My mother has a 14 year old Shih-Tzu. 5 days ago on Sat. he seemed to be drunk, he could not use his front legs and he refused to do anything but sleep. He started feeling better Sunday night after an expensive emergency trip to the vet ($150), who gave him a cortizone shot and some medications to "perk" him up so he would be interested in eating. But Monday he started to vomit everthing he ate or drank. He could walk but still seemed unsure of his footing. So we brought him to his regular vet on Monday and he just said its a seizure and to go home and deal with it($100). Well Bear means more to my mom then her kids and she could not just go home and deal with it, because no test were done to prove he had a seizure. We brought him to the same vet that saw him Sunday night and he did extensive blood work (CBC, glucose, white blood cell count, checked kidney function, and many more and found NOTHING!!($200) So I got online and found this disease called idiopathic vestibular syndrome and it sounds exactly like what her dog went through. The lose of balance, eye twitching, nausea. But this vet thinks it something called Addisons disease but after researching this I don't see his reason for this because all his blood work came back normal. Now he wants her to have another $150 test to see if he has Addisons disease. My mother loves this dog but she is not made of money and the stress of this will end up giving her a heart attack if we don't find out what is wrong with him soon. If anyone can help us with this, we would appreciate it or if your dog has had either of these illnesses.

thanks,
shon

Hi Shon.
I have only seen one case of Addison's but this does not sound anything like that to me. As to Vestibular Syndrome, I've had two dogs which have suffered that and yes, it does sound very much like it. If it is then the chances are that she will recover within around a week.

Addison’s is sometimes call the Great Deceiver because the symptoms mimic a number of other ailments which mean that diagnosis is often not made until it is too late. (Which happened in the case of my friend’s dog)

Regards, John

Hi Shona
As John said, it doesn't seem like my friend's dog who had Addisons .
I've replied to your other post about Vestibular.

Regards
Sami