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Old, Stiff Dogs

by landauvet - November 20, 2009

Hi Steve,

Well it is Friday night and I am looking back at some areas of confusion.
One area where I am feeling like a true novice is with a few old, stiff dogs I have seen of late.
Let's start with a 9 year old Spaniel Border collie mix. She looked 13. Walked so stiffly and sore all over that it hurt to watch her move...ouch. This is my first visit with this dog in 5 years. There were no musculoskeletal complaints 5 years ago. This dog receives Aspirin 60 mg bid which helps with the stiffness. She is most stiff at first rising. She overheats very easily and can not tolerate the heat. She often pants all night. She has a history of flea allergic dermatitis and a urinary tract infection. Diet: Wellness Sr. kibble and Alpo.

Tongue: red and thin
Pulse: deep, hard to feel and weak

Points were unremarkable to me. I adjusted her gently. Based on symptoms I see yin and blood def with stasis and heat.

I started her on ZBDHW and a low dose of XCHT to move stasis.

Owners called 2 days later saying she was much worse. More stiff, depressed. I told them to stop the herbs and get a checkup at the primary vet's office.

She felt better after stopping the herbs, Abnormal bloodwork is listed: Globulin sl. elev
Amylase sl. elev
CPK low
CBC normal
T4 low Primary started Thyroxin
U/A protein
mucus
microalbuminurea suggesting possible renal injury

Owners left me a message saying no more herbs ...ever. I am happy to try again but want to understand what happened.

I understand that ZBDHW potentially tonified stasis creating more pain. Maybe, the low amount of XCHT was not enough to prevent pressure from building leading to more pain.

What should I do to strengthen such a weak and painful, prematurely aging dog? How can I better evaluate this old dog from the start to prevent the set back?

Kevin Landau

by naturevet

November 21, 2009

Hi Kevin,

I don't know that the same thing might not have happened to me. Not that we know what 'that' was. About the only difference between our protocols is that I almost invariably just start with one formula, my best guess, which here would have been Zhi Bai Di Huang Wan, or some other Yin tonic. By only using one formula at a time, if something goes south on you, it's not as confusing to figure out what happened.

The only other thing I do to safeguard against that, which can happen to anyone, and has to me on many occasions in the past, is to let the points guide the prescription. Then you rarely if ever make a mistake (he says, tempting fate).

I'll give you an example of how this could have happened to me yesterday, were it not for the active points. In this case, it was a human who was clinically depressed (but on meds) and was experiencing violent headaches (subarachnoid hemorrhage) and severe neck pain on a highly unpredictable basis. His pulse was extremely weak, suggesting some tonifying strategy was in order. However, he had very active LV and GB points, all of which required sedation to strengthen the pulse. In addition, chiropractic to his neck radically strengthened his pulse, making it deep and wiry instead of weak and thin. When I sedated the points, the wiriness went away and was replaced by 'the pulse you'd want to own'.

I wound up sending him home on Chai Hu Jia Long Gu Mu Li Tang, a strongly cooling, draining and dispersing formula. Without that response to acupuncture treatment, I would have made the mistake of trying a tonic, and probably wound up having made him much worse (by tonifying an excess, as you suggested was the case with your dog).

So that's about all I can really offer. I assume it's not comforting, and that is in part because of the owner's undue reaction to your treatment. Owner bias against herbs, even as they seek them out or agree to them, is very common, and is most commonly manifest by the way they react to a drug side effect vs. a perceived herb side effect. Drug side effects are commonly endured without complaint or comment, while herb side effects have owners picking up the phone right away. Many of these complaints turn out to be coincidental, and exhibit no dose-response relationship to herb use when the formula is retried. As for the herbs aggravating renal function, there's no evidence for that, if pre-treatment blood work was not performed. Aspirin should be considered just as likely, if not more likely, a culprit there.

Hope that soothes your bruised ego a little. Keep your chin up, bud.

Steve

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