r/EpilepsyDogs

A couple of weeks ago I posted about my dog starting on phenobarbital, he wasn't doing very well at all. I totally expected the wobbliness and ataxia, but it was pretty severe for him. Everyone told me it would pass after a couple of weeks, and I was willing to wait it out. If it was just the ataxia, I would have been fine with it.

Gus doesn't do anything normally. He's had a few uncommon health issues in the past. I'm a vet tech and I've seen many dogs started on a phenobarbital, but I've never seen any get as sick as Gus was.

True to his nature, unfortunately, Gus developed the very rare side effect of phenobarbital: pancreatitis. He had liquid diarrhea, wouldn't eat anything and was vomiting. I woke up one morning to ten piles of liquid diarrhea throughout my house. Gus wasn't the dog I knew, he was miserable and so was I.

Gus has suspected microvascular dysplasia. This is abnormal vasculature in the liver, which makes it harder for the liver to clear medications from the body. With his reaction to the phenobarbital, I'm more confident that he actually does have MVD. It took about three days for him to come back around after stopping the phenobarbital. I had to carry him up and down the stairs, lift him up onto furniture, he wouldn't touch food and just slept all day. He was dragging his hind legs even two days after his last dose. I feel like every time we gave him a dose, we were piling up onto the last dose that hadn't left his system yet.

I spoke with all of the vets I work with as well as Gus's neurologist. We decided what was best would be to try to take Gus off of the phenobarbital. Gus has only had one episode of seizures. The episode involved 2 seizures about 5 minutes apart on June 16.

We decided that we will monitor Gus for further seizures and if they become frequent, we will revisit medications in the future.

Gus has now been off of the phenobarbital since June 26th, and he's back to his normal bratty self. We haven't seen any signs of further seizures so far. We do have emergency intranasal midazolam in case we need it. If seizures do happen in the future, I'll talk to the neurologist again about medication options.

He did have an MRI and we know he doesn't have a tumor or any other brain abnormalities, so that makes me more comfortable with this plan. (On brand for Gus, he's a rare case of idiopathic epilepsy presenting in a senior dog)

Just putting it out there that sometimes medications aren't right for every pet. You have to weigh whats right for your specific situation and you and your dog's quality of life.

My dog had his first seizure in March and has since been on Keppra. He is taken 4500mg a day and I don’t think its wise to go up any further.

He is having seizures about once a month and theyre about 4-6 minutes long or so.

He is not the same dog as he was but most days are really good.

A CT, MRI, spinal tap, maxed out seizure drugs, two neurologists and many critical care vets later… We still don’t have a clear cause for the seizures and his ongoing vestibular symptoms, but he’s improving! All they know is it really hit his nervous system hard. We’re still waiting on the cultures that were sent off to a pathology lab… maybe something will show there. They’re not sure it’s epilepsy, because the MRI didn’t present the usual signs, and he didn’t respond to the drugs initially. Neurology said unless it’s an extremely rare presentation of a rare epilepsy, they’re not confident saying it’s that. He’s still on epilepsy meds daily for the foreseeable. Main thing is we have him home and he’s resting! 💛 love him so much.

My pup had cluster seizures and the vet prescribed keppra and so far she hasn't had another seizure. But on day 7 of the meds, she started losing strength in her hind legs and now (day 9) she's unable to move her hind legs. Fore legs are still working. She has urinated and defecated as well.

We looked after our friend's dog recently and were really concerned that he was suffering with seizures. Each time he laid down, he would start to fall asleep, and just as he was dropping off he would twitch and startle, sometimes wobbling, and would often jump up and pace around before settling again. He would do this pretty much every time he started to fall asleep, so just wouldn't get any sleep in the day. I have over 10 videos similar to the one attached. Overnight it seems to happen less. We have a dog ourselves and know what it looks like when they dream, and this seems quite different.

Our friend took him to the vet and they ran bloods, but said all looked ok and he was probably just feeling unwell (he had a pancreatitis flare up around the same time). Does anyone else think that it's more than that?

