Diarrhea! Any suggestions ....

[cagham]

We have had Sylas our 9 week old puppy for a week and a half and in that time he has only had 1-2 days where his stools have been semi firm.
We had given him canned puppy food with dry food until I read on this site about food allergies so I started him on puppy mince with cooked potato and carrots. That went ok for about 2 days now his stools are nearly like water. Am taking him to vet tomorrow but wanted advice from boxer owners as vets
receptionist told me to put on a complete dry food diet. This went straight through him. We are so worried about him. Any suggestions?

 

[gmacleod]

What is it with vet's receptionists that they like to give medical advice without consulting the doctor? LOL - I wouldn't take (or even be given) advice by a human doctor's receptionist when I was phoning about an ailment - I would see the one with the medical training (as opposed to the one with the secretarial training) every time.

At 9 weeks, it is unlikely to be a food allergy. I think you're better off with the canned or homecooked food for an upset tummy than with dry also - but in any case, that may not be the problem here. Very likely, the loose stool may be caused by either parasites or some form of protozoan infection such as coccidia. Both are very common in puppies. To find that out though, and to get appropriate treatment if it's needed, you need to see the doctor

Really, I'd take the young guy along and let a vet take a look at him. If there's a problem, or if there's no problem beyond an upset tummy, let someone with actual medical training make that call.

 

[ELubas]

Hi. Both my girls cme to me with coccidia and were teh age your pup is. It is a nasty little parasite but easily treated with no lasting effect. It causes awful stool, runny and odd colored. Meds will clear him up but as gmacleod said only a vet can diagnose it. Might want to bring a stool sample as I bet they will want one. Good luck and keep us posted

 

[matrok]

How is your puppy doing today? Were you able to get him into the vet?

 

[cagham]

I kept him on the chicken mince and vegies yesterday (Sunday) for breakfast and lunch and gave him chicken necks for his tea and by late last night he had firmed up again so I will keep an eye on him and if anything changes I will get him straight to the vet. Hopefully I was panicking. He got into cat food which may not have helped him. I have discovered a good pet food shop in town which has plenty of fresh meat including kangaroo which is interesting. I don't suppose many of you members would know how boxers react to eating roo. I will introduce it to him slowly and see how he goes. I like to idea of the BARF diet so I have to do my studies on this. Can this diet be summarized or is it a bit more involved than that?