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Spoiler aside, it all sounds good Smallie. I'm happy for all of you!
 
We are all thrilled to death. Thank you for the continued updates Smalls.
 
That is great new Smallville. I am also really glad they are reducing his dosage of Prednisone. When I was a kid we had an Old English Sheep dog who had to go on that and because the doctor didn't reduce the meds like yours is doing it messed up his liver pretty bad. We switched vets after that and that's when we found out the same thing you did, that that medicine isn't great for the liver. Sounds like Bandit is in great hands (both the doctor and his parents)!!
 
The PUG! Thanks for the link!

I was on heaps of pred for many years, I remember all the blood tests and the hunger :starving:.
Spoiler
For the record, I never ate my poop. Can't say I'm familiar with that side effect.
 
I'm glad you didn't
Spoiler
eat your poop, Julie!
 
Sounds like everything is getting better Smalls. :good:
 
From his March 16 exam: Best results yet. Platelets are at 203,000. They have held steady for the past month and a half, ranging between 180 and 207 since the first part of February. White blood is at the lowest levels since this all happened. In fact everything is within the reference range and has been for at least the last month. This month’s tests showed everything moving more toward the middle points of all the different readings they took. He’s down to half a pill a day of Prednisone (10 mg, down from 20 mg two weeks ago and down from the 60 they started him at). He’s still taking one pill every other day of Azathioprene and his liver pill, one pill every day.

He’s up to 68 pounds so we are going to start cutting back his food to 2 cups per meal (had been 2-1/2 for a while now) because the last thing we need is a fat Bandit. He’s getting better with the steps, climbing the deck steps pretty quickly now; still can’t get upstairs from downstairs without help. He also tried to jump up on the bed this weekend. Well kind of. We tried to get him to use the ramp but he wanted to jump up. The best way to describe it is he looked like Phil Mickelson winning the Masters. His butt end didn’t move but his front feet got about two or three inches off the ground! He’ll go back in again next week.

They noticed something with his knee that they want to keep an eye on; but it’s a side effect of the Prednisone in their patients with joint issues that they can’t really look at real good until he’s off it. The doctor said most of the time it goes back to normal after the pred is over but sometimes they have to go in and fix it. So we’ll worry about that if needed.
 
Yay, Bandit!
 
Bandit’s checkup from March 31 went so well that they told us to bring him in once a month instead of every other week. Platelets were at 227,000 and his liver enzymes were half of what they were a month ago. He also gained another three pounds so he’s up to 71 now. We are cutting back on his food to his normal one cup plus a little wet in the evenings. We are continuing to feed him two cups in the morning. They don’t want him to gain much more weight because of the joint issues. The most he ever weighed was 75 a couple of years ago.

The doctor is leery about taking him off the Prednisone because she doesn’t want to see a relapse since he almost died earlier. So we’ll see where the platelets are in a month and maybe go down to every other day like the Azathioprene. He’s already down to half a tablet of Pred a day now. They won’t be able to address the knee as long as he’s still on the Pred so I’m hoping they at least cut it back next time. He did stand on his back legs, on his own, with help from the couch. But he couldn’t make it up on the seat. But we hadn’t seen him try before so that was cool. I’ll update this after the next check-up.

There haven’t been a whole lot changes in his condition in a while, everything seems to be leveling out and staying pretty consistent. Medically, his levels are fine. We just need to get him off the medicine and see if he can do it on his own.
 
Great news Smallie.
 
We took Bandit in yesterday afternoon for another checkup. They are taking him off the prednisone and we are going to use up the last three or four liver enzyme pills so once those are gone, we'll only be giving him the azathioprene every other day. His joints are much better and they want him off the pred to see if his floating kneecap will go back to normal (it likely will, they said). In two weeks he'll go in to see the doctor about the knee and see how it is doing (they can't diagnose it while still on pred). All of his blood counts are in the acceptable range and his liver enzymes are way down from last month (and they were way down then as well).

In the last couple of weeks he has stood up on his hind legs on his own with help only from the couch and I got him to start using the ramp again so he's been getting on and off the bed all day long again. He gained another 1.5 pounds so he is up to 73 (he was as low as 55) so he's gonna lose half of what he eats in the morning (he is back to what we gave him before all of this happened). We don't want that extra weight to stay, they want him between 65 and 70 pounds.

His platelets were down slightly from last time (but still well in the acceptable range) but they had trouble getting an accurate count because his blood was clotting (which is the point of all of this we have been doing, so that's the best news of them all).
 
That's great to hear Smalls. :alien2:
 
great to hear and good luck
 
Fabulous news, Smallie--congrats to all of you! It's been a long, hard road.
 
The vet had us buy something called Synovi G3. It's a supplement for his joints. Hope that stuff helps.
 
Is that doggie glucosamine? Or more like synvisc?
 
Pretty much:

SynoviG3 is a new generation of Synovi nutritional supplements. SynoviG3 is available in Chewable Tablets, Granules and the NEW Soft Chew formulation, each containing Glucosamine and Perna Canaliculus to revitalize the joint matrix, rebuild cartilage, insulate the bone from friction and cushion the joint in movement and Creatine to help develop the strength and endurance of the muscles, tendons and ligaments surrounding the joint. Also contains MSM, a naturally occurring nutrient that helps relieve the pain involved in arthritic joints, Omega-3 Fatty Acids which have shown significant anti-inflammatory properties, and antioxidants to prevent damage by free radicals, unstable oxygen molecules that can cause cellular damage. SynoviG3 is a truly complete geriatric supplement for your pet.
Click to expand...
 
Best of luck...hope that it does the trick and he's able to be stable with just the supplements.It's pretty tough on ya when your children are sick.
 
SynoviG3 is a truly complete geriatric supplement for your pet.
Click to expand...

Ya know, that's not the word I needed to read.
 
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