What to do CT head and spinal tap or not to diagnose focal seizures in my dog?

Question by Carolyn Reward: 75 Pond Points + 10 Knowledge Tokens Status: Pending a resolution
Hi
I have a maltese dog 4.5 yrs old who one and half weeks ago started having focal seizures almost daily. She has had 2 episodes of cluster focal seizures. My vet has done numerous blood tests to give her the best possible chance of something else causing her focal seizures. The next step he suggested is CT head and spinal tap to exclude or diagnose brain tumour or GME. My question to you is should I put my dog through sedation to confirm which one of the two diseases that have a very poor prognosis? I've been told that if GME is the cause of her focal seizures that the spinal tap may exacerbate her symptoms during the proceedure and she might die. Im confused as to what to do. If I take the pallitive care approach and just love her day to day and treat the symptoms as they occur until the inevitable or give myself peace of mind in the "hope" that she may not have either of these two diseases and then go down the idiopathic epilepsy track treatment. Its breaking my heart watching these episodes when they occur, as in between she behaves like the hyperactive maltese dog she is and then bang out of the blue she has the head stiffening and turning to the side,a vacant type look on her face, during recent episodes she has an increased swallowing behaviour and then last night she had loss of power of her front legs lasting only seconds. Each attack of the focal seizures lasts seconds but she can have up to an hour or more of sleeping or curling up in her basket before she has full alertness. Then she behaves just like her old self until the next attack. I just don't know what to do whether to put her through the stress of sedation for these proceedures and may loose her on the table and not have had that bit extra quality time or am I being selfish/ignorant/bad owner if I take the path of not doing these tests?
Regards Carolyn



Reply from RoamingInsomniac User Rating:  2070 Knowledge Tokens
your poor doggie... i guess if i needed to know, i would sedate the dog, and hope for the best...you need to know what is wrong with her...her quality of life isn't good while she is having these seizures...i hope they can find out what's wrong with her...
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