Question Details
Diarrhea
by flaviaz - February 12, 2010
Hello
Norton is a 10y NM herding mix. He used to be very anxious and aggressive, has mellowed, mostly Fire, but the Earth is coming out. He had very bad diarrhea about 1 year ago, we did a food trial and his diarrhea resolved on z/d and an initial course of flagyl. Fine for 6 months until the owner's husband went to the pet store, was told that vets are out to rip you off with Rx diets, and was given a canned beef diet. Explosive diarrhea, unresponsive to flagyl, probiotics, has been back on z/d for about a month, still loose with some improvement. No odor, mucus, looks like small bowel, no vomiting
He is thin, eats twice his daily requirement, without weight gain(osmotic diarrhea?)
Pulses thin, right>>left, somewhat evanescent; they are there, but they're not.
Tongue well defined, dark red line underneath sides and tip, lavender on top, purple underneath, dry.
Ears and top of paws warm, bottom of paws cool.
deficiency BL 21 and ST 36.
Loves massage, balanced heat and cool, but loves the sofa. No effect of climate.
I see Spleen Qi Def and Blood deficiency. Trying to reconcile the Damp and Heat signs.
I suspect there are quite a few things going on, and am asking for some help in choosing an herb to start.
thanks for your help, I have have learned a great deal following this forum.
Replies
by naturevet
February 12, 2010
Hi Flavia,

The tongue reflects Heat and Stasis. The response to the Z/D and Flagyl suggests Heat and Spleen deficiency. Putting it altogether, I'd probably start first with San Ren Tang. If the pulse had been more superficial and forceful/obvious, I would have tried Si Miao San. But without that, SRT is a safe place to start.

I'd be careful with the tonics, though. About as far as I would dare go along that vein might be Xiao Yao San, if you felt it was a good fit (irritable, diarrhea worse from stress). In the event you're wrong and tonics are bad for the case, it's got some built in sefety valves that will stop the inflammation from getting too bad in response. The beauty of SRT is that it can reperfuse chronically damaged tissues while limiting their ability to become inflamed.

Hopefully you'll get some decent results like with your own kitty.

All the best,

Steve
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