This is all the stuff Lola is currently on - mostly for her urinary incontinence. (The link will take you to a good, succinct summary of the problem and the types of meds used to treat it.)
Left to Right we have...
Phenylpropanolamine (aka, Proin) (Dose: 3/day) It's an "alpha-adrenergic agonist" which means that it helps the bladder sphincter by telling it 'hold it more'.
DES (Diethylstilbestrol) (Dose: started with 1 every two days for a week and now is 1 per week) It's a type of estrogen; it's not clear why this works (See the link above about urinary incontinence for more details).
Imipramine (Dose: 2/day) It's an anticholinergic, which means it helps the bladder fibers relax and store urine. (It does this by increasing serotonin levels in the brain.)
Lipiderm (1 or 2 per day) This is a vitamin & fatty acids(fish oil) supplement to help with her skin & coat. Lola's coat always seemed a little dry (even with good dog food) & her skin is sensitive. (I tried adding the liquid version to her food, but she would have none of that.)
Hydroxizine (Dose: 2 tablets, 3 times/day as needed) This is for Lola's allergies (which seemed to have hit her hard this year).
Antibiotic (Dose: 2/day for 10 days) She's been on two types of antibiotics in the last 2.5 weeks. The first one was prescribed because her paws were a little raw from the allergies. The second was prescribed for a cut on one of her paws. I have yet to figure when or how she sliced her paw (though I'm starting to suspect a nail I discovered sticking through a piece of threadbare rug. Stupid apartment!)
Easy Cheese Just like me, Lola will eat just about anything smothered in cheese. :) And it really is the easiest way (for me) to give her her meds - no fuss, no muss.
This combination of meds seems to be working for her urinary incontinence. [If they hadn't, my vet said, the next thing to try would have been collagen injections on her bladder sphincter - how very LA. :) ]
She's very good about taking her pills (as far as she knows, she's getting cheese for doing nothing more than looking cute). However, she's a complete brat when I've tried to put neosporin or Bactine on her cuts/wounds.
She now has some itchiness on her jaw - I thought it may be allergies, but it appararently not (the hydroxizine helped with the itching, but it didn't seem to go away like her other allergy symptoms). It's probably a bug bite (She continues to chase flying bugs like she's the mightiest of fly hunters.) She's going back to the vet next week about that.
3 comments:
Quite a list! I can empathize! Glad to hear that you've found a combination that works. You;ll both be much happier, I'm sure.
In our house we used to wrap pills in lunchmeat and that worked wonders. Now, because of her diet issues, Kaylee can't take them with anything and we just shove them down her throat - and she's a good girl about it, as long as we give her an extra-special venison treat after each pill.
Then we discovered that Indy would take his pills wrapped in a peice of dried apple (one of Kaylee's few "treats"), and that's how we've been doing it for a couple months now. He doesn't seem to have noticed yet...
Yeah, I tried lunchmeat, too. Lola ate the meat & left the pill. Brat. :) Cream cheese (or any spreadable cheese works for Lola, too.
Man, what a list of pills.
Poor Lola. :(
Hope she feels better.
Post a Comment