when Cody nearly died last year with liver and other problems, they also considered sugarless gum with zilatol (not spelled right, just sounding it out) It can cause those symptoms you mentioned. Any packages of sugarless gum laying around?

Cody's values were sky high in the thousands, he survived. It took him a while to get back to normal. I looked up feeding for liver disease and tried to feed him a diet that helped with his liver.

Sorry to hear what you are going through. It is a very tuff thing to go through. praying he will recover completely. sharon

Thanks Sharon. It shouldn't be gum (we're not big gum people) - but it's a thought. It doesn't make sense to me that it's just his bile acids at this point.

Though, well, since his liver panels had all been normal previous times other than bile acids we just tested them this time.

I did some reading and hyperlipemia (fat in the blood) can throw off the bile acid numbers, at least that's what I understood. And he did have fat in the blood.

So something else to investigate with the vet - just waiting for a call back.

I'm also curious about metabolic disorders and liver disfunction, given that we know he is hypoglycemic. Maybe he has diabetes issues as well?

Post-exercise he often becomes high energy - higher than during the exercise, quite frankly - and tears through the house, jumps on things, and in general sort of freaks out. Could that be indicative of blood sugar raised?

Jennifer,

You posted last November that Neb's liver enzymes were:

ALP - lowered
ALT - very high (normal range 5-95; Neb was 446)
AST - very high (normal range 5-71; Neb was 266)

Have they been normal since then? For how long?

They've been normal since late November, early December - I don't recall the exact date of the first normal test. His last full liver screen would've been done in late January, and it was also normal.

I spoke to the vet and she suspects the fat in the blood (lipemia) is throwing the bile acids off, which we have to investigate, but she wants to rule out food as a possible cause first. So we'll switch him over to the reduced fat core, give him some time on that, and then do the full blood screen. I'm more comfortable with her thought process now, also since he has no clinical signs/issues that makes me feel better as well. If there are issues, then we're looking at an ultrasound/biopsy and specialist from there.

I confirmed for her that the emerg vet did the cPLI test to rule out pancreatitis, which is the same test my vet did, so she was happy with their testing on that. Though it does lessen the likelihood of pancreas issues.

Normal liver enzyme levels are encouraging, as are repeated negative cPLI results. Hopefully it was a one-time liver insult - which could be caused by any number of things - and that he has now recovered. However, chronic hepatitis leading to cirrhosis can be present for an extended period with no obvious clinical signs until liver damage is advanced (as I found out the hard way). You might want to consider a follow-up liver screen sometime in the future, even if you get normal bile acid results this time.

I do hope everything turns out well. Keep us posted.

Thanks.

We're going to do a full liver screen and CBC with the next round of tests, and if all turns up normal I'd still like to follow up with at least a few full liver screens. Just to be on the safe side.

I feel a bit better now about the raised bile acids result what with the possible explanation of lipids/lipase in the blood, though it's still upsetting. Especially since while they think he may have ingested something to cause the November attack, we can't think of what. He's crated when not supervised at home (luckily my partner usually works from home so it's not too much time) and always on leash when outside. His chances of getting into things are pretty low. And he didn't have any damage to his tissue membranes or whatever it's called - his mouth and throat were normal, which if he'd ingested certain toxic things they wouldn't have been.

jennifer: I am so sorry to hear about your dog. We did follow up tests on Cody's liver for a year when he nearly died in Jan of 2010. It seems like a hard road to go. I hope things work out for you. No answers yet as to what caused this? We never found out what hit Cody. Interested in hearing about your situation and results.
Praying
Sharon

No answers. I wish there were so we could take proactive preventative measures. I'm even more paranoid now about what he even sniffs though..... I'm thinking at least a year will be what we end up doing with follow-up too, and then on a yearly basis fro there if all tests end up okay. I'll keep updating you.

Is Cody back to normal in all values now?

His values have come back to normal and he has been normal for approximately one year.

I understand perfectly how you feel. when you do not know where the source was or what has caused your dog to be sick, it is horrible. each day I go out and check for mushrooms, anything thrown over the fence or maybe a dead animal.(my neighbor uses poison to kill gophers and squirrels.) I don't feel comfortable leaving Cody outside for very long alone. I know people think I am crazy but watching all he went through I think that is the least I could do. On top of his liver malfunction he also got a huge sore on his stomach that the emergency vet said was vaculitus.
It caused his skin to basically rot and fall off. He had a huge chunk of tissue missing and you could see holes inside to his stomach. It took 4 months of care to heal that. We used collodial silver and herbs and I was blessed with a sister who is a nurse- wound care- so she helped me with dressings and care. We laugh about it now, Cody is the most expensive mutt we have ever had, and he even has his own personal nurse!
To this day there are no answers. So now when he is experiencing stomach or intestinal issues, we are worried, probably over worried since all we have gone through with him.

Does your yard have any mushrooms? anyone in your area, neighbors poison pests? They even asked us if we used herbacides on weeds. We didn't.
I hope you find out what is causing the problem.
Any food sources that may have had contaminated meat? Just a thought?
Anyway. So sorry to hear what you are going through. I really pray for your pups complete recovery.
Sharon

Jennifer: How is the pups doing? sharon