At the end of March, suddenly Salma began to refuse her breakfast, something she had never done.
At the beginning of April I noticed some blood on the grooming table and she was licking a lot so I thought that she was coming into season, which might explain her lack of appetite in the morning because she continued to eat her dinner as usual
However, I soon began to realise that this was not a normal heat when she stopped wanting to eat her dinner too. The only thing she would eat was her treats when we did exercises and games. At that point I decided that I should consult the vet over the telephone. She immediately suspected pyometra and prescribed homoeopathic Pulsatilla 200CH which is Salma’s constitutional remedy, Sepia 30Ch and Hepar Sulph 30CH. She wanted to do an ultrasound which was arranged for the following Monday afternoon.
As I was rather concerned, I took Salma to the clinic on the Friday afternoon and we could see a pus discharge from the vulva. The vet then thought that it would be best to do an ovaro-hysterectomy and arranged for that on Monday afternoon instead of the ultrasound. I understood where she was coming from because the previous week she had had an emergency case of pyometra and she showed me a photo of what had been removed from the poor dog.
Over the weekend I was unable to sleep thinking about whether it was wise to go into surgery before determining the extent of the complaint, so on Sunday afternoon I asked whether we could do the ultrasound first and then, depending on the result of that, decide whether surgery was absolutely necessary. The vet agreed.
Fortunately, the vet who does the ultrasound was still available on Monday afternoon. It was obvious that there was slight infection in the uterus but not serious enough to warrant surgery. That was a great relief!
The vet then prescribed Pulsatilla 200CH once per day and Sepia 30CH twice a day. Although Pulsatilla and Sepia are quite contradictory in their spheres of action, the aim with Sepia, which is one of the truly “female” remedies, was to keep the uterus open so that the pus could discharge.
Luckily the type of pyometra Salma was experiencing was the “·open” variety which would allow the discharge. Had it been “closed” the panorama would have been much worse as. The pus would not be able to discharge.
Another interesting thing which emerged was that there were deposits in the gallbladder probably from a previous digestive upset that Salma had had some time before. The ultrasound vet made a remark which I thought was very interesting. He said that on his machine he could see the present and the past!
We also took a blood sample for analysis. The results of the blood tests were:
Biochemistry. Very good. Chelidonium 30CH. 1/day for 2 weeks
Haemogram. Not so good. China 30CH. 2 per day for 2 weeks
Anaemia
Low Haematocrit
Regeneration also low
The new protocol then was:
Sepia 30CH
China 30CH
Cheledonium 30CH
Pulsatilla 200C H
China 30CH
Sepia30 CH
Basically, I was administering a remedy every three hours.
The vet then suggested that it would be prudent to check for Ehrlichia. As the laboratory still had some blood, they were able to do that very quickly and fortunately that possibility could be ruled out.
Two other things were prescribed once the results of the blood work were received. One was Carduus compositum, a homoeopathic “cocktail”, and the other was Ursobilane to address the flow of bile.
It turned out that Carduus was not available in Spain. Ironically it is available in large quantities for the treatment of cattle but the small, 5 ampoule presentation for small animals, can only be obtained in Germany and France. How absurd is that! Fortunately, I was able to contact a friend in Berlin and she did me the great favour of sending me a packet of 5 ampoules.
The protocol for these was 1ml of Carduus twice daily for one week and then 1ml per day for a further 5 days plus one capsule of Ursobilane per day.
Salma has now recovered completely. She is happy, full of energy and vitality and her appetite is very good – perhaps even TOO good. As she has now recovered her weight, in recent days I have had to begin to restrict her food intake.
The vet pointed out that we should keep a close eye on her at the change of seasons, particularly in spring and autumn because these episodes tend to occur around that time. Interesting!
One interesting thing about this episode is that Salma has changed some of her usual habits. She always loved the liver treats I made in the dehydrator, but now she does not want them, but she does eat slightly braised liver. She has changed her sleeping places and during the day has returned to the spot she used to lie on when she first came to us at age 3. This is quite interesting to observe.
Ursobilane is a prescription medication containing ursodeoxycholic acid which has an interesting history. Apparently, it was originally obtained from the bile of polar bears. Thankfully these days it is synthesised in the laboratory because I don’t think I could contemplate using it if polar bears had to be sacrificed to obtain it!
At the moment the vet has decided that she should continue to take the Ursobilane for another week and then we will assess the situation.
