# Does/Did your dog have giardia?



## MyJaxson (Jan 5, 2010)

If they HAD it how long did it take to get a rid of? If they HAVE it how long has it been?


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## MyJaxson (Jan 5, 2010)

I will start.. Jaxson has had it for 5 weeks, as far as I know.. I got him 5 weeks ago. He has had 3 fecals all with positive results


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## BeauShel (May 20, 2007)

Luckily my goldens never had it. But now that I think about it, my american eskimo was very sick when I got her and had almost every type of parasite when I got her. It took a long time to get rid of it. And also car sick so every vet visit was a very bad experience.


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## egcc (Feb 23, 2009)

So far, Ellie has had it once. We live in Tacoma, WA, so there are always LOTS of puddles. The vet speculates that she got it from drinking from a puddle. She gets almost obsessed with drinking from puddles, so this is exasperating. We noticed it when she had a little bit of blood/mucous in her stool. Luckily for us, she was able to get rid of it after just one course of treatment. So, once we started to treat it, it was out of her system in about 2.5-3 weeks. We had to keep her out of day care, so we were so happy that she did not have to go through another course of treatment. Good luck to you!


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## jaxx_n_gunner (Jan 28, 2010)

Gunner had it at about 6.5 months. Took about 2 weeks to get him back to normal. He was a pretty miserable little guy, but fortunately it only took 1 round of the medication.


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## Ljilly28 (Jan 22, 2008)

Tippykayak and I chose two littermates, Finn and Gus, who had terrible cases. We struggled for several months with it. I learned a few things: wash food/water dishes daily, clean up the yard like crazy- the pups can reinfect themselves so easily. Are you giving Flagyl? That is the only thing that seems to work.


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## amy22 (May 11, 2008)

Misty had it when she was about 5 months and if I remember right she took 2 rounds of the antibiotic. I lived in CA at the time and I guess she must had taken a drink from an infected puddle on one of our walks. Thats the only time she had it.


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## tippykayak (Oct 27, 2008)

Ah, LJilly, I remember those halcyon days.

The only other thing I've learned about it is that treatment needs to be prolonged. One round of flagyl will wipe out all the active protozoa, but they have a cyst stage that isn't harmed by it. There are some newer protocols where the dog is treated for a week, takes one to two weeks off, and then is treated for another week. Definitely ask the vet.

You're lucky that the fecal results have been positive, so you know for sure what you're dealing with. Lots of the time, the results come back negative, even when the dog is infected. I know, it's a weird thing to try to feel lucky about.

I really feel like our dogs just had to grow out of it. Gus had it on and off for months, but once he got to be about 10-12 months old, it just stopped happening.


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## AmberSunrise (Apr 1, 2009)

I have never had it in any of my dogs (5 goldens now) , but the area I live in was flagged on premium lists as giardia hot-spots so perhaps my dogs develop an immunity to it? They are in the woods most days ....


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## tippykayak (Oct 27, 2008)

Sunrise said:


> I have never had it in any of my dogs (5 goldens now) , but the area I live in was flagged on premium lists as giardia hot-spots so perhaps my dogs develop an immunity to it? They are in the woods most days ....


I think it has a hard time really getting going in adult dogs unless they're immuno-compromised in some way. Gus got it over and over and over, and then boom, with adulthood, he never had a problem again. I'm not saying healthy adult dogs _can't_ get it, but the symptoms really seem to affect puppies more than anything else.

Apparently, many, many adult dogs in CT are symptomless carriers.


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## Doodle (Apr 6, 2009)

I agree 100% with Ljilly and Tippykayak. Brady battled with it practically his entire puppyhood, then at about 10 months finally grew out of it. We did several rounds of Panacur and metronidazole to try and get it when it was in the protozoa stage, and I'm sure that helped, but I really believe that Tippy is right that in stubborn, prolonged cases like we had, their immune system has to develop enough to fight it off themselves. We also cleaned the yard, our shoes, his paws and the house like maniacs to try and keep the bug numbers down to try and help him fight it off, for whatever that was worth.


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## Ljilly28 (Jan 22, 2008)

It is miserable. I hope I remembered to express my complete sympathy in my last post. If not, you certainly have it.


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## Swampcollie (Sep 6, 2007)

Depending upon where you live, Giardia is one of those things that is nearly impossible to avoid. The waters in the upper midwest and great lakes areas harbor Giardia so if your dog swims, wades or drinks it is exposed. 

Here in Minnesota, it's just one of those things we have to live with because there's no getting away from it.


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## Rigg Z (Jan 3, 2010)

Riggz is now 4.5 mos. old and has had loose stools for about a month now. He had a weeks worth of metro and his stools firmed while on the meds but as soon as they were gone ... diarhea again. The vet now has given us a full month's worth of metronidazole. So far, his stools have been better and we hope that when this course is finished, he will be normal. The vet also prescribed SD prescription i/d food as it is easier to digest. Later this week we will begin his transition to regular adult dog food. We have chosen Purina One Lamb and Rice formula and hope that we are through this bout of stool problems. After many fecals, there was never a positive test for any parasite. I think the vet was treating the symptoms and not the cause. I think they all assumed Riggz had giardia but never actually committed to me this thought. We are crossing our fingers.


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