QUESTION

Our puppy has always been extremely lively and in perfect health up until 2 days ago when she suddenly had a fit in her sleep. She came round after about 3-4 minutes and we called the vet which told us to bring her in the next day. She had another fit before then 6 hours later. We took her to the bets the next morning where they took blood. She then proceeded to have another fit 11 hours after the 2nd. We got the results of the blood tests and they came back negative. She had another fit some 15.5 hours after the 3rd. They seem to be happening at longer intervals but what on earth could have caused a healthy dog to suddenly have fits like this? It seems too much to suddenly be eppalepsy?! please help as the vets don't seem to know what it might be.

Donna

ANSWER

Dear Donna,
Dogs that suddenly start having fits that get progressive are always a worry that there will be an underlying cause. In cavaliers there is a specific disease situation that occurs that can come on around this age where they get a buildup of CSF (fluid around the brain) and this can lead to collapsing episodes or epilepsy. I have gone blank on the name at the moment but it is only diagnosed by use of testing by MRI scanning. The other things that should be looked at are having someone look at a sample of the CSF to see if there is anything else going on there as you could have a meningitis of infectious or inflammatory origin going on. The use of phenobarbitone and other drugs to suppress the fits may be indicated irrespective of the cause but the investigations to find the cause are best done if you want to know an answer. Sometimes these fits can still be idiopathic and therefore have no identifiable cause but at least then we know why we treat them with phenobarbitone.

Paul Wilson