Hypoglycemia

we have a five year old english pointer who has in the last three years has experienced several seizures. our vet said that he was hypoglycemic. he has these seizures usually after a very hard hunt - it has happened in cold weather when he was wet and also on a semi-cold day (like in the 50's). we have gotten use to carrying a bottle of sugar water to give him like every 30 minutes or so. we usually feed the dogs in the evening around 5 o'clock. when we are hunting them we started giving them a little extra food the morning we are hunting. i usually can tell when he is on the verge of a seizure as he is usually a hard running pointer. he starts really slowing down, so we then know that we need to get him some food, sugar and warmth. is there anything we are doing wrong or can you suggest something else. we were wondering about carrying karo syrup in syringes to give him occassionally when he is hunting. he doesn't want sweets or candy chocolate or even granola bars. he seems to like the sugar water. but we don't know if he is getting enough to keep him from going into a seizure. it usually takes about 15 minutes to pull him through one and we usually don't hunt him anymore that day. he loves to hunt and we want to do everything we can for him while we are hunting. any suggestions would be appreciated, thanks, tammy brandon

Tammy, this one hits pretty close to home as one of my dogs has hypoglycemic problems on occasion. First of all make sure there isn't any underlying disease like adrenal gland problems (low adrenal gland function called Addison's disease has been reported to cause exercise-induced seizures in hunting dogs). The best luck I have had with my dog is to feed him well the night before the hunt (I may even add a bit of bouillon or canned food to his dry food to stimulate him to eat) and during the course of the hunt take breaks and feed him a gainesburger (as often as every hour, they are easy to carry in a vest and are basically held together with corn syrup which is a good source of glucose). I do carry either Karo syrup or a plastic bottle of 50% dextrose that I can give orally if problems occur. The sugars in candy and table sugar are "complex" sugars and have to be broken down by the body to "simple" sugars to have any effect, stick with Karo or dextrose. Good luck, safe hunting.

Dr.Mike

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