As many of you know, our 4-year-old golden retriever, Delilah, was taken to the ER on Monday, 3/30 at 3:30 AM and required a 4-day stay in the ICU. She initially started having a cough and vomiting on the Friday night of 3/21, but it quickly improved. On that Monday, her primary vet thought it might be viral kennel cough that would resolve on its own, and we agreed to monitor symptoms. At this point, the cough was almost gone, and she would only get tachypneic (fast breathing) with exertion, and her respirations would return to normal.
By the following Friday, 3/27, she was still having symptoms but not worsening, so we emailed her vet to get us in on Monday for a follow-up. However, by Sunday mid-day, she was not able to tolerate any food or water, was working hard to breathe, and was tachypneic at rest.
Come nighttime, she was restless and clearly uncomfortable. She hadn't been sleeping, so we brought her to the ER as something was obviously not right. They took her back right away, but it was hours before her initial x-ray and blood work were complete.
Our morning report from the doc was concern for heart failure, and that was some rough news to receive. Then the chest x-ray indicated this was a respiratory issue. She had widespread inflammation throughout her lung fields and lung wall thickening indicative of a chronic lung issue. We were shocked since Delilah has never had any respiratory issues in the past. She trail runs like a stud up Cowles weekly and will swim for a frisbee all day. Her arterial blood gas (ABG) also came back abnormal; she was acidotic, and her CO2 was elevated, which would typically be low in someone breathing so fast, which meant she was not having good gas exchange. They placed her in the oxygen chamber for many hours to see if supplemental oxygen would help her work of breathing and correct her ABG.
By that night, her work of breathing had worsened, and there were no changes in her ABG, so she was placed on high-flow nasal cannula which required sedation. She had some concerning blood work come back that showed her eosinophils were elevated, which meant it was either a fungal or parasitic infection or a chronic condition called eosinophilic bronchopneumopathy. We sent off a fungal panel, which takes up to a week to come back, but in the meantime, started her on steroids.
She was able to titrate back down to the oxygen chamber the next day, and her ABG returned to normal; treatment was working! She required a couple more days in the oxygen chamber and continued IV antibiotics, IV fluids, and IV steroids. But finally, she was able to tolerate room air and switch her meds to oral. After ensuring she'd be able to tolerate room air, we finally got to bring our baby home.
So we finally brought our baby home and she’s exhausted.
Valley fever came back negative and due to the positive response to steroids they believe she has this chronic lung disease called eosinophilic bronchopneumopathy. We will be monitoring her breathing trends, completing antibiotics, anti-parasitic, & oral steroids in the next week then discuss steroids via inhaler as a long-term medication for her condition. We are so happy she’s home.
With her multiple-day hospitalization in the ICU, many medical tests, and different treatments, we racked up quite a bill to keep our sweet baby alive with us. There was just no other choice for us but to try. Dog lovers know how much our fur babies mean to us. Luckily our pet insurance is covering $5,000 of the $13k bill, but we could still use assistance for the $8,000 remaining. We understand that not everyone is always in a position to donate, but we appreciate anything you can give to help us out. We've been so appreciative of the love and support that we've received along this journey.
Finally, we can't emphasize enough how wonderful the staff and doctors have been at the VCA Emergency Care Center in Mission Valley as well. Each day, they allowed us to visit twice a day while they carried out critical treatment for the other admitted doggies and kitties around us. We had tons of questions and concerns, but they helped us gracefully, giving us assurance of the care they were giving to our baby dog.