I am wondering if anyone has any suggestions that may help our Malinois. About two weeks ago she started having bad diarrhea. We immediately put her on Flagyl and Canine ID which has cleared this up in the past within a few days. After about three days there was no change, so we started her on Imodium and took her to the vet. The Imodium didn't help and the blood tests showed borderline EPI and nothing else. The vet took her off the Imodium, raised the dose of Flagyl and started her on Viokase and a low residue diet made by Iams. We were going away for a week, so we left her at the vet where she could be closely monitored. We called during the week several times and were told there was a slight improvement. We got back yesterday and didn't recognize her when they first brought her out. She is down to 37 pounds from 50. We don't see any improvement and are very worried about her. They gave us Prednisone to try and we will start that on Saturday. They don't know if it will help or not. If that does not help we are taking her to the Animal Medical Center in Manhattan. I was wondering if anyone has had a problem like this and knows of something we haven't tried. I don't think Duchess can go on like this for very long. Her energy level is slightly lower than usual, she is eating and drinking well but the weight loss is scary.

This is not something that we, on a message board, could (or should) answer for you. You just need to keep with your vet until the problem can be discovered. I assume blood tests and fecal tests have been done to rule out any internal parasites, etc.?

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This is not something that we, on a message board, could (or should) answer for you. You just need to keep with your vet until the problem can be discovered. I assume blood tests and fecal tests have been done to rule out any internal parasites, etc.?

I wasn't expecting a diagnosis from a message board, however, if there is a chance that anyone can think of anything that may help Duchess I would like to hear it. We are continuing to stay in contact with the vet and will take her to a specialist if the Prednisone does not work. Yes, in addition to everything else, the vet wormed her.

I would take her to a specialist NOW. If she has already lost that much weight, her reserves are gone.

If she has EPI, Viokase and Flagyl are the course of treatment, but maybe there is something else going on also.

I wouldn't wait if it were my dog! She has lost more than 25% of her body weight in a week...not good.

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I would take her to a specialist NOW. If she has already lost that much weight, her reserves are gone.

If she has EPI, Viokase and Flagyl are the course of treatment, but maybe there is something else going on also.

I wouldn't wait if it were my dog! She has lost more than 25% of her body weight in a week...not good.

Thank you! I am thinking she should go to a specialist sooner as well, but her vet didn't seem to have a sense of urgency about it which I found strange. I am extremely worried about her. I think there may be something other than EPI going on, but nothing shows on the tests. We'll see what the AMC can tell us.

Let us know what the AMC finds out.. good luck.

I read am article about a dog with diarreah for a very extended period of time that went undiagnosed by several local vets. The dog was finally taken to Tufts & it was determined that the dog had Cauda Equina Syndrome. Which is a painful nerve system disorder the affects the spine. Apparently it was causing pressure on the bowel area or something like that & that was the cause. After the surgery to correct the problem the dog had normal stool. It took Tufts vets to find the problem...apparently, it was beyond the scope of the local vets to figure this out. Or they did suspect that this symdrome could effect the dog in such a way to cause the constant loose stool. Just a thought to ask you vet about.

Here is an excerpt from the article:

It turned out that she'd been having diarrhea *for over a year. They suspected something called "Cauda Equina Syndrome," and it's something that German Shepherd Dogs are susceptible to as they age. It involves a narrowing of the spinal column around the spinal nerves due to changes in the tissue or bone in the spinal column. The symptoms depend on which nerves in the spine are being pressed on by these tissue changes. The dog can experience terrible pain if nerves are pressed one way, or certain parts of the body just don't seem to work anymore if nerves are pinched in other ways. To verify this diagnosis, the Tufts vets asked allow them to do an MRI on her back to be sure of the diagnosis and to pinpoint where the problem in the spine was so they could try to fix it.

Thank you! I had briefly thought about a spine problem because I put my 13.5 year old GSD to sleep last year when her degenerating discs caused the same type of thing. Duchess moves okay so I didn't think that could be it. I don't know much about Cauda Equina and didn't know it could do that as well. Duchess is going to the AMC tomorrow at 11 am, my boyfriend is taking her and I will let him know that he should ask about Cauda Equina.

Taking Duchess to the AMC was the definitely the right thing to do. They went over the test results done by her vet, gave her a sonogram, checked her spine and tested her for Addison's disease. They ruled out EPI because there is no indications of it on her test results. We are going to have to ask her vet why she even thought it was a possibility. I have a copy of the blood tests and the AMC is right, her results are normal. Her sonogram was normal except for a slight thickness in her stomach which they don't think is a problem. Her spine seems to be okay. The results for the Addison's test are not back yet. Right now they are thinking maybe a food allergy or Addison's. They gave us a different antibiotic to try and if that does not work they want us to put her on a diet with a unique protein and recommended Kangaroo. Ick! They said she is a happy healthy dog except for this current problem. Hopefully there will be a diagnosis soon!