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Old May 21st, 2008, 08:56 AM
marlamous marlamous is offline
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Location: Northern CA
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Reoccurring Giardia

I have a 5 month old Manchester Terrier puppy. He has been tested 4 times for Giarrdia. One week after we got him we took him to the vet, we took in a fecal sample, he tested positive for Coccidia. He was treated, the next week he was retested & they found the Giarrdia. He had no symptoms during this time. We put him on the meds & he is still testing positive. This has been going on for 3 months. He also gave the Coccidia to my other 2 dogs. Shady my pit/chow mix can't take sulfa dogs so they had to treat her with Panacur. Shady almost died 2 years ago. My neighbor a retired vet gave us DiTrim which caused her to go into auto-immune hemolytic anemia. Her blood level dropped to 6.9. She had to have 3 blood transfusions & 5 medications to keep her alive. This Giarrdia problem is getting very stressful for us, as we want our dogs to be healthy. I feed the pup Canidae with brown rice & cooked chicken. Does anyone have any suggestions. I have watched the video from Dr. Lee, very informative. Please help!!!
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Old May 21st, 2008, 03:52 PM
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Kristin7 Kristin7 is offline
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I had a cat with giardia once, but it cleared up nicely with the drug Flagyl. What medication was your dog given for the giardia? Could be the giardia is resistant to the medication? Or, maybe your dog keeps getting reinfected. Do you know where your dog picked up the parasite? If it is still around, like in your yard, in a pond or something, and your dog keeps drinking it, then he could possibly get it again. Or perhaps the test is giving false positive results (though I think false negatives are more common).

here is an informative website:
http://www.beaglesunlimited.com/beag...giardiasis.htm
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  #3  
Old May 21st, 2008, 10:28 PM
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Dr Lee Dr Lee is offline
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I am sorry to hear about all of your pup's problems.

Giardia can be frustrating. The main reason for this, as Kristin indicated, is re-infection. The cysts are released in high numbers and simple licking of the fur can cause reinfection.

For difficult cases. I recommend panacur (fenbendazole) for 10 days with daily bathing. For cases that are still recurrent then I will use both panacur and flagyl (metronidazole) and consider giardia vaccination. The giardia vaccination theoretically helps reduce the numbers of infective cysts released in the stool and thus helps to reduce re-infection.

As a general rule, panacur works better than metronidazole but they can work together in a synergistic fashion. There are some giardia than can be resistant to these medications and then a medication called ronidazole is used. I recommend avoiding this medication as it has a much higher rate of clinical side effects and toxicity than metronidazole. Also the medication is very expensive.

I hope that helps. I work with lots and lots of giardia cases in my area so have become very familiar with treating it. If there are any additional questions, please feel free to contact me.
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