Those who know about Cushings Disease in Dogs.

[lisaross]

Well last week i wrote about my dog having to urinate so often..having accidents, and drinking so much water..We had him go for blood work - all came back normal..urine test came back negative and when they tested his blood for Cushings, it came back at a 33 - 34 or over means he has cushings. Dr. now wants him to come in for an 8 hour test which is much more thorough to see if it will rule out Cushings - if thats ruled out he thinks we need to go see a specialist which could run about 1000.00 to do more extensive ultrasounds i think...

oh boy!!!

We have been walking him much more often so we don't have any accidents, and also limiting his water - not sure if thats a good idea or not..he is also eating more...

 

[LUV4EEYORE]

Hi. Sorry to hear about your dog. My dog was diagnosed at age 11 last november. We had the same problems with the contant urinating etc. I never saw a specialist, my vet did the 8 hour test and maybe one other and it told him that Rex had cushings and that it was not the malignant type. We started him on Vetoryl (about $75 a month) and he did awesome. He was very close to being back to normal. It is not easy to diagnosis but once we knew my dog thrived on the medicine. We had to put him to sleep 5 weeks ago do to bladder cancer but not cushings go figure. If you have any questions I will try to help. I will tell you it took about a month to get the medicine in his system enough to start helping and they need follow up blood work but my vet let me do that less than needed because of cost.

I was also going to tell you my vet said not to limit the water, because their adrenal gland is producing to much steroid they really are thirsty and hungry and can get dehydrated. That all got better on the medicine.

 

[WishIwerethere]

I have a dog whom the vet preliminarily diagnosed with Cushings -- I ended up spending several hundred dolllars on additional testing which were "inconclusive" in that vet's view. This same vet told me that my young dog (approximately 1 year old at the time) had a huge heart murmur. When I had a different vet check them out, no heart murmur at all in the young dog and no Cushings in the old one -- that was probably 1-1/2 years ago and both dogs are still going strong, without Cushings or any heart murmur.

My old dog -- 14 years old -- had the same symptoms as yours: lots of accidents. Those symptoms ultimately stopped some weeks later. The second vet said she could have just had an infection which cleared up (can't recall whether he gave her any mediciation).

Bottom line -- I would not pay what you have been quoted for additional testing. I would get a second opinion first.

 

[lisaross]

so sorry to hear about the passing of ur dog...

I hope to get a answer soon. My vet is doing the 8-hour test tomorrow - he said if it does Not show Cushings then he will refer me to a specialist. I hope i get an answer soon. We are now waking up in the middle of the night to give him a walk - we tried gating him in the kitchen, but he stays up crying all night...

Hi. Sorry to hear about your dog. My dog was diagnosed at age 11 last november. We had the same problems with the contant urinating etc. I never saw a specialist, my vet did the 8 hour test and maybe one other and it told him that Rex had cushings and that it was not the malignant type. We started him on Vetaryl (about $75 a month) and he did awesome. He was very close to being back to normal. It is not easy to diagnosis but once we knew my dog thrived on the medicine. We had to put him to sleep 5 weeks ago do to bladder cancer but not cushings go figure. If you have any questions I will try to help. I will tell you it took about a month to get the medicine in his system enough to start helping and they need follow up blood work but my vet let me do that less than needed because of cost.

 

[LUV4EEYORE]

Thanks....It is hard at first dealing with the going out at night. We were up to every hour at night before they diagnosed him and he got the medicine and we could not ignore it (tried) he cried and paced. Good luck.

 

[lisaross]

He does not think he has cushings, BUT his blood work came back normal as did the urine test for a urinary infection = so he just wants to rule out the cushings and then he is not sure why my dog would still be drinking so much, peeing etc so the next step would be to go to a specialist..

I have a dog whom the vet preliminarily diagnosed with Cushings -- I ended up spending several hundred dolllars on additional testing which were "inconclusive" in that vet's view. This same vet told me that my young dog (approximately 1 year old at the time) had a huge heart murmur. When I had a different vet check them out, no heart murmur at all in the young dog and no Cushings in the old one -- that was probably 1-1/2 years ago and both dogs are still going strong, without Cushings or any heart murmur.

