Hello everyone, I'm new to the boards and came here to seek some advice, suggestions, and/or opinions on what my 2.5 year old male lab may be experiencing. My parents were visiting friends with our yellow male Labrador Retriever, Yogi Bear, when he had an attack/episode. He was out in some deep water catching sticks when all of a sudden my Mom noticed him paddling in circles with his head tilted to one side. He gradually got slower and slower until he finally became submerged underwater. We were very fortunate that our family friend is a good swimmer and was able to grab and hold him above surface while he swam to the shore. He said that when he grabbed Yogi and lifted him up, he was awake but his legs were completely limp. By the time he got him to shore, he was back to himself. According to my parents, Yogi was pretty exhausted from all of the swimming and running around with the other dogs, and he seemed more tired that day than usual. I contacted our breeder and she confirmed that his father is clear for EIC, but his mother is a carrier. Even so, science is suggesting that he shouldn't be affected with the disorder. If it's not EIC, than could it be a seizure or another type of recessive disorder? Apparently, this is his second attack. The first time was a couple of months ago when he was completely exhausted from running around again. He started to waddle a bit before collapsing. I wasn't there to witness both episodes so I can't fully describe them to a tee. It was only yesterday when I found out about them and so I'm repeating what was mentioned to me. We are taking him to the vet tomorrow, but I wanted to get some opinions from a community of Labrador owners. I'm not expecting a diagnosis, just some ideas as to what may be causing Yogi's episodes. Thanks so much for taking the time to read my long post and really look forward to hearing your thoughts!
Hi Courtney and welcome to the forum. I am sorry to hear about Yogi, it does sound rather odd, especially now this has happened twice. Have you discussed this with your vet? They may want to run some tests on cardiac function, run a full blood panel, as well as checking blood sugar. You are right in the fact that EIC does need 2 copies, and Yogi is just carrying one copy of the mutated gene so should be OK. Your vet would be the best port of call, I would, however, be inclined to limit exercise, (especially if it's warm!) until you got to the bottom of it.
There's also a thing called water intoxication. It's when a dog has been in water for too long and the sodium gets leeched from their systems it leads to neurological problems and collapse. If you look up hyponatremia.
My 4 year old has similar symptoms to EIC. This has happened twice. Both times seen by the vet and as right as rain when we got there. However he’s not my first dog with some form of EIC. So it was decided to test for EIC, the results came back clear, he’s not even a carrier. I insisted that he was referred to a specialist. The neurologist took bloods and tested for another condition (for the life of me I cannot remember the name) this test was sent to a laboratory in America, again all clear. Outcome to this is inconclusive, the neurologist did say he would have liked to have seen a video of this happening but completely understands that I am very aware of how much excerise he can cope with before he keels over and there is a chance if I continue exercises for longer he could collapse and die, he couldn’t guarantee that wouldn’t happen. He did say that just because he doesn’t have the gene for the EIC we tested for, doesn’t mean that he doesn’t have another faulty gene that is yet to be discovered. In Yogi’s case, the way forward would be to test for EIC, in the uk it’s labokin laboratory’s, I think the cost is about £70 for the test. If that’s clear there is a couple more tests that can be done but speaking to a specialist will give you a better picture. I would definitely restrict his excerise and thanks for posting this, although we’re not down at the water much, ( too many other dogs and Cupar is dog/dog reactive) I always thought that being too warm was a major issue, obviously not, any swimming will be carefully monitored. With Cupar I monitor his exercise, he can walk for miles and is fine, the episodes are brought on by doing his favourite things, retrieving his ball and over excitement. At the moment I’m more careful as it’s warmer and as the vets are unclear to cause , be it overheating, excitement or just too much excerise, Cupar is getting really small amounts of playing, I try to do more search and find stuff with him, although that is now getting him wired up. Whatever Cupar has, I have learned how much is too much, he doesn’t miss out, he can still do lots of fun stuff just not to extreme. I count the ball throws, I manage his condition and Cupar doesn’t know it.