Today we hit one year seizure free with our little short circuit, Kaiya. We have fallen in to such a good routine, meds at 4am, noon, 4pm, and 8pm. She knows when it’s time for her meds and has become even more of a Velcro pup. We know the battle is never really over, but it’s nice to celebrate the small victories.

I am getting a Red Light Therapy (RLT) panel for myself for pain relief from nerve injury in my ankle after total ankle replacement. It's also useful for arthritis, low back pain, skin. Then I noticed recommended for dogs as well. Plenty of scientific papers on the use of RLT in veterinary care. https://novaalab.com/a/help/article/14684

Usefullness includes:

1. postop wound healing, especially Orthopedic surgery

2. pain control

3. arthritis

4. dermatitis

5. anxiety (releases endorphins)

6. yeast ear infection

7. IVDD

8. Cognitive decline

9. stroke

There is a warning that could cause a seizure in epileptic dogs. Mostly because blinking lights are known to cause a seizure in humans. I bet if used RLT goggles for dogs, no problem. Eye protection recommended for humans even though not known to cause eye damage. Even used for macular degeration and myopia in kids (not home devices).

I will be consulting with my vet before I use for my dog. Have any of you used RLT in your dog?

Nelly has focal seizures. She was thrown into our garden when she was a few months old. She had one after we had her for about a month. It lasted a couple of minutes and she recovered quickly. After that she had one every 3 months or so, so she wasn't put onto medication. Then about 4 months ago she went into a trance like state. We tried Keppra at first, that didn't really work at all, although we gave it a couple of months. Our vet, who specialises in neurology, gave her a rescue dose of diazepam which worked for a day or two. She also prescribed phenobarbital. For 2 weeks she came out of it but then slowly went back into it. We took her back for blood tests to get her levels checked. The blood was sent to Germany and the results came back 2 weeks later. Her levels were fine, she should have responded as they were supposedly at a therapeutic level. So our vet gave us some Keppra to add to the phenobarbital. Unfortunately Nelly had a really bad reaction and she totally freaked out on it, so we had to stop it. I usually give Nelly her meds but I had to go away for a couple of days, so my partner gave it to her instead. She suddenly improved! She had secretly added an extra quarter of a tablet at bedtime. Within 2 days she was completely back to her normal self! She has now been fine for a month! She also has MCT oil for her liver function. We told our vet and she said that science said that we shouldn't up the dose but that in real life it had worked, so she very much approved! She also said that owners know their dogs better than the experts, so always question your vet if you don't agree with them.

Hi Everyone,

Just wanted to introduce you to Bruce, my soul dog. He's been my shadow since the day he came home as a puppy. He's 9 years old and has had two suspected previous seizures (he had a lot of foam on his fur and around his mouth when we came home) and a confirmed seizure 06/03 and another 06/29. On 06/03 we rushed him to the ER to rule out anything metabolic with bloodwork which all came back great. We had a follow up with our regular vet and she prescribed midazolam and seizure tracking. We had our neurologist appointment on 06/30 and it was very thorough. They had time so we opted for an MRI and spinal tap. The MRI came back clear and the preliminary results from the spinal tap were clear as well, we get the official results back from the lab on Thursday. She diagnosed him with idiopathic epilepsy.

The neurologist originally wanted to prescribe Keppra but unfortunately, we work in the office during the day and would not be able to give it at 3 dose intervals, so she opted for phenobarbital to be given twice daily. We are starting his medication on Sunday because unfortunately we are going away for the 4th (We have a non-refundable Airbnb). His seizures seem to be triggered by the excitement of us coming home in the afternoons, so we are debating no longer using the garage when we come home.

We found him a new epilepsy friendly daycare to take him and his brother Tucky when we travel next because his current daycare will kick him out. He will be in the VIP suite with a bed, TV, arts & crafts, media package, 3 playtimes, and puppy icecream. They also have a vet on staff from opening until midnight.

I know we're in this for the long game, but any encouragement or advice would be greatly appreciated.