Well it has been a rough past seven weeks. It started the second week of November. Jade started coughing and hacking this slimy clear liquid with some white foamy stuff mixed. Took her to our Vet and found out that he retired and his son bought the business and hired two vets, a man and a woman. First visit was with the woman. She went off on some tangent that Jade had Mega esophagus. she told us we would have to go to the emergency vet in Columbia, SC three hours away because there is no emergency vet in Horry County where we live. She is wrong, I transport injured birds for the Avian Conservation Center. There are two emergency vets in Horry County. I was not familiar with either and was hesitant as to which one to take her to. One of the vet techs handed us a pamphlet for Blue Pearl Vet Hospital in Awendaw and hour and half away. Off we went. They were fabulous, and after xrays and blood work we were told that she did not have megaesophagus. She was diagnosed with esophagitis and aspiration pneumonia. After week of treatment it all started all over again. Another trip to our local emergency vet and another week of treatment for the above diagnosis. Then it started all over again. We took her back to our vet and saw the male vet this time who is great. He felt that the treatment was not long enough. Prescribed two weeks of treatment along with one 20mg Prilosec a day.
I started to back track my steps and on the 27th of October I had purchased a new bag pf dog food and instead of purchasing the chicken and rice formula that we were using I grabbed a bag of beef and rice instead. All the years of breeding Labs that I had done my number one advice for owners was to NEVER change the dog's food. My daughter and wife decided to try some sensitive stomach food to see if it had any effect. Lo and behold the hacking started to lessen. That is when I realized that it may have been my fault all along that caused this problem. I broke the carnal rule. This past Monday during our follow up visit to our vet I ran this idea past him and he looked at me like "you should know better". He did recommend to up the dosage of Prilosec to 40mg per day account she does seem to produce an excess amount of stomach acid. Right now she seems to be back to her normal self with just a couple of coughs when she is excited. . Our vet told us to keep doing what we are doing with the sensitive stomach food and if she is still coughing in two weeks he wants to see her again. I am pretty sure we have everything taken care of and she will be fine. After all of the problems it seems that I caused she still thinks the sun rises and sets with me and still loves me, thank God.
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