John Williams asked:
Gastric bloat or volvulus can be a greatly disturbing occurrence for your pet and the discomfort they may feel can b unbearable and in some extreme cases cause death to your dog