My old dog -- 14 years old -- had the same symptoms as yours: lots of accidents. Those symptoms ultimately stopped some weeks later. The second vet said she could have just had an infection which cleared up (can't recall whether he gave her any mediciation).

Bottom line -- I would not pay what you have been quoted for additional testing. I would get a second opinion first.

 

[luvsmickeymouse]

I lost our 13 year old poodle from Cushings. She didn't do well on the treatment. The vet said there were other problems with her as well. I am sorry that you are going through this, it wasn't easy.

 

[kaysmommie]

My 16.5 year old Shih Tzu had Cushings. Meds didn't seem to make a huge difference in her. But she drank tons of water and had an HUGE appetite as well. She had it for about 3 years and then got diagnosed with Renal Failure this past April Still miss her very much! So sorry you are going through this. I hope your vet is able to figure out what is wrong and able to to give your pup the proper meds. I think cushings is slightly more manageable than Renal disease. Though they can usually put them on a special diet for that. It was too late for my dog though. Just 6 weeks ago I gave in and bought the kids a pug puppy. Good luck to you and keep us posted.

 

[zumbergc]

the peeing alot. I'm guessing they did a blood glucose check on the dog. Drinking tons and peeing, diabetic? Blood glucose should have been checked along the way, in standard blood work.

 

[LuLuO]

My dog Bella (rescue dog between 12 and 14 years old) was diagnosed about six weeks ago. Routine bloodwork showed that a liver enzyme was extremely elevated. This led the vet to suspect cushings, along with her ravenous appetite and increased water consumption.

Bella was hard to diagnose and after doing the 8 hour supression test it was still inconclusive so we did a test through the University of TN and it turns out she has Atypical Cushings. We loaded her on Lysodren for 10 days and had her tested again and everything looked great. Her appetite went back to "normal" and her water consumption decreased slightly but it has been very hot here so the vet said that wasn't a good meter at this time of year.

She has been on 1/2 a pill of Lysodren once a week for about 4 weeks and will be going in for another blood test this Thursday. Unfortunately in the last week her ravenous appetite has returned and she is peeing in the house again so I assume her water consumption is up again too. I haven't spoken to the vet about this yet but from what he told me before, this just means that we may need to increase her meds to 1/2 a pill twice a week instead of once a week and see how that goes.

I suggest visiting k9cushings.com because those people there are full of knowledge on this subject and it will at least help you get your head around what a diagnosis of cushings or atypical cushings means. If you can provide them with test results and other numbers then they can be much more helpful.

FYI our vet starts out with the least expensive tests first and then moves up if we so choose. $1000 for an ultrasound sounds outrageous to me and I would look for another place to get that done if necessary. Call around for sure. That said, you do want to go to a vet who is experienced in treating cushings because a lot of them are not. Ask how many cushings patients they have treated.

Also, we have not done an ultrasound on Bella. The test from the Univ. of TN showed her elevated hormones and that was enough for the diagnosis. We could do an ultrasound but I will not do surgery on our dog for adrenal tumors or pituitary tumors so I personally don't feel it to be necessary for us. There is no cure for cushings, there is simply managing the symptoms to make them and us more comfortable.

(((hugs)))

 

[lisaross]

yes, checked for diabetes..

All the blood is pretty much "normal"!! So frustrating - just want an answer.

Thanks everyone will post again when i get some more results...

My Ernie is a miniature poodle - 13 years old!

the peeing alot. I'm guessing they did a blood glucose check on the dog. Drinking tons and peeing, diabetic? Blood glucose should have been checked along the way, in standard blood work.

 

[meriface11]

we are going through the same thing right now with our 12 YO shepherd huskie mix. they did a 4 hour suppression test on her yesterday and we are waiting on the results. she's been drinking heavily and had a few accidents that the vet described as leaking. she's not herself--lethargic, just lays on the cool floor. this is the 3rd vet we have taken her to. the first 2 said nothing was wrong with her and it was probably just a liver or bladder infection. we really like this 3rd vet, so hopefully he comes up with something concrete. whether it's treatable or not, we would just like to know either way. it's been very stressful not knowing whether something is really wrong or whether she's just aged really quickly in the last few months.