| photo albums | 0 |
| total photos | 0 |
| photos viewed | 0 |
| Registartion date: | Aug 4 2010 |
| First Name: | Wesley |
| Last Name: | Black |
| Gender: | Man |
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ourpitbulls.com main page |
| Skeletor, a rescued pitbull diagnosed with heartwo | |
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This page is for a pit bull that I rescued in February of 2010. This dog wandered up to my front door at roughly 35lbs. He was literally a walking skeleton. Hence the name, Skeletor. Skelly is an unneutered male roughly 1.5 years old. He was diagnosed with heartworm during his first vet visit under my care. He weighed in at 37lbs. Since then, my roommates and I have been doing everything we can to get him healthy enough to undergo injections to eradicate the heartworms. Things were going ok for a while, then the vet gave him the heartworm preventative. This caused a very strong auto-immune reaction. During the months that followed, we administered the prescribed prednisone and antibiotics in hopes of alleviating him of his anemia. Skeletor seemed to be doing better than ever, but suddenly about 2 weeks ago he became lethargic and lost his appetite. After a couple of days, we noticed blood in his urine. We took him to the vet and his red cell count was down to 28%. This is after an all time high of 40%. He was just as bad off as he was when he had the initial reaction. The vet treated him for another auto-immune reaction, since the symptoms fit. Four days later (today), I took him in for a follow up. His red cell count is now even lower - down to 21%. Furthermore, his platelet count is low and his white cell count high. The vet performed a chest x-ray and noticed that parts of his lungs are non-functional. I was told that this could be due to 2 things... Pneumonia or a blockage caused by the heartworms. Since his temperature doesn’t indicate a severe infection, we can only assume that the blockage is to blame. I am going to get a sonogram as soon as possible to confirm this diagnosis. (hopefully tomorrow) I asked the vet what the next step would be in the event that the heartworms are indeed causing a blockage. The only feasible options are surgery or euthanasia. Giving him the injections at this point would surely kill him. In the meantime, I’m reaching out to organizations and individuals in hopes of raising some funds for what I expect will be a very expensive operation. Please let me know if you offer any sort of grants for situations like this, or can point me in the right direction. Thank you for your time. Please help me spread the word so we can save this wonderful pup. He has come so far! I have been documenting Skeletor’s progress on his blog since day one: http://helpskeletor.blogspot.com/ Connect with Skeletor on Facebook http://www.facebook.com/pages/Jacksonville-FL/HelpSkeletor/317436999631 Video: Week One with Skeletor http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6a23lzFNEeA Video: Week Two with Skeletor http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HntKZP1lvgE HelpSkeletor Buttons for your blog or website http://helpskeletor.blogspot.com/p/bloggy-button-codes.html -- Kindest Regards, Wesley Black (904)387-2237 |