NAUSEATED BOXER ... Can you help us?

[Haarhoff]

About Titan: He is a 2 year old rescue (our first dog!) we adopted about 7 weeks ago. His vet checks, heartworm testing, castration, etc. were all taken care of by the rescue before we received him. He weighs about 70lbs.

Symptoms: These nausea spells consists of him swallowing really loud, licking his chops, drooling alot (mostly water looking) and gagging. Occasionally, he will throw up (the vomit no longer resembles kibble). We take him outside and he eats grass like crazy, which actually seems to settle his stomach.

Frequency: Titan can go a week without any nausea "spells" and then suddenly he has problems. For instance, he had three spells just this week. They typically last from 3 to 6 hours.

Based on the symptoms, we do NOT believe this is related to:
kennel cough
reverse swallowing
acid reflux - (We shortened the time between feedings without positive results)
toncilitis

Feeding: He gets 2 cups of kibble in the morning around 6:00 a.m. (1.5 c Blue Buffalo, 0.5 c Purina Sensitive Stomach) and 1 cup around 5:00 p.m. We use a toy in his food bowl to slow down his eating. For an occasional treat, he gets a Kong filled with probiotic yogurt. We do give him a little bit of pumpkin to settle his stomach during his nausea spells, but it really doesn't help much. After eating (whether he's feeling good or not), he'll usually go lay down for a few hours.

Excercise: We take him to a private, fenced-in yard (no access to other dogs) where he runs HARD and plays for about 30 minutes a day. We watch him closely, and he does not eat any plants or odd things there that might be causing this.

Thoughts??/What we've observed:
Could the Kong be causing his nausea? He sucks on it like a bottle to get the food completely out.

He sleeps nearly 18 to 22 hours a day. When sleeping, he seems fine (snores some). But, when he's having a nausea spell, as soon as he stands up or lifts his head, he starts gagging/drooling. All he wants to do is press his head into your chest and be scratched OR stare at a wall OR go back to his bed.

He sheds like crazy - I cannot even describe the amounts of hair he loses every day (even after daily, vigorous brushing with a Zoom Groom) We thought this might have been due to the stress of moving to a new home, but he doesn't act stressed out... just sick when he's having these nausea spells.

PLEASE, if you have any experience with this type of issue and would take a just few minutes to offer some advice, I would appreciate it. I'm open to ALL ideas and opinions. THANK YOU!!!

 

[avaboxer]

Advise hope it helps.

Being that the vet came out good is a good thing.
Boxers are very different from alot of breeds of dogs...

Grass can cause boxer coilitis according to my vet.

Yogurt gave my boxer excessive gas and some other things.
IF gas can not escape their stomachs it can cause vomiting and several symptoms. The dog will not feel good and have an "upset" stomach and therefore they eat grass to try to calm their stomach.

I would take the yogurt probiotic away and see if the spells loosen up.
I would also try some gas busters for dogs to see if it helps these sick spells.

ALso, watch his bowel movements and make sure there isn't alot of liquid in them. If you are really concerned and he keeps having them after taking away yogurt and giving him gas busters I would contact vet to see what opitions are.

My FIL gave my dog vienna sausages and yogurt and she quit eating completely at 9wks old. The vet told me to get Karopectate (not sure if spelled right) the only place I could find it was walgreens. Since your dog is no longer a puppy I would go with a gas reliever or gas buster and see if it alleviates him. Boxers can have food allergies to dog food too and Purina isn't one of the best brands. Look up food analysis reviews on here.

My boxer has to have a four to five star food to keep her normal. She was allergic to purina science diet and she got coilitis on blue buffalo. I hope this helps.

I feed her Wellness for dogs.

For the hair loss, make sure he doesn't have any bumps as Ava had infected follicles that caused her to lose hair and make sure vet does skin scrapping if you take him to vet. I spent several hundred dollars trying to get her to stop losing hair and stop having bumps.









.

 

[BxrMommieNAZ]

Have you tried changing foods? I would dump the purina it's an extremely low grade food and may be causing part of the issues. Blue Buffalo just went through a recall so it may be worth trying a different food (preferably grain free) to see if this makes any difference. Also dairy (ie yogurt) can cause issues with some dogs. If you want the benefits of the probiotic without the dairy I'd recommend acidophilus/probiotic capsules (you can get them in the vitamin aisle of any store for humans). Also pumpkin isn't for an upset stomach it's for constipation or diarrhea. Best thing you can do for nausea (if it isn't caused by hunger) is to remove all food for 24 hours to let the stomach settle down. I would also recommend giving equal amounts of food at each feeding, looks like you give 3 cups total per day so I would do 1 1/2 cups at each feeding.

