Seizures.... Cause?

For those of you who have dogs with frequent seizures. Do you treat them with gabapentin or lyrica or have you tried other things? And if your dogs have frequent seizures have they been diagnosed with epilepsy or SM or both?

My dogs don't have seizures, but my friends who do have dogs with seizure treat with anti-seizure meds. Phenobarbitol (sp?) is one and I'm not sure of the other but I would highly recommend you see a veterinary neurologist who will have the best perspective on which medicines your cavalier needs. BTW, my friends who have cavaliers with seizures do not have dogs with diagnosed SM. (not to say they may not have it and it may be undiagnosed, don't know …)

Any dog that is seizing should definitely be evaluated by a vet asap. Most of the time, the reason will be epilepsy, and there is a fairly high incidence of this in the breed, especially in wholecolours (rubies and B&Ts). Generally it is treated with phenobarbitol or other seizure medicines; though gabapentin and lyrica are used as anti-seizure meds in humans I have never actually heard of them being used for this in dogs.

If the seizures are due to SM or hydrocephalus, then there may be a different approach to management. Other things could also cause seizures as well.

SM generally is pretty severe if it is causing seizures and a neurologist would really be the place to start to consider that possibility -- a dog seizing from SM should probably be on a mixture of meds for SM. A vet would be able to test for epilepsy though, and that is where I'd start asap. Most epileptic dogs can be managed fairly well on daily meds or should have meds available if they start to seize. You'd also want to be sure the seizures are not actually episodic falling syndrome -- there's a simple DNA test for that.

I'd have the same experience as Lani -- I know many cavaliers that have epilepsy, and have only ever known of a couple that seize due to SM.

My boy Joe has had idiopathic epilepsy (probably stress related) since he was a young puppy going out for the first time, but his daily Phenobarb tabs keep it well under control. Gabapentin has never been considered.

Rebel had SM/CM and was symptomatic from about 8 years old until his symptoms were too severe for him to carry on any more just before his 12th birthday. He was treated with Gabapentin, among other medicines, but never experienced seizures.

Thank you for all of the responses. Sonny has definitely been seen by my vet several time since he started having seizures. The first time it happened was in the middle of the night so we rushed him to the emergency vet where they did a variety of tests but said they weren't able to pin point a specific cause for seizure however they did mention he was at the exact age of usual onset for epilepsy. I have been recording date, time, duration of every seizure and being in contact with my vet after every one. My concern is they are getting more frequent. My vet had told us that medication for epilepsy was obviously our choice but that once we started it he would have to take it forever and if we ever missed a dose he could have a major seizure that kills him. He also told us that the seizures are not painful for Sonny and that although it is traumatic for us to watch Sonny doesn't know what is going on. The intensity of the medication made my husband and I decide to hold off on giving it to Sonny until the seizures became too regular since in the beginning it was only every two months. I have discussed SM with my vet a lot and he said obviously the only way to diagnose would be through MRI. His guess is Sonny's seizures are not related to SM because he feels we would be seeing other symptoms. I think we will eventually do a MRI sometime this year to hopefully rule out SM. There is a good neurologist about an hour from us.

Oh another interesting thing my vet told us was that there is some research talking about a connection between food allergies and seizures. He said that there is a special prescription food that we could try and he has had about 50% success rate with it stopping seizures in dogs he has tried it with. I think thats going to be our first try, but deep down I don't think it going to help.

Did the phenobarb stop your dogs seizures or just reduce? My vet warned me that the medication will not stop them completely, but will hopefully decrease the intensity of them and decrease the frequency.

The phenobarb stopped LJ's seizures completely so far as I know. It is always possible of course that he had some episodes during the night when I was sleeping, but as his bedding is never disturbed, I doubt it.

There are various doseages of phenobarb. My boy has 30 mgs twice a day. Would a stronger dose perhaps be more likely to stop your dog's seizures completely?