Update on Bo

I have had a couple people and neighbors ask how Bo has been doing.  Most of neighbors have been really sweet checking in on us, especially since they have seen Rob have to carry Bo home from a walk, or they were watching one of us coax him out to the front yard. 

He has been on Itraconozole for 17 days.  The first 10 days, he was on the true version that we filled locally at the Target pharmacy.  We were waiting for the compounded version of the drug from an Veternary Pharmacutical company in AZ to arrive.  The compounded version is slightly cheaper, not as much as she advertised!  I am price shopping currently, as it would be nice to get it for even less.  The true version of Itraconozole was $9/pill, and he needed two a day, just to give you a hint of how expensive Blastomycosis is to fight.  Compounded Itra is much more reasonable. 

Bo seems to be in a better mood this week.  The last 3-4 days he has eaten normally, he hears us fill his bowl and he comes trotting in.  For this I am so thankful, the week of force feeding him with prescription id mush shoved down his throat with a syringe was no fun.  He has lost about 15-20 lbs already, so I am ready to fatten him back up. 

His breathing is almost back to normal.  The Blasto is in his lungs.  One of the major symptoms is wheezing, coughing, and panting.  He did give me quite the scare Saturday/night with several nose bleeds. 

Now I need to address his sores.  The sores are broken skin where the yeast trys to escape.  The skin gets swollen, and then it breaks through.  It is not pretty!  Bo has about 15 sores.  The worst are on his left paw, this is what causes him to limp.  My next step is to track down some pastilite clay.  It is supposed to help with itching and draw the toxins out.  I think I need to help him stop licking them at best, it would help them heal. 

I am happy to report that Bo seems happier this week.  He was so excited for all the trick or treaters tonight.  He wags his tail.  He is picking up scrapes under Noelle's chair again.  He even trotted around the yard today, running to sniff the fence when people were walking by.  I hope we have turned the corner.  I am super cautious as the stats are still 50% on recovering from Blasto.  Many dogs and people are not strong enough to handle the harsh meds.  Itra is really hard on the liver and kidneys.  We are lucky Bo was super healthy and we caught it fairly early.  That was also luck as our vet has only diagnosised this once before.  It is not prevelent in Iowa. 


All this to say that I am really thankful that Rob has owned dogs before.  I had no idea how to make this decision.  Since we manage our money well enough, we have some funds to throw at this.  If Bo wants to fight it, we will help him.  But we'll have to be realistic if the time comes, and that will be a difficult day.