Caring for a Three Legged Dog or Cat
Tripawds is your home to learn how to care for a three legged dog or cat, with answers about dog leg amputation, and cat amputation recovery from many years of member experiences.
Join The Tripawds Community
Learn how to help three legged dogs and cats in the forums below. Browse and search as a guest or register for free and get full member benefits:
Instant post approval.
Private messages to members.
Subscribe to favorite topics.
Live Chat and much more!
Register
Log In
Members
Add Topic
Offline
Hey everyone,
Kota is doing really well still. We are about 6 weeks post-op. Kota has been hopping around, playing with his brother, and playing with his toys regularly. He’s back to being a food snob. I figure it’s time to ween him off the Gabapentin. We started doing that not even a week ago. I think we went from every night giving him a pill to every other night. I guess my only complaint is that it just seems like he still has low stamina (kind of.. he’s always been a lazy boy) and he pants pretty quickly when he hops around. My wife said she thinks these are symptoms of withdrawals. I don’t remember him being this “winded” when he was on the Gabapentin. Any thoughts?
As far as I know Gabapentin is not known for having withdrawal effects like lethargy. But I'm going to let Dr. Pam chime in with her thoughts as a vet who prescribes it for patients.
One thing to consider: is it hot where you are? Panting and being winded can be related to the current crazy summer weather, combined with building stamina over the long-term.
I know that we panicked when our Jerry was showing these kinds of signs not long after summertime went into full swing. The cause was simply that he was a hot dawg!
It is more likely that the panting is due to the extra exertion it takes to be a tripawd especially in heavily muscled breeds. I have not noted that as a side effect of weaning off the gabapentin but some dogs do get lethargic on the higher doses which is why we often use gabapentin to help calm down anxious dogs and cats when they need to go the vet.
Pam
Kota is on the 400mg capsule. We had been giving it to him once a day. For maybe a week, we have been doing every other day. How long do you think we should continue that and should we lower it more or just stop it from here?
It is relatively hot here in Mississippi, but it’s cool in the house. I’m just concerned at the amount of panting he does when he moves and stands for a lengthy time. Just seems like he’s doing that more now being off the Gabapentin than he was before.
I think you can just stop since he has not been on it long term. Sometimes I will change to the 100 mg capsule or you can open a capsule and mix half with some canned food but really you should be fine since he is 6 weeks post-op.
Pam
New question, using an older topic. Is it a problem to go 'cold turkey' with gabapentin? I wanted to ween Freek slowly, he's on 50 mg twice a day now (has been four times because of visible phantom pain attacks). I don't see any signals of phantom pain , but he's most of the day outside or sleeping out of my sight now... so I'm not sure he doesn't have any pain.
But somehow, he's doesn't like the very tastefull food (special cat soup) I use to give him the powder anymore. Well, he takes a few sips, but he doesn't empty the bowl, so I'm not sure of his total intake of the meds anymore. And he already gets just a very little bit of the soup, but he rather has his dry food now. I'm about to give up trying to give him his meds. Could that be harmfull in any way?
It is not really harmful especially if they have only been on it short term. The main reason to wean them down is to see if they still need the medication. If some animals are on really high doses long term then it is generally a smoother transition then stopping cold turkey but it sounds like your cat is doing this himself.
Pam
1 Guest(s)