If you switch foods and you do not see any changes, then I'd say it's time for a vet visit.

Good luck!

 

[silly24boxer]

Switch the feeding times! It too long between meals for your dog. Try it this works for so many boxers on here. I had the same problem took me alot of vet bills to figure this out. Feed at 6am 2pm and 10 pm every 8 hrs and a good size snack before bed. Gauge has the same thing its the bile in his stomach making him sick. On some boxers if they re stomach is empty they drool, vomit, shiver and shake in my case and refuse food because they feel ill. Try it and let me know if it works,

Darlene and Gauge!

 

[Haarhoff]

Thanks for all the great advice! About the food we actually picked up a bag of the Blue Buffalo Wilderness (Salmon-no grain) and we will work this into his diet and get rid of the Purina. While at the same time changing his feeding schedule.
We actually have acidophilus/probiotic capsules in the house so we will start including that once the switch food. I don't want to make to many changes at once. Talking about capsules we have been giving him fish oil capsules. Is that ok or should a person break them over the food?
Titan has no problems taking pills as he would eat anything you give him. Also been reading alot of good results from Hokamix, any opinions on the supplement? Again thanks and will keep you updated in the results we see, have a Merry Christmas!!

 

[BxrMommieNAZ]

Thanks for all the great advice! About the food we actually picked up a bag of the Blue Buffalo Wilderness (Salmon-no grain) and we will work this into his diet and get rid of the Purina. While at the same time changing his feeding schedule.
We actually have acidophilus/probiotic capsules in the house so we will start including that once the switch food. I don't want to make to many changes at once. Talking about capsules we have been giving him fish oil capsules. Is that ok or should a person break them over the food?
Titan has no problems taking pills as he would eat anything you give him. Also been reading alot of good results from Hokamix, any opinions on the supplement? Again thanks and will keep you updated in the results we see, have a Merry Christmas!!

Whole fish oil capsules are just fine to give whole.

 

[doodlesmom]

sensitive stomache

our boxer rocky went through similar thing...we give him pepcid 2x a day he gets fed 4x a day....every 4 hours 3tbsp kibble and yams and water....he also gets a snack before bed every night (we also give him activia light and skim milk) hope this helps

 

[BxrMommieNAZ]

our boxer rocky went through similar thing...we give him pepcid 2x a day he gets fed 4x a day....every 4 hours 3tbsp kibble and yams and water....he also gets a snack before bed every night (we also give him activia light and skim milk) hope this helps

Make sure on the yogurt (Activia) it's the plain version as the flavored stuff has sugar and/or artificial sweetners which can be deadly.

 

[Haarhoff]

Update and Thx for Advice!

Hello. Just wanted to give an update on Titan's health and say "thank you" to everyone who took the time to reply to our question. We have made many of the changes you've suggested (shorter times between feedings, unflavored yogurt, Pepcid, dumping the Purina, etc.)

Update - Last week saw signs of nausea again, so we said "ENOUGH!" and took him to the vet. She suspected it might be liver related and did some blood tests, which ultimately came back normal. She also gave us a prescription for Sucralfate (2x daily) and asked us to get back in touch in a week if he was still having sick days.

It hasn't quite been a week yet, but he's still had 2 more days of nausea despite being on the Sucralfate. I think we'll be bringing him back in on Wednesday for further testing.

Despite this outcome, we're thankful to you all for the wonderful advice; we've learned so much from you. And, we'll keep updating this thread if we learn more about what is causing this.

 

[Lisa H]

I am sorry to hear about Titan. We are in the same boat. Justice has had bouts of vomitting for 13 months now. She refuses to eat, her stomach starts making terrible noises and then she throws up. She is typically fine an hour or so after she vomits. It use to be yellow bile but know it is just white foam. We too are on Sucralfate and thyroxine. We have been to the vet over a half a dozen times including a gastro specialist in Buffallo. We have changed food, increased feedings, been on several meds, had ultrasounds, xrays, blood work, fecal tests...you name it...we have done it. She actually began vomiiting shortly after having a MCT removed and has never stopped. We have seen 4 different vets at 2 facilities and all state that she is healthy and they cannot find anything wrong with her...it is infuriating not knowing what is wrong and not being able to help her. On one occassion, the vomitting was so bad she was having a hard time breathing. My vet gave me an injection to take home and use if it ever got that bad again. That was 7/4/10. It hasn't been that severe since...thank god! I wish you luck and hope that you find answers for Titan.

Lisa and Justice