Hi, my name is Tony and Im new here and wanted to introduce myself to everyone before I get into my current situation.

I have a 5 year old soon to be 6 year old Siberian Husky named CoCo which most recently started to have seizures about 5 days ago. In the past my brother has told me that he saw her seizing about 8 to 12 months ago. At first I did not believe him cause hes young/ naive and tend to be over dramatic. This wasnt the case until 5 days ago when he and my sister both witnessed her seizing on two separate occasions ON THE VERY SAME DAY. This alarmed me and I rushed home to check her out. She acted totally fine and her behavior was the same as usual until I myself witnessed her seizing about 6 hours after the last seizure my sister saw. So this makes 3 seizures in a period of 24 hours that we saw, so who knows how many shes had throughout the day that no one saw. I quickly rushed her to the Vet ER and there she did not seize up at all throughout the 5 hours we were there. Had a consult with one of the ER doctors which gave her a checkup and ran blood work which came out negative for any metabolic reasons that were causing the seizures and prescribed some 32mg of phenobarbital. ER doctor recommended a neurological consult with one of their doctors that will be in during normal business hours. So I took her home and gave her the pills when she seized about an hour after.

I rushed her back for a neurological consult with one of the neurologist the day after and after examining her he decided at this time an MRI wasnt necessary due to checking her out and she acted close to normally how she behaves. We left her overnight and he increased the dosage of phenobarbital to a "sustainable" dosage that was injected thru a catheter and would get to her system faster. I picked her up the day after and the nurses/ doctors have informed me that shes had one mini seizure with them but none after.

Fast forward to all day today she did not have one all day I believe until now. No one witnessed it but we placed her back into her cage for her protection as right now she cant properly walk, climb stairs due to the after effects of being on pheno.

My question is, should she still be getting seizures after being on it since Friday? Does it take a lot more days for the drugs to finally kick in? I fear that I might need an MRI and those Ive been told cost around 1500 dollars. My vet bills already been 1300 so far. THanks for reading

Hi Tony. I'm so sorry to hear about this. My dog, Kobey has epilepsy and he is also on phenobarbital. His neurologist said it takes 1-2 weeks for it to become affective. His seizures were very mild before he started the medication (he had two in one month- that we knew of)... He has been on it since December and has had one seizure since then that we know of. Does Coco sleep with you at night? Kobey's seizures have mainly only occurred in the middle of the night. It's so scary not to know if there are some that are missed..
Best of luck to you and Coco. If I were you, I would consider getting another opinion and definitely consider the MRI..

How much does CoCo weigh?
Can you elaborate ""sustainable" dose" of the phenobarbital?
Can you say if her seizures were "focal" (petit mal) or "tonic/clinic"? (gran mal)?

This is a subject near and dear to my heart and while I'm certainly not an expert, I've got more experience that I care to have.....
Very often no actual "cause" will be found for seizure disorders. If her liver enzymes are ok, her thyroid levels good and no obvious tumors lurking, it's likely you'll never know the source. It could be hereditary or environmental and while there's nothing you can do to change THAT, you can treat the seizure disorder itself. Phenobarb is probably the most often med used. It will make her dopey and uncoordinated until her body adjusts to it -- and it WILL adjust -- but probably not as quickly as you would like. Be patient.

Because my dog suffered Tonic/Clonic seizures, my Vet prescribed us liquid valium to be administered rectally in the event of a "big" seizure that wouldn't stop on its own in about 2 minutes (which seems like an eternity at the time). This ended the seizure within a minute and left him drowsy enough to allow him to rest. I've had a 40 year relationship with my Vet but I know there are not many out there who WILL dose out the liquid valium because it is a highly controlled sedative. But it's worth asking about for the peace of mind it can provide.

After a seizure, blood sugar plummets and that itself can cause another seizure. You can help avoid this by keeping some Haggen Daz Vanilla Ice Cream in your freezer. Once the seizure has ended, take a teaspoon or 2 of the ice cream and S-L-O-W-L-Y feed it to her -- rubbing it on her gums if necessary. This will quickly bring blood sugars up and it's not a huge amount of dairy (should she be lactose intolerant)

(I'm not sure I can post a link -- I'm new here and haven't had a chance to filter thru all the rules -- but canine-epilepsy-guardian-angels.com is an EXCELLENT source of information).

Coco sleeps downstairs...Ive actually placed her back in this large cage. Lately due to the side effects of pheno she has been stumbling and pacing around downstairs like shes drunk and not her self. I have a old baby monitor w/ camera system that records her. Her cage is dry and has padding so if she does have an episode where saliva, spit comes out and wets the cage I can go back to the video and rewind it to distinguish if its her soiling in her cage or its an episode. So far she has not had an episode according to the video that records her all day.

Coco is about 54 pounds. Before she was on pheno yet alone any meds, her seizures were anywhere from 30 seconds to a min where right after shes disoriented. Ive done some researched and also someone else mention to feed them ice cream but I guess that could work