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Hypoglycemic Puppy Won't Eat After Nutri-Cal

Daisy

We got a 7 week old Yorkie puppy Tuesday. Wednesday she had to be taken to the vet with seizures. They believed it was hypoglycemia, perked her back up and said if she does it again come back. She started it again this morning so I took her back to the vet's office. Again, hypoglycemia. She ate just before we went to bed last night but sometime during the night this all came on. (She ate probably 5 times yesterday.) Food and water are left out so all she has to do is eat. Today they gave me a tube of Nutri-Cal and told me to give it to her every 30 minutes til she eats. That was about 11am, it's now almost 9pm and she still won't eat. Has only taken a sip or two of water all day. All she does is sleep. I don't know if that gel is making her full so she isn't getting hungry or if the problem is bigger than that. Her stool is now pure water. I was told not to force her to eat.

What do I do? I can't afford to take her to the emergency clinic since the puppy itself was so expensive then two vet trips in less than a week. The emergency vet wouldn't give advice without an office visit. Can you please help?

Symptoms: Lethargy, No Appetite & Anorexia, Diarrhea, Seizures & Fits

• Master Advisor Matthew says:

  September 01st, 2008 at 05:08 PM

  Hi

  I have encountered this problem quite a few times before, it seems to only happen in Yorkie puppies, ie it is breed related. Unfortunately the only solution is to syringe feed the puppy every 2 hours, throughout day and night. If the puppy won't eat by itself, it has to be force fed with liquified food in a syringe. In our clinic, we advise using a food called Hills a/d, which is like a meaty puree that can be made runny enough to suck up ito a syringe by adding water and stirring it to the right consistency.

  Your puppy could have a liver shunt or something, which would unfortunately require surgery at some point, but in the short term, without veterinary diagnostics and treatment in an emergency clinic, all you can really do is the forced syringe feeding to keep the glucose levels up.

  Also make sure the puppy is kept warm as they can get hypothermia very easily.

  Good luck

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