My Precious Boy was diagnosed with Kidney failure about a month ago. He seems to be managing ok at the moment. He is putting on weight, fairly active and eating reasonably well. He is on Fortekor, amlodipine and asprin and he has Royal Canin Renal prescription diet.

My concern however is that My Husband and I took him for more blood tests today and his Creatinine was 317. although his other levels (Albumin, Phosporus, Urea etc) seem to have stablilised the Creatinine has been increasing steadily for the last few weeks and we are worried. What should we expect? How high do these levels need to get before the Dog becomes really unwell? Is there anything at all that may help?

We would greatly appreciate any advice from anyone who has/is going through this

Austin is an 8 year old Weimaraner.

Please help......................................................

I haven't had this problem with my dogs, but I thought this web site might be some help. There are more links to canine kidney problem sites at the bottom.

http://www.dogaware.com/kidney.html

I hope Austin does well and has a long life on medication. :-) I do love weims. ;-) (soft spot for HPRs)

Thank you, the Dogaware site is very useful I have seen on this page a supplement available in the States called "Azodyl" which contains Probiotics. I wondered whether giving probiotics would help? Ethier in tablet/Powder form or as in Live yogurt/Bio Yogurt? Has anyone had any experience or advice on this?

Austin has been back to the vet today and His Creatinine level has risen to 408. He still seems to be coping ok, He seems well in himself. However, We are still very worried about his blood levels. How high can the creatinine level get before our precious boy starts to deterioate? We love him dearly and cannot bear the thought of losing him? Is there still a chance these blood numbers could improve?

If his phosphorous and other levels come down, I thought creatinine should follow. I had a girl in chronic kidney failure given 2 weeks, and I went to the dogaware site, and stuck rigidly to the protein levels and phosphorous levels by home cooking and a small amount of renal diet. It was hard managing a menu for her, but it became a 'way of life' for us. I managed to give her another good 8 months as a result. For example cooked egg whites are excellent protein, but low in phos. I found that just using the renal diet her levels continued to rise, so I used this in calculation with a home diet mainly.

I cannot recommend the dogaware site highly enough. It did initially mean that I had to sit down with all the info to understand the protein/phosphorous levels, but once I got the hang of it we were off. My girl was already in chronic failure by the time she was diagnosed. If Austin is in early failure you have a much better chance of preserving the remaining kidney function.

Good luck. With some work I am sure you can improve his numbers and keep them that way. Our girl had blood tests every month, or sooner if I was at all worried.

Kat

Sort of a hard one to answer... I wouldn't go with the figures, I would go with how he is. I don't think it's the sort of thing you can predict 'how long'. I have friends that had a Golden Retriever with kidney failure, who went on I believe for a couple of years longer than the vets expected! None of us know how long we've got - to me it's a question of trying not to worry and enjoying what we have - if that helps at all. :-) I know my friends with the Golden did various things related to diet to try and help... and I think that was essentially the mainstay of treatment.

I have an old boy with chronic renal failure. It has been just over 1 year since he was diagnosed.  The vets told us every time we went for a check up his levels were worse. However, this time the vet said they had improved.  So yes they can alter.  I never ask what his levels are as i just go by how he is in himself.  If he is eating ok and happy in himself then thats the best we can hope for.  His digestion is more delicate now though and there are lots of things he could eat before that are a definate no no now. He is fed Royal canin renal, dried in the morning and tinned at night and apart from some lightly cooked vegetables, cooked egg whites, and the odd bit of digestive biscuit as a treat we stick to the renal diet.

So I go along with what the previous poster said, diet seems to be the best treatment, take each day as it comes and just enjoy his company.