Title: was wondering!!!
Description: alfie
Description: alfie
mel - October 18, 2009 03:17 PM (GMT)
wasnt sure where to put this so chose here in the end as most people come in this bit! :D
alfie my lab has gone all sort of sunken above his eyes :( hes fine and normal in his self and my vet isnt worried, i just wondered if anyone else had owned or knew of a dog that had this? i took a pic, i will upload it in a bit!
alfie my lab has gone all sort of sunken above his eyes :( hes fine and normal in his self and my vet isnt worried, i just wondered if anyone else had owned or knew of a dog that had this? i took a pic, i will upload it in a bit!
mel - October 18, 2009 03:26 PM (GMT)
alfie :wub:
Hedda - October 18, 2009 04:04 PM (GMT)
sorry...I have never heard about this before.. how old is he?
Lovely pic :wub:
Lovely pic :wub:
kealagirl - October 18, 2009 04:10 PM (GMT)
Mel, I am no expert, but it looks like a condition which Keala had a couple of years ago called Mitochondrial Muscle Myopathy or MMM. I thought I had put a post on about it at the time, but it must have been on the old site before we came on here.
My vet had seen it before and knew how to treat it, however what he did say was that the correct way to diagnose it is to send of samples of the effected muscles for testing.
Kealas problem started with her being unable to open her mouth fully to pick up her ball (which alone is a trauma for Keala as the ball is everything to her lol). The muscles on her forehead were also sunken like Alfie's.
It is basically pain in the facial muscles which in turn sends a message to the brain and the muscle starts to waste away. My vet prescribed Steriods, which he said may have to be used long term. However she recovered very well and did not need to stay on them.
He also recommended giving her a tennis ball or similar to mouth/chew on to build the muscles back up in the face.
The steroids made her very hungry and very thirsty but they did the trick. She has never had the condition again, although it can be a recurring problem
Has your vet said what he thinks it is? Or prescribed anything?
My vet had seen it before and knew how to treat it, however what he did say was that the correct way to diagnose it is to send of samples of the effected muscles for testing.
Kealas problem started with her being unable to open her mouth fully to pick up her ball (which alone is a trauma for Keala as the ball is everything to her lol). The muscles on her forehead were also sunken like Alfie's.
It is basically pain in the facial muscles which in turn sends a message to the brain and the muscle starts to waste away. My vet prescribed Steriods, which he said may have to be used long term. However she recovered very well and did not need to stay on them.
He also recommended giving her a tennis ball or similar to mouth/chew on to build the muscles back up in the face.
The steroids made her very hungry and very thirsty but they did the trick. She has never had the condition again, although it can be a recurring problem
Has your vet said what he thinks it is? Or prescribed anything?
mel - October 18, 2009 05:40 PM (GMT)
hes 6 Hedda,
no my vet wasnt worried, hes still picking up his ball when we go out and eating and drinking, he is his normal self, i was just looking back at older pic's of him and he was sunk abit then, should i see another vet?
and thanks for the reply :D
no my vet wasnt worried, hes still picking up his ball when we go out and eating and drinking, he is his normal self, i was just looking back at older pic's of him and he was sunk abit then, should i see another vet?
and thanks for the reply :D
Sue - October 18, 2009 06:45 PM (GMT)
My old yellow Lab Kim got like this, but she was really old (15 1/2) and had started to lose weight.
Hope he's ok, give him a cuddle from me :friends:
Hope he's ok, give him a cuddle from me :friends:
Tina - October 18, 2009 09:32 PM (GMT)
Zigo started to look a bit like that too over the last year, but he had lost some weight too. It wasn't as visiable as on the pics you showed of Alfie, but still a bit like it. I thought it was due to the weightloss and agechanging, but dunno...
kealagirl - October 19, 2009 01:41 PM (GMT)
| QUOTE (mel @ Oct 18 2009, 05:40 PM) |
| hes 6 Hedda, no my vet wasnt worried, hes still picking up his ball when we go out and eating and drinking, he is his normal self, i was just looking back at older pic's of him and he was sunk abit then, should i see another vet? and thanks for the reply :D |
Hey Mel, some of the other muscles in Kealas face around the jaw were also effected which is why she couldn't pick up her ball. I would want to know personally what it is, he is only 6 and his muscles shouldn't be wasting away like that! But that's just me :)
hulamor - October 19, 2009 09:40 PM (GMT)
Masticatory Muscle Mysositis (MMM)
I have seen it twice:
first dog couldn't open it's mouth fully and the second one could. The owner of the second one only took him to the vets for a booster and thought that the muscle wastage was due to old age.
If your dog was quite thin, the sagittal crest would also be prominant but from the photo the dip either side of the crest appears quite severe. You could either mention the above condition to your own vet or phone all of your local veterinary surgerys and ask if any of the vets have any experience of this condition. If they do, then you could go there for a 2nd opinion if you wanted to.
I have seen it twice:
first dog couldn't open it's mouth fully and the second one could. The owner of the second one only took him to the vets for a booster and thought that the muscle wastage was due to old age.
If your dog was quite thin, the sagittal crest would also be prominant but from the photo the dip either side of the crest appears quite severe. You could either mention the above condition to your own vet or phone all of your local veterinary surgerys and ask if any of the vets have any experience of this condition. If they do, then you could go there for a 2nd opinion if you wanted to.