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sleep apnea/stop breathing at night

M

Mabel's Mom

Active member
Mabel is 4 years old and over the last 6 months has had trouble breathing only at night. She snores very loudly then stops breathing. Next she'll struggle around the bed until she wretches and gags and finally gets breathing again. Sometimes she'll do this 5-10 times per night. These episodes can last 30-60 seconds, which may not seem long, but when your baby is struggling to breath, it's an eternity. She recently had surgery to shorten her soft palate, but it doesn't appear to have helped yet. Has anyone had a similar situation and what did you do?
Thanks,
Mabel's Mom
 
Sorry to hear she is having difficulties. If she is having problems still , then you really need to go talk to your vet about this, if they haven't been informed. As you'll know, this is a problem caused by their shortened faces -- they are brachycephalic -- and for some dogs this can cause quite serious problems, as you have found. I don't know what the recovery time is -- but if it has been a while with no improvement then it would be important to talk to whoever performed the surgery.

The other thing to say is -- if she is even an OUNCE overweight, get the weight off of her. Get her down to a *lean* weight -- meaning a very distinct waist. Every bit of extra wieight can seriously exacerbate her breathing difficulties. If she is at all overweight you may find just getting the weight off her solves the problem. My rescue girl was exrtemely overweight and not til she worked down to a lean weight did her excessive snoring, gagging etc stop. She still snores but it is now a minor issue.

More info here:
http://cavalierhealth.org/brachycephalic.htm

This is the maximum girth a cavalier should have:

weightpics_003.jpg


More images and feeding info: http://roycroftcavaliers.com/manualfeeding.htm
 
Karlin,
Thank you for the information. Her surgery was a week ago today. We did go back to the vet and he said there may be some swelling so he gave her prednisone. She still has episodes, but there aren't as many. We are hoping over time this will help. She is overweight and we have agreed to try to get her to lose some of it. We would do just about anything for her...she is the most precious dog.
Thank you.
Mabel's Mom
 
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