Inflammatory Bowel Disease?

[Jazzypad1]

Slippery Elm is very good for firming up stools/settling digestive issues. It can be used long-term if necessary.

[Snowshoe]

This is day 6 of Prednisone. The Royal Canin canned was done yesterday and I'd had to slowly start introducing his own regular food a couple of days ago. Last night and this morning were the first full meals of only regular food. Poopers are slowly getting better. Still very soft but no more fire hose (liquid under pressure) Strangely though, flatulence is increased a bit but it's not as bad as a few weeks ago. Also strangely, he's only pooping once a day. Two or three on our morning walk is normal for Oban. He's lost a lot of weight so maybe that's a factor.

Here is what we are dosing right now:

Omeprazole 20 mg in the morning with small amount of food, wait 20 minutes then give rest of meal. - 10 days

Sulcrate 1G twice a day with Prednisone with meal. - 10 days. Great, just discovered I paid for 20 tablets and only got 11.

Prednisone 5 mg, give 6 = 30 mg with meal twice a day. Reported to Vet yesterday and will do again on Thursday. I was supposed to get 150 of these. Suppose I should count what's left to be sure I got the right amount of them too.

RXzmes 1/4 tsp sprinked per can of food on each meal and allowed to sit for 15 minutes before feeding. Now that we're on solely kibble I need to wet the kibble. Oban gets 1 and 1/4 to 1/2 cups of food each meal which is slightly less than a full can of food but Vet told me to heap the little scoop a bit.

The worst part is making the poor little man wait the 15 or 20 minutes after I mix up the food.

I will see if I can find Jeff's thread, or NancyO's. Maybe Sulfasalazine is Sulcrate here? Will look. Thanks for asking. Oban cannot be feeling right but he is still a happy boy, wants to walk and do his normal activities. Dogs are such troopers.

[Jeff]

maybe sulfasalizine or sulfa-something-ine. I think he found it worked for Hemi when nothing else would when Hemi was a younger lad.

Good memory,

Yes Sulfasalazine. It is a medication for Humans and Dogs with this. I would try this over the prednizone. But you already started. Hemi tried everything. We did the Metronidazole for a long time and tried the Royal Canine, tried the chicken and rice, actually ground beef and rice seemed to work better for Hemi. What ultimately worked was sulfasalazine. However he had a flare up last year when we came back from camp. We had to get the gut bacteria under control. This was 15 days of Metronidazole and 10 days Amoxacillin at the same time. When at about the 12 day mark we started with Sulfasalazine while finishing the metronidazol. 15 days of sulfasalazine. 1 and 1/2 tablets twice a day, then after the 15 day mark slowly tapered off. 5 days 1 tablet twice a day, 5 days half a tablet twice a day, 5 days tablet once a day. This slowly let his gut start regrowth on it's own.

[Snowshoe]

I'm not sure. I found information to say Sulcrate was the same as Sulfacrate. And information to say Sulfacrate was the same as Sulfasalazine. I guess they are the same or very close. Something to soothe the gut and particularly used on ulcers, or just irritation.

Jeff, you used it on it's own? As you see I'm to use it with Prednizone for 10 days. In my readings on IBD Pred is THE go to but it's a bit of a mystery why it works. It works when there is some bacteria or something that has been diagnosed but it also works when no culprit can be found. And medical people, human and for pets, don't know why that is.

Back from a walk and we have regressed in the poopers, I guess becasue of being back on regular food. Many attempts, lots of straining, very soft and liquid. Crap.

Speaking of, you know what's being touted as a possible remedy in humans? Sticking a piece of somebody else's healthy poop up the sick person's butt. Really, it apparently repopulates with the good, healthy bacteria the sick person is lacking. Synthetic poop is being worked on but because the medical profession isn't sure what all is in good poop, and what bits are good and what bits might not be, it's hard to be sure synthetic poop is complete. But of course there is the concern of introducing disease of another kind with real poop.

