Hi, don't know if anyone on here has ever had any experience of this.

My 5 year old girl, Leah, collapsed at a show in June, her walking got worse and worse until she could barely stagger back to the van (many thanks to those who helped, I was very upset and needed guidance re withdrawing from class etc)

anyway, my own vets had her for 4 days, proclaimed her liver to be of unusual shape, none of her enzymes seemed right, and their intention was to conduct a liver biopsy etc....

luckily (sort of) she was never well enough to have a GA, and then a decision was made that she would be better off having an MRI, for which I had to get approval from my insurance company, before taking her over to Chester for further treatment..

during her 4 day stay at my vets she had developed pressure sores on all legs and urine burns

the vets at Chester were great, she stayed a further 8 days with them, and although it was upsetting visiting her and seeing her when she had to be helped to walk with a great big sling, it never crossed my mind not to visit...the staff there had her on 2 mattresses and 2 duvets to ease her sores which were bandaged, and she was catheterised until she regained control of her waterworks

the MRI showed nothing untoward, no mechanical spinal problems, no infection (meningitis was considered) and certainly nothing at all wrong with her liver (it is believed that the steroids administered by my vets skewed all her liver results )

so the only opinion left is that she had suffered a spinal stroke and she would slowly regain her walking and toileting..

she is now, 2 months later, back home, with her shaved bits, she is happy, likes to have a little run on her own now and then, though she doesn't have the speed or stamina that she used to have, and I have promised her no more shows!!

The whole experience has left me feeling very disillusioned with my own vets, who never made any further contact to see how she was.


her symptoms came on suddenly, from walking happily one minute, to getting shakier and shakier until she could barely put one rear leg in front of the other. She spiked a temperature and had blood in her urine. I am assured by the experts in Chester that this was a chance occurrence, and certainly nothing for which I should hold myself responsible (although of course I did!!)

If this is of any use or help to anyone else then it is worth posting

Hi there,(Fibrocartilaginous Embolism) it is also called drag leg syndrome try looking this up on your computer for more info. (Not all vets Know about) It. I had a litter of D,eerhound pups and they were all about to go to their new Holmes. When one of the puppies started to drag its leg so I took it to the vets. They told me it was ruff playing with the other puppies, and it was a trapped nerve. This was on the friday by monday the puppie had died.
So my sister looked it up on the internet and came across this which is a stroke in the spine. we took our findings to the vet and they admited that they had never heard of it. and also admitted that yes i sounded like that this is what may have happened to my puppie. I have read of other people who have had this but It Is Quite rare. but it is more prone to Irish wolfhounds, and Scottish Deerhounds.. I hope your dog is getting better ....take care sheona...

oh thanks for posting that Sheona, I know the vet in Chester said she had seen it in Wolfhounds and that it was rare

she is recovering well, and almost back to her full naughty self lol

she looks sweet too, she isn't wearing her collar at the mo cos of her shaved neck, so sje sports a bright red bandana and loves it!! My older boy wouldn't wear one at all when I tried him a couple of years ago, but Leah seems almost proud wearing it, I don't know who's daftest, me or her

Sounds very similar to something one of our labs had. She had xrays galore, eventually ended up going to chester for an MRI but they never did fully diagnose it. It did re-occur several times, but she did normally got back to normal after a few days rest. We lost her at 6 years old due to another illness.

Have you got any pics of leah sporting her new bandana ?

What a scary thing to happen It is definately something to try and store in my not so good memory bank.
I hope Leah is fighting fit soon.
Thanks for posting

it was VERY scary - I really thought we were going to lose her, I was so so upset...makes it all the more special to have her around now

I have a few pics of her on my phone, but I need to take some proper ones, she looks very rock n roll hound dog lol

and I didn't realise how few pics I have of her with me as well, cos I'm usually taking the pics so am not in them, so that needs to be rectified too

oh and I think her running legs are pretty good now, she hared off after a cat last night, the other hounds were on leads as they were havin a party next door and I didn't think they'd want any four-legged gate-crashers....hubby did a good impression of being on water ski's being pulled along as they all tried to get after the cat

and yes the cat got away, silly thing!!