[Dailydrool] Getting a dog to eat

[Pamela McQuade]

My poor Horton has had diarrhea and trouble eating for a while now. It
began when he started limping and went to the vet's for that. Initially I
thought he was responding badly to one of the drugs he was on , so we
stopped it, then started it again when he seemed to improve for a while.
After restarting it, he began to have a poor appetite and then didn't want
to eat at all, even when I stopped the offending medication again. My vet
prescribed metronidazole, but when he wouldn't eat, she said not to give it
to him.

On top of this, my poor boy has had really nasty diarrhea. I think there
may be blood in the stool, though two weeks ago, when he had seemed to
improve, we did a fecal and he was fine.

Yesterday we went to an emergency vet, spent about six hours waiting to see
a vet, then was told he needed an ultrasound.. We had to leave him
overnight because the guy who did the ultrasound was booked until the wee
hours of the morning.

The results of the ultrasound didn't show anything conclusive (isn't that a
thrill?). They said something about his having some benign lumps, like the
ones bassets commonly get on the outside, but they do not seem to be
concerned it is cancer. His adrenal glands had something funny going on,
but not enough that the ultrasound guy thought it  was anything to
worry about--just  keep an eye on it, we were told.

Because Horton is such a nervous boy, the ER vets had to treat him with
medication to keep him calm, which evidently works against his eating well,
so they sent him home this morning, telling us to feed him anything he
liked in human food. I have given him Entyce and have metronidazole to give
him when he eats.

I tried giving him chicken the other day, which he usually loves, but no
go. Just now I gave him some ground beef, of which he ate a little but not
enough to be considered a real meal . I will keep trying, but it's a real
challenge..

Has anyone had such a situation with their basset? What do you all use to
get a hound eating?
Pam, food slave to the only current Dashing Basset
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