Originally Posted by
taysel
Short question is - Is it considered diarrhea if my puppy only has loose stools during his regular bowel movement times? In other words, he does not have uncontrollable diarrhea in the house, and isn't running out to diarrhea on a continual basis.
Backstory - Caleb had severe diarrhea last Friday night/Saturday morning, where he asked to be let out 5 times in 5 hours. After that bout, he calmed down and we took him to the vet when they opened Saturday morning. They prescribed an antibiotic usually prescribed for giardia, a probiotic, and a prescription bland canned food. They reviewed his stool sample and noted he had high clostridium in his stool. It comes from eating raw or improperly cooked meat so we took away his bully sticks (and all treats). As his diarrhea cleared up, we took him off the prescription diet and back on his kibble (we transitioned using a mix over the course of a day). The vet called back regarding further analysis of his stool sample by a lab during this time and said they found a bacteria in it that is from birds but is generally harmless to cats and dogs (I couldn't understand the name of the bacteria as she said it and couldn't find it online). It was unclear from our conversation whether he had both bacteria or not, but it sounded like it was just this "harmless" bacteria from birds. Fast forward to today, after about a day or two of good stools, he's back to diarrhea. But it's not any sort of "oh my God I need to go out right now!" diarrhea. It's just the three or so bowel movements he has a day, that just happen to be very soft. We'd rather avoid another vet visit if possible so we are going to do the "wait and see" approach for a few days, especially since he's eating, drinking, and playing just fine. His next (and last!!! yay!!!) vaccines are next Tuesday so our goal is to hold off until then when we can talk to the vet more.