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Border Collie with Hydrosyringomyelia

I've spent all day trawling through all the SM posts on here! We have been back on the omeprazole for three days, he has has lost that dull look in his eyes and has instigated play behaviour so I can only assume he is feeling better. He has also stopped choking/coughing when he is eating, on Tuesday morning he wouldn't eat at all,I had to feed him from a saucer as he was lay down. He is still dragging both front feet so I am busy cutting up play mats for our path outside.....he did however make an attempt to chase a bird so that made me smile. These dogs have such courage!
His balance however is awful, my brother came to visit earlier and of course Blue got excited and he just couldn't keep upright. I am definitely going to ask for a referral to Chester Gates from my vet. It makes sense that it would be the right place to take Blue to, my vet has been excellent but I would value an experts opinion. In one way his novelty factor might bode well for a speedy appointment!. I tend to look at Blues future as short term but reading all your stories there are some brave little dogs that do well for maybe years on the correct treatment....so that is my new plan of action! It's so hard to sat positive when you see the confusion on your dogs face and the struggle they have, but you have to fight just as hard as them, and be the person they are worthy of.
 
Just wanted to say that you sound an amazing mum to Blue and I hope Chestergate will sort out the medication for you. I got two Cavaliers with CM/SM and what you said in your last post is so true.

But you have to fight just as hard as them, and be the person they are worthy of.
 
I hope this works....Blue has been fantastically bright today! On Saturday he was miserable, listless, not eating properly and moved away when I tried to touch him, it was grim, his balance was terrible. Like he had vertigo.
Today he is so much better, thank heavens for omeprazole, the difference is startling. I am hoping this link to a you tube video works...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DSJJ1XCGm54
 
Hi Sarah

Watched your video and that was one happy dog - give or take a few backleg wobbles! The gabapentin will have helped as well, as it is a pain preventive and helps to make dogs more confident about moving around when they realise it isn't going to hurt. So glad Blue is responding well to his medication - though no doubt there will be a few hiccups on the way! My Oliver had trouble with his front leg - it was one of his first obvious symptoms of SM (there were a lot more, less obvious, that we all missed!), stumbling and not wanting to put weight on it; this was due to the nerves in the leg not working properly, but after 2 years on gabapentin and frusemide it seems fine and he never stumbles. So things can improve - we just have to keep fighting...

Kate, Oliver and Aled
 
You may also want to look into adjusting the Gabapentin to 3/day as it typically is out of their system in about 8 hours, though with my girl with SM, it wears off in about 6 hours. Some days she needs 4 Gabapentin, though she does have a severe case of SM.

Good luck to you!
 
We can get to Chester Gates next week to see the specialist there, so I am asking my vet to refer me today. So he may well tweak the meds. He downtown honestly seem to be in pain now, he doesnt yelp out, he goes very quiet and withdrawn. He was obviously really struggling with his head last week before the omeprazole kicked in, thank God I saw it on here and Clare Rusbridges site!
 
Sorry to hear about your border and welcome!!!
People are wonderful on this board...
I was wondering about one little thing: you said 100mg's twice a day right? Isn't 100 mg very low for a border who weighs much more than a cavalier? maybe some people on here can answer this for me..
 
Your talking about the gabapentin? I can increase it to three tablets a day if I want, but to be honest he doesn't seem to be in discomfort. I believe it's 5mg per kg body weight twice a day starting dose, increased to 10 mg per kg if necessary, so that would make it 200mg twice a day. When he has been in pain in the past he just takes himself off and doesn't like you touching him, maybe that's a difference in the breeds as to how they show pain? My vet has referred me now to chester gates, so hopefully a neurologist can tweak things. But at the moment, apart from a few wobbles, he is doing fine. He isn't dragging his feet as badly and is instigating lots of play behaviour. It feels like a miracle!
 
Hey, I'm glad you got the referral. Do you have any video of Blue with his front legs crumbling so the neurologist can see him at his worst and not his best? They can usually tell anyway by their exam how bad a dog is. Good luck next week. I'll be anxiously waiting to hear what they recommend for your guy.
 
No! I'm a numpty! I should have videoed him when he was bad, but I got so upset I just didn't want to! Mind you, he has plenty of symptoms still for him to work off. I did take some photos last week as I'm preparing a report for the pastoral breeds health committee, they want to know all the details as no one has come across with a collie with this condition before. We are booked in to see Mr Skerritt next Wednesday at 2.30pm. In a weird way I'm looking forward to it, it will be good to get a neurological explanation for some of his problems
I'll tell you what's interesting, in collie obedience work when they do heel work they are meant to have their head right back, almost at ninety degrees to their body, looking at the handler. My dog training club teacher pointed out over a year ago that Blue was very uncomfortable doing this, he dropped his back end right down to lift his head high, we didn't make him do it as I never intended going into competition, but his neck must have felt stiff even back then. Loads of little things make sense now.
 
It's good that you have your referral, and I completely understand about looking forward to it, it does help having a neurologist to speak to. We had battled our old vet for months on Misty, after changing vets it only took a 20 minute consult to get our referral, and I felt nothing but relief at the time.

