One of my girls was diagnosed,last Monday,with hypothyroidism and was started on .5mg of Soloxine twice daily. She seemed to be doing fine. She had stopped carrying her tail over her back ,this was something that she had always done, and on Friday I noticed that she was back to carrying her tail as "normal" and she seemed to be more alert so I felt that we were on the right road.

On Friday I was advised, by my vet, to avoid food containing Kelp so I went and bought some Natures menu as so many foods have kelp in them and she ate this,no problem. However, yesterday she refused her cornflakes and milk at breakfast time and turned her nose up at cottage cheese and yoghurt, things she usually enjoys, but ate a bonio and a chew stick. She ate her tea last night with no trouble and I hid her pill in some garlic sausage which she ate. Today she refused breakfast, except for a handful of dry food and refused some ice-cream when I was dishing it out to the in the afternoon. At tea time she took a few mouthfuls of her food but was picking the meat out from the biscuit and then walked away from it. I offered her just a tin of meat with no biscuit and she ate that. She refused the garlic sausage today and I had to put the pill down her throat this morning but she took the last one in some chicken. I was stripping the meat off a chicken carcass just now and the others were all hanging about with hopeful expressions but she didn't show any interest. 

I am sure she will take her bedtime Bonio too.

Am I silly to worry?? Is she just chancing it?? Or is she poorly? :-(

Any thoughts would be most helpful.  

Sounds like she's well and truly spoilt to me and pulling a fast one :d  How quickly do you take the food away if she doesn't eat it straight away?

Don't forget, I presume that you are in the UK, it is extremely hot at the moment and I don't know about you but I'm eating less but drinking more.

Yes I am in the UK and you are right about not wanting to eat so much in the heat.She doesn't seem to be drinking an awful lot either though. I have a feeling that I have gone into a panic as she has me wrapped around her little paws:rolleyes:

I don't leave the food for very long before I remove it and I am a bit suspicious about her behaviour as she has always been a bit of a "madam" who thinks she is and above the others:-)

Thank you for your input

Has anyone had experience of this "refusing to eat". She took a tin of meat for her tea last night but refused everything else all day. Yesterday the vet checked her temp and gave her a multi vitamin injection and an antibiotic jag just incase she was incubating something and said to bring her back in two days if she was no better.

I am sick with worry now as she has refused everything today and will only eat grass. I have an appointment at the vet again for tomorrow but I am imagining all kinds od things. I had hoped this morning that she would be a bit better as it is not so hot but she is not :-((

hi scarlettwynter,  I know nothing about hypothyroidism in dogs but have an underactive thyroid myself and was totally knocked for six with it and off work for a number of weeks as I had such a rapid decline. I would imagine the medication is just a dog version of thyroxine and if it is it took a week to see any difference as the medicine has a 7 day half life and it also shouldn't be taken within 4 hours of having calcium as calcium affects the absorbtion of thyroxine.  it also takes approximately 4 weeks to get the full benefit of and for the level of dosage to stabilise and it has taken 6 months for me to reach an appropriate dosage for myself.  HTH

I am hypothyroid too and have been told, as well as to not take at the same time as calcium, to take first thing in the morning, preferably one hour before eating.  That is so it is all absorbed into the system before mixing with food which could carry some of it out.  Perhaps should be the same for dogs?

Thank you. Did either of you lose your appetite when you first started out on your medication?

When she begins to eat again I will make sure that she has no calcium within 4 hours and I shall give it to her on an empty stomach.

She has eaten something tonight though......a little piece of tissue that she found

My Ellie has got an underactive thyroid ( think this must be the same thing as she's on Soloxine too).  I've always found the opposite - that I really need to keep an eye on what she eats as it increased her appetite and caused her to gain weight :rolleyes: (this is in addition to her being a greedy Golden!)

Now we've got it under control and she's back to being a healthy weight and she's a normal happy girl (except when the GSDs try to jump on her both at once )

Paula

Hi Paula,

I thought,if anything, her appetite would increase. She was at the vet today and everything seems normal but they have halved her medication to see if this is the trouble. Apparently, I wasn't told this last week, lack of appetite can be a sign of too much soloxine.
She is down to .5mg a day and she is back on Saturday and if no improvement they want to run blood tests to check kidney/liver function:-(

What doseage is Ellie on just now? I did feel that Katya's dose was quite high, she weighs 26kg which is a bit porky but she put a lot of weight on over the last few months. This is some crash diet though that she has started!!

My Afghan is hypo-t and weighs about 23kg.  She is on .3mg x 2.  It is better to give the soloxine twice a day as it only last about 12 hrs.  I give mine on an empty stomach about half and hour before feeding, but  do know some people who give it with food, the only thing is to be consistant in how you give it and then everything seems to be right.  This is my second hypo-t Affie and I am treating her the same as the last one.  Her appetite is usually quite good but sometimes she wont eat in the mornings or only half her evening meal but I have never known her go without for a longer period.

When having her levels checked it is best to do it 4-6hrs after giving the tablets as this is when it is at its peak.

I hope everthing soon sorts itself out.

Sue

Thanks Sue. I think I will half the tablet tomorrow and that will be approx .25 each time. I have already given her it for today!Maybe the previous level was far too high and it may take a day or two  for it to come back down in her body.  I am really stressing about this as this morning she was a bit sick, just bile. She took a treat from me but has refused everything else. I am trying to stay calm as she will pick up my tension :-(

Sorry for not replying sooner - busy weekend!! :rolleyes:

Ellie is on 0.8mg of soloxine a day now, though she started off on double that - which I didn't feel was necessary, as she was only borderline underactive - think the vets were trying to crack a nut with a sledgehammer (kerching ££££! :rolleyes:).  I feed hers with her feeds twice a day and her blood tests have been pretty consistant for ages now, she has a blood test every six months, or the vet won't prescribe any more  

Ellies appetite decreased when she started the soloxine, as she was eating everything in sight before ( mind you she still has a good appetite, even the soloxine doesn't stop her being a true GR :D) She is now about 29kg though she was about 36kg before her diagnosis and her diet - she now has a waist (Perhaps that's where I'm going wrong!! :D)

Paula

Thanks for getting back Paula.

I felt that Katy's dose was high also but at the moment she is off it completely. The vet told me to half her doseage on Thrusday to see if this would help her appetite and this made no difference. Yesterday she was back to see the vet and he thinks her hormones may be playing up....no symptoms of a false pregnancy but she is mounting my other dogs. She was given another type of drug in the hope that this will kick start her appetite and since the vet doesn't want two types of hormones going into her I am to keep her off the Soloxine until Friday.

On Friday I am to start her on .5 for a week and if she is eating and doing well I am to increase it back up to .5 twice a day.

If she still refuses to eat she has to get blood tests done.

The little tinker went into the vet yestaerday and I was saying how she still have no appetite and in front of the evt she ate a Polo that my son handed her. The vet probably thinks I am a nutcase and that my dog is fine.