Poor Vinnie, his stay at the hospital....

Here's the back story:

Vinnie has been on medication to control his recent diagnosis of epilepsy.  He has been on a high dose of Phenobarb for the past few months.  The plan was to add another drug, Potassium Bromide, and wean him off of the Phenobarb.  Last weekend, with the advice of my veterinarian, we started the Potassium Bromide.  He had to be on a high dose for 2 days, then a lower maintenance dose thereafter.  We started on Saturday, May 31st.  Everything was going well for Vinnie, even with him being somewhat "drunk" from starting the new meds.  

By Monday evening he was projectile vomiting yellow bile all over the place!  I had no idea what was happening with him.  I called our veterinarian, who happens to be my new boss, at 430am June 2nd and rushed him into the clinic.  Vinnie was given a shot to stop the vomiting and put on IV fluids.  He spent the whole day at the hospital.  I took him home that night and he slept all night and wouldn't eat a thing.  In the morning he started vomiting again.  I took him back to clinic and they started a barium study.  

A barium study is then they put a milky liquid in the dog. This liquid shows up on x-rays and you can see how the digestion is functioning in the animal.  You can see a blockage too - if there is one.  He had a ton of x-rays and although his digestive system was moving very slow, nothing abnormal was showing up on the x-rays.  He came home that night, Tuesday, with the instructions to "feed him whatever he'll eat".  He was scheduled for another x-ray Wednesday morning to see if the last of the barium had passed through without trouble.  Well, Vinnie ate Tuesday night!  It had been 2 days since he ate anything and he now was finally done vomiting and he felt alot better!  He ate rice, chicken breast and canned ID dog food - and lots of it, every hour he got more food!

We returned Wednesday morning and he passed his last X-ray!  He was now all better and in the clear!

Here's what was the problem was, the Potassium Bromide had caused his stomach lining to be inflamed and severely irritated.  We had to stop the Potassium Bromide and the Doctor lowered his other med, Phenobarb, instead.  He had to have all those x-rays to make sure he didn't have a blockage and to make sure this was, in fact, all we were dealing with.  It was a hellish few days for us here.  Cleaning up vomit, staying up all night checking on Vinnie, worrying....   All is better now.  Vin is back to being a puppy now :)  An almost 7 year old puppy anyway!  

I guess it was fortunate for us I work at a vet clinic again :P  You can see Vin's shaved little arm from the IV.  The Doctor gave him a verbal award for being a pro at posing for x-rays, he had had so many!