Try not to dwell on the signs you think you may have missed, I was very angry with myself for not changing vets sooner, but someone on here pointed out it does no good to kick yourself over it. Hindsight is indeed a great thing :rolleyes:

I never had any videos to show Allison when I went to Glasgow on Monday, I just wrote down a list of Misty's symptoms beforehand. Again, that advice was from someone on here, I forget who, my memory has been terrible lately. It was just in case I forgot anything on the day, as it can be very overwhelming, I felt sick to my stomach waiting in reception.
 
Lets see if this works...a photo of Blues scan, not very good quality but you get the idea. I pick up the hard copy today.

IMG_4386.jpg
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Goodness me!

Now i've never seen an MRI of a Border Collie but even I can see that isn't normal,

I presume the big white blob in his brain is the Hydrocephalus and his spine is almost white in colour and surely should be grey!!

I'm so pleased that the Pastoral Club are taking such an interest, its things like this (getting info early) that will make all the difference!

I'm not saying that SM is an issue in the Border Collie BUT maybe eith early intervention it won't be a problem in the future!!!
 
yes, those are his enlarged ventricles & as you can see his syrinx is huge! in cross section in places you can hardly see any healthy cord. yet today he is bouncing round our warehouse at work trying to trip me up with a burst football, apart from the occasional wobble you wouldnt think he had anything wrong with him! he is a Fantastic dog & i am so proud of his ability to cope! :l*v:
 
Blue has been to see Mr Skerritt at Chestergates....he was really kind to us and very helpful. We have decided to stick to the meds for the time being, we can half his frusemide dose, stick with the omeprazole and gabapentin, and look at dropping his steroid dose. We chatted about a ventricular shunt but I am really loathe to rock the boat, in that a few weeks ago I thought I would never see my dog run on a beach again, or climb the stairs again, but Blue is so joyous in himself at the moment and loving his walks etc, his foot drag has disappeared and apart from the occasional wobble and his eyes getting red on occasion, you wouldn't know he had anything wrong with him. So you can see why I am reluctant to Put him through a big operation. Maybe if he started to become tolerant to the omeprazole or showed signs of deterioration I might consider it, but at the moment it's just so nice to have my chirpy chappy back! We go back in three months but will do a monthly progress report. I'm very pleased we saw Mr Skerritt, he has answered lots of questions and given us a sense of direction.
 
I'm glad you had such a good experience but more glad that Blue is doing so well. Omeprazole seems like the miracle drug for him. Isn't it great to have your dog back? That's how I felt when Riley started on prednisone. Hopefully Blue will stay this way for a long, long time - especially since he's still so young. Keep coming on this board and let us know how he is. He's an honorary cavalier.
 
He's an honorary cavalier.
lol....:badgrin:.....its easy to look out for every little stumble etc and get paranoid.....dogs have the blissful ignorance of what is in store for them & live for the moment....i'm trying to take a leaf out of his book!
IMG_5688.jpg

This was him on penrhyn beach after the appointment....not bad for a dog with 80% of his spinal cord in his neck obliterated by this pesky syrinx!
 
What a gorgeous dog! Glad you had a good meeting at Chestergates! All of my dogs have been MRI'd there. :)

Thanks for posting a copy of the MRI–very interesting to see. You can definitely see how enlarged the ventricles are. It is interesting to see that this does not seem at all to be SM based on the Chiari malformation though, as that isn't present as far as I can see. When you talked to Clare Rusbridge or Geoff Skerritt did they give you any indication of why they thought Blue had developed syringomyelia?

With cavaliers, it is closely linked to the malformation and the skull being too small for the size of the brain–which seems in turn to be due to the fact that as others have noted, the skull & the brain do not communicate well with each other as they develop (some of the results that have come back from the cavalier fetal tissue research and which would correspond with some of the ideas put forward by researchers –for some reason, there is a mismatch by the time the puppies begin to grow). The skull malformation seems to be linked to the shorter muzzle of cavaliers and other short faced breeds–research has shown that a lot of structures get completely turned around when dogs are bred for a shorter nose (and a lot of people are beginning to feel this is one of the things that is probably going to have to go in the breed and other breeds with the same problem, to bring back any level of breed health).

Collies, of course, would not have this problem–and also would not be known for having syringomyelia. Thus I am wondering if either of these neurologists suggested a cause for Blue's SM? I know it can be caused by a severe impact, for example, or as a form of congenital spinal bifida in some breeds, but I would also guess if there is some other type of internal malformation or obstruction, it could also develop.

We are all so used to thinking of cavaliers alone, which have one particular reason for having SM, that it is easy to forget that there are many other possible causes of the condition. I wouldn't think that Blue would have SM for the same reason that cavaliers have SM, although the end result, and all the frustrating difficulties and challenges, are the same. And, the treatments would be the same I should think, which is where a lot of us have a lot of experience that I hope will continue to be helpful to you and to Blue. :flwr:
 
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