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my basset hound

Posted by macy 
my basset hound
August 29, 2011 08:23PM
My 9 year old basset hound recently passed away and I never really got any straight answers as to why.Was just wondering if you can give me your thoughts on what you think might have happened. Back in January, she was diagnosed with complete heart block. She also had a minor case of aortic stenosis. They did an abdominal ultrasound to make sure nothing was going on and everything looked fine. I went ahead and got her a pacemaker -- she became a miracle dog -- acting like a puppy again. 3 days ago, around 10pm, she started having some breathing difficulties -- heavy breathing -- with her nose pointed upward. She could not get comfortable and would not lie down. She then started coughing like she was trying to hack up something. I was up with her all night and took her to the cardiologist at 7am. He said it was probably one of 3 things -- blood clot in her lung, congestive heart failure, or her aortic stenosis has gotten worse. They were planning on doing all these tests -- blood work, abdnominal ultrasound, chest xray, etc. They gave her an injection of furosemide and put her in an oxygen cage. An hour later, doctor called me and told me she was getting worse and coughing up blood. They said they didnt want to take her out of the oxygen cage to do those tests because she was having so many problems breathing. He said she was suffering so I just ended up putting her down. Never got an answer as to what was causing this. She was doing so great with the pacemaker and I had expected to be around at least 3-5 years. Any thoughts on this. Since he mentioned he gave her the furosemide injection and then she started coughing up blood --- isnt that what is supposed to happen -- the injection is supposed to get the fluid out of her lungs? any insight would be appreciated
Re: my basset hound
August 30, 2011 06:24PM
Coughing up blood with heart disease is usually a sign of terminal heart failure so the question is - was it heart disease that caused the problem?; I suspect not. It is more likely that there was other pathology - severe primary respiratory disease - infection or tumour, or a clotting problem eg a an embolus (clot) in the lung or a deficiency in the normal clotting system - lung worm for instance or a low platelet count.
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