ETA: Oh, I should have said tooted instead of touted, shouldn't I? Just to be funny.

[Sue-Ram]

Speaking of, you know what's being touted as a possible remedy in humans? Sticking a piece of somebody else's healthy poop up the sick person's butt. Really, it apparently repopulates with the good, healthy bacteria the sick person is lacking. Synthetic poop is being worked on but because the medical profession isn't sure what all is in good poop, and what bits are good and what bits might not be, it's hard to be sure synthetic poop is complete. But of course there is the concern of introducing disease of another kind with real poop.

ETA: Oh, I should have said tooted instead of touted, shouldn't I? Just to be funny.

Sounds more like a fetish than a remedy.

[Snowshoe]

Synthetic 'Poop' Can Cure C. difficile Infection, Study Finds | University of Guelph

LOL They call the synthetic stuff RePOOPulate.

[Jeff]

Jeff, you used it on it's own? As you see I'm to use it with Prednizone for 10 days. In my readings on IBD Pred is THE go to but it's a bit of a mystery why it works. It works when there is some bacteria or something that has been diagnosed but it also works when no culprit can be found. And medical people, human and for pets, don't know why that is.

Yes, I was able to do it completely by itself. The biggest thing was really getting off everything else and letting the gut bacteria get itself back in check. The Sulfasalazine basically relaxed the inflammation in the lower intestine so it could do it's job. Hemi has a few recurrences of issues, like when he got Giardia, we had to cure the Giardia but then of course everything was out of whack again from the Metronidazol. So I had to use Sulfasalazine again. For Hemi this was a miracle drug, and finally restored him to a happy non diarrhea pup. Also one of the things that seems to help keep Hemi in check is high fiber foods. Sweet Potato, Apples, Etc, we still share an apple every night before bed time and he get sweet potatoes in his food and fresh once a week.

Speaking of, you know what's being touted as a possible remedy in humans? Sticking a piece of somebody else's healthy poop up the sick person's butt. Really, it apparently repopulates with the good, healthy bacteria the sick person is lacking. Synthetic poop is being worked on but because the medical profession isn't sure what all is in good poop, and what bits are good and what bits might not be, it's hard to be sure synthetic poop is complete. But of course there is the concern of introducing disease of another kind with real poop.

Then, yes I have heard of this, there are a few different options, the one you are referring to is Fecal Bacteriotherapy. Fecal bacteriotherapy - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia I heard an interview with someone that has had this done, they had been in the hospital for something, I don't remember but the antibiotic they received completely destroyed the gut bacteria they had. For over a year this person had diarrhea. One transplant and it fixed them.

There is another one I know someone that actually did, and it worked, the bacteria itself from a health person was separated from the rest of the fecal matter and then put into a capsule form the person could swallow. Capsule dissolved as it reached the intestines to let the bacteria live and thrive. The person had severe problem from crohn's disease, it helped them quite a lot.
Could Replace Fecal Transplants of Gut Bacteria - D-brief | DiscoverMagazine.com

[Snowshoe]

Just back from the Vet's, we went to update weight and decide how to proceed.

Oban is down to 70.3 pounds. His backbone is sticking up, all his ribs are easily visible.

But poops seem to be slowly, very slowly, getting better. And that's on his own food. We will keep up the high dose Pred. and the Sucrate and Omeprazole too till we get down to 6 Pred a day, divided. The latter two are to soothe his stomach and gut and help protect from the Pred. OH took photos of poop in to show the Vet and when we get all poops a day being formed, soft is ok, then we'll start to cut back on the Pred. Vet calls his problem Protein Losing Enteropathy, which I have yet to google to be sure he's right. LOL. Trying to LOL. Oban is LOLing, still his happy self. Poor little boy, he looks like an old dog due to the weight loss and loss of condition. He's only six.

[Tilly]

Sending good thoughts that you get his tummy under control and the weight back on soon

[Jax's Mom]

Prayers for you all.