My heart is in my stomach............I just got off the phone with the board certified internal medicine veterinarian. Barney went in to have an abdominal ultrasound because of a mild but persistently elevated liver enzyme. So I wanted to make sure we did not miss anything.
To make a long story short, Barney's liver is showing some mild changes to the architecture which may be due to age, left over inflammation from his pancreatitis episode last year, or some unknown liver disease (cancer, copper storage deficiancy, etc). The only way to know about the liver is to do a biopsy, which I am not doing because (1) Barney is not showing clinical signs or symptoms of illness and (2) a biopsy needs to be invasive to be worthwhile and there is a risk of internal bleeding and death which is increased in a dog of his size (8.5 lbs). He will be treated with liver antioxidants, denosyl, marin and another drug I forgot the name of but will post later...it started with a "u". Pancreas looked good.
Then we get to the kidneys........and they were showing "bright" on the ultrasound. Two mildly elevated kidney values as well on blood work last month.
Concern: DOES BARNEY HAVE AN INFECTION, AND IF SO, IS IT LEPTOSPIROSIS.
LEPTOSPIROSIS? WHAT??!!! This as my WORST FEAR stopping the vaccine and not taking the advice of my vet who said to vaccinate him for it. I bantered back and forth about this - NO LEPTO NO LEPTO NO LEPTO. Finally dropped the vet for persisting and annoying me with it.
Where did this leave me? Testing my Barney for LEPTO.
I'm sick to my stomach, I feel like throwing up.
As an aside and to share...........I asked the specialist "what is your opinion about the lepto vaccine especially in small breeds.."
Here was his answer, an exact quote:
"I have seen enough cases of leptospirosis in dogs we could not help to SCARE me enough to vaccinate my own dogs." One of which is a small dog around 15 lbs.
I went further - what about reactions in toy breeds and risk.... The recommendation was to VACCINATE my dogs. His opinon: the risk of reactions in the current lepto vaccine was not any greater than any other vaccine and greatly outweighs the risk.
I am hoping and praying to god that Barney does not have this disease becasue I will not be able to live with myself for not vaccinating them the last couple of years.
Once again I'm reminded that I do not know more than my vets and I'm just sick over this. I'm hoping in 5 days from now I do not hear that he has it.
