people who have no knowledge thought that it was because the dog has been crying since the dog has a sad look. That sad look indicate that he or she is sick, that's why the eye discharge and the not happy face.
2. VOMITING: If you ALWAYS give your dog regular food, not altering it, and it vomited, then you should ask yourselves these questions first before rushing it to the vet:
1. Did you or your friend gave him some other food which is not dog food or not his usual food?
2. Is it a puppy and it just change food from wet/soft to dry?
3. After it just ate, did you play with him or her and it rolls a lot? Just like human, it might get dizzy playing after eating and might vomit. It's natural.
4. Did your dog ate too fast? or choke?
5. Did your dog ate too much?
6. After he or she vomited, did it try to lick and eat back the vomit? If yes, then don't worry about it. It does not mean that he or she wanted to clean up the mess, but simply because he or she really liked the food, ate too much and do not want to waste it. So he or she licked and eat back the vomit since it still has the food taste.
7. After vomiting, did he or she lay down looking helpless and weak? Or did he or she run about as if nothing happens? If it runs about, no need to go to the vet. But if it lies down looking defeated and helpless, RUN to the vet immediately!
8. Check any of his toys, or dangerous materials at home. Did your dog eat parts of his toys? If yes, do not panic! Go and give him some dry dog snack topped with a little bit honey and olive oil. The honey will make his body strong, and the olive oil will help to get that part out of his system. A vet told me this trick since i once got a dog who eats EVERYTHING including my bra and bible.
3. SHITTING: This is the best way to tell whether your dog is healthy or not. It might sound gross, but it is the best way to tell. If your dog is healthy you can see by the brownish color shit, and it should not be too hard nor watery. If it is watery, way too watery, do not wait to consider what has happened to him. Bring him to the Vet immediately. Because:
1. Even if it eats different kind of food from his usual ones, dogs do not get full diarrhea. His shit might look a little different than usual, but not ALL WATERY.
2. Even if he eats part of his toys, it will usually came out as small pieces of the toy, not turned into some watery diarrhea.
3. If it is having a diarrhea, it means he losses a lot of amount of water in his body, and he might die dehydrated if not treated soon. He might die from dehydration first than from the actual sickness.
4. If you see that your dog has a diarrhea, and refuses to move about, just lay down looking all weak. That means serious. Because dogs are not like human, we tend to want to rest and lie down when we are not feeling well. Then after laying down for awhile then we might get better. For dogs, in fact, unless they are DYING, they do not do this. Humans, when they are aware that they are in danger, they will speak up and ask other humans for help. But in dog's case, when they are dying, they will quietly retreat and lay down. Because they got rank in the pack. And he does not want his pride to be lowered down with the rest of the pack knowing that he is weak. I got a dog whom got crashed by a car, but not full blown, but still, he got crashed. He yelped loudly, and i was screaming more loud than him and louder than ever. After yelping and toddling back to the pedestrian, he ran again as if nothing happened. My jaw dropped. I was very sure that i saw him got crashed by a car just now. It wasn't my imagination because i heard him yelping and i saw him toddling back to the pedestrian. When we got home, i checked his feet and both of them were bleeding and the fur came off on some spots showing under his skin, since the skin also came off, and his paw was bleeding as well. I cleaned them up by washing it clean with dog shampoo. Then after that, i put some dettol anti bacterial on top of the injured spots. He wrinkes and growls showing that it is painful to have dettol anti bacterial smeared on top of his wound. After saying all kinds of praise and encouragement for him with a super sweet voice and super soft and super nice voice topped with a super motherly look and with super big encouraging smile, he backed down and let me dettol him on all his two injured feet without making a noise except for low whining whispers. He is so sweet!
Then after it is all done, he was back running all over the place again, with his tail wagging more than ever and his eyes gleamed with happiness, because then he gets his favorite snack: The super dog bone. And he got to sleep near me, covered in warm blanket. (Well, he sleeps with me everyday anyway...but because of the accident he got special treatment until he heals...)
See? So unless dogs are dying, they do not show their weakness to other members in the pack , that is including to you. Since you are his pack member to him.
Or perhaps his parents to him. In my case, my dog thought that i am his mom. Because it was my fault. I adopted him when he was only 15 days. I did not know that that was not good for me to do so.
5. If your dog's faeces, that is shit, has blood in it, run to the vet as well! Because even though he ate his toys, the outcome will be that same toy will come out just like it is, because the dog's stomach cannot digest plastic. It will come out fully like it is. It will not turn into blood! If it has blood in it, that means, the inside of your dog is injured and is bleeding. Which is perhaps, his stomach, his butt, or maybe his kidney.
6. See if your dog is a female, it might be mistaken as her mens. But look at the blood. If the blood is just beside the faeces, and not on it or mixes with the faeces, and your female dog is having her period, then that's pretty much it.
4. PEEING: By looking at your dog pee and smell, you can know whether or not your dog is healthy. Other dogs, tend to smell another dogs anus or private parts because actually they wanted to smell the faeces and pee. By smelling this, one dog can know a lot of things about the other dog. For example: What does this dog eat or drink? How is his or her health condition? Is his or her kidney OK? Is he or she healthy or has any infectious disease?
Guess what, your dog can tell! There is even a dog that i saw in animal planet that was trained to detect deseases in human being. For example: a Human lady was told to lay down, she has a skin desease on some parts of her body. Then the dog was told to circle and smell her. The dog only needed to circle her once and then stopped at the correct spot where she has contracted her skin desease. Which was on her thigh. Isn't that amazing? That dog can save hours of doctors and research works to detect where that skin desease is!
When doctors will need hours for a simple detection, a dog only need less than 3 minutes. It is the same like wolf. A wolf could detect his prey's health condition just by looking at his foot print. In this case his paw print or his saliva. The wolf could know that this animal is weak and not walking properly just by smelling his saliva! So the wolf then hunt this animal down and eventually caught him. Talking about wolf, i really like wolf. And i ALWAYS wanted to have a cross wolf-siberian husky dog. Too bad, they do not have this in China. But i heard that they do breed wolf husky in Canada and USA.
A healthy pee should be yellow in color, just like our pee. Not too dark, not too smelly, although a dog's pee is naturally smelly, but an unhealthy pee is dark or reddish in color and smells weird, with a strong odor. Usually a dark brown or dark yellow brownish or reddish colored pee means kidney failure, it is the same like in human.
5. EARS: Dogs do not have ear shit like we do. Even though they do have, but it is so much and if you see that your dog's ear is FULL with ear shit, that only means one thing: Your dog got infection.
Or maybe he got ear mites. There is this mite who like to dwell in ears above all places! But it is true. So you should check your dog's ear every now and then. Since you are the mommy or daddy, he won't mind you looking inside his ear up close and personal.
Use big and soft cotton that we usually use to wipe off make ups. Those ones that is big and round shaped like a mini ball. Unless your dog behaves like mine, who dropped dead when i tried to clean his ears, because he enjoys it so much that he started to curl on my lap like a cat, or layed on his back snoring, you cannot use cotton bud. Because you might accidentally poked his ear with it. Do not use human ear cleaning aid or face cleaning alcohol. Strictly use dog's ear cleaning solution only. Do not drop the solution directly inside his ear. But you should use cotton to clean the ear WITH the solution.
My dog had an infection once. One of his front paw is bigger than the other one. And his ear is full with ear shit that you can smell it from half meter away. So i treated his infection first, which is the most important, then his ear. If the infection goes away, the ear shit will go away as well.
Some ear shit is caused by other problems than infection. You should bring him to a visit to the vet. Healthy dogs has no ear shit. They aren't like us.
6. NOSE: If your dog's nose is ALWAYS wet, that indicates that he is healthy. It is OK. If it is dry, it does not means he is sick, some dogs has dry noses. If your dog's nose turned white in winter and black in summer, it is OK, do not worry about it.
CLEANLINESS TIPS:
Always cut the fur that is on his private part if it is a male. So when he pees, the pee won't stuck and dried up on his fur that is on that area. Because if you do not cut it, it eventually will turned yellow and then green. Meaning you have mildew or moss stuck up there on your dog's private area's fur. And he will lick it and he will lick you as well. Imagine that! So cut all the fur on his private are including those ones that is near his butt. Or else he will have dry shits stuck up on his butt area. And he sits on your lap and sits on your sofa and bed. Imagine that!
Actually, if you taught your dog NOT to scratch you with his nails, you do not have to cut his nails. I NEVER cut my westie's nails because:
1. He never scratch me
2. Look at rule number one
I do not cut his nails because i know he needed it. I always take him out to run and play outside on the grass field nearby my apartment. And he neede his claw more than ever to grasp on the grass and make a strong run and jump. He also needed his claw in case he has to defend himself. And i NEVER cut it because i taught him how to USE his claw properly. He can use it on anything else, except for me. So when he wanted to touch me with his paw, he will relaxed his claw, making his hand like a doll hand, only touching me or pushing me with his paw, but not grasping or clawing me. He is sweet, right?
Clean his teeth often, dogs can have cavity like us. But it is very difficult to brush your dog's teeth, right? So buy him snacks that can clean his teeth, or nylon toys, where he can chew thus cleaning his teeth and make him has a healthy gum as well. He needed it. My dog NEVER has a bad breath. I always give him teeth cleaning snack once a week because i allowed him to lick me on the face to show his affection for me. How could i forbid him to say,' Mommy, i love you?'
ALWAYS clean your dog's feet after an outing. It is really necessary for the cleanliness of the whole house. Unless your dog is going out on a boot, if it is bare feet, then you need to clean it with water everytime he gets back inside the house. Imagine how many worms and fungus and bacteria on the soil or on the ground. Especially in summer time, or else you might caught some skin desease like ring worm from the soil.
HAPPY DOGGY!!
Do you know that according to research by scientist, people who has dogs, live longer and live happier than those without? How can this be? Because when we caress our dog by caressing its fur, it increases our loving mood and release some endorphin and love to our brain. Making us happy and loving other people more than when we were without dogs.
So, I ALWAYS THANK GOD FOR CREATING DOG IN THIS WORLD; I SIMPLY THANK GOD FOR MY SWEET DOGS; I LOVE THEM MORE THAN ANYTHING ELSE IN THIS WORLD