From: srlee@beta.lanl.gov (Stephen R Lee)
Newsgroups: rec.pets.dogs
Subject: Re: Urinary tract infection
Date: 12 Nov 92 20:24:16 GMT
Organization: Los Alamos National Laboratory

In article <1992Nov12.153737.9801@cas.org> sla54@cas.org (Sandra Augustine) writes:

[stuff deleted]

>	I sold Ozzie (golden retriever puppy, almost 3 months old) to Colleen
>early in October. Since then, he's developed a urinary tract infection with
>some crystals in his urine. The external symptoms of his problem are drinking a
>lot of water and needing to go outside frequently. Ozzie has been on Amoxicillin
>for one week with no improvement. Yesterday, Colleen was told by her vet that
>because Ozzie has crystals in his urine now, that he will always be predisposed
>to having these crystals. The vet also said that Ozzie will need to be on
>a special diet his entire life and should have monthly urine tests done for a
>least a year. He also discussed the possibility of surgery for Ozzie. As you
>can imagine, Colleen is very depresssed about this. And as you can imagine,
>I feel very bad for Colleen and Ozzie.

I'm not sure if this will help or not, but I'll toss it in.  A long time ago
we had a cat that developed this problem.  Symptoms were as you state, plus
blood in the urine.  The problem was easy to clear up, but the cat also
had to be on a special diet the rest of its life, for the same reason (i.e.,
that he would be predisposed to get them again).  I did not think much of it
at the time, until you mentioned it, but the veterinarian in this case also
blamed the Purina cat food he had been eating all of his life.  I have to admit
that I really did not believe this, but he is the veterinarian.  I mean, how
many cats and dogs eat Purina dog food?  I know lots of people that feed Pro-Plan
to their sled dogs without any problems.  I don't think they feed it to their
puppies, however.  Most of the people I know feed Science Diet Growth or Eukanuba
to their pups.  I have no first hand experience with Purina, other than with the
cat.

Again, this is probably not all that useful.  This was a cat, and an old one
at that.  You have a young puppy.  You'll proably get lots of "my dog does
fine on Pro-Plan" and "my dog almost died on Pro-Plan" type responses, which 
probably won't help all that much either.  Nothing wrong with getting a second
opinion, of course, but special diets after something like this do seem to
be common.  If the dog does need a special diet (I think the cat was on Hill's
"Stone" diet), it is not really all that bad.  My recollection is that it was not
THAT much more expensive.  I never calculated the cost over the rest of the life
of the cat, however, so I guess I really don't know exactly how much more expensive
it was.  I would certainly get a second opinion on surgery.  What was the proposed 
surgery, anyway?

I hope this helps (somehow :-) ).

>
>********************************************************************************
>Sandra Augustine  |Home of: Conformation, obedience, and field titled Golden
>NORWOOD KENNELS   |Retrievers who do therapy dog work, a disobedient but
>ems: sla54@cas.org|beautiful Siberian husky and a *cute* Norfolk terrier puppy
>********************************************************************************
>	       The above opinions are not those of my employer.
>********************************************************************************
>

-- 
============================================================
Stephen R. Lee                 | 
OooWoo Racing Kennel           | I'd rather be driving sled
E-Mail: srlee@beta.lanl.gov    | dogs.
Newsgroups: rec.pets.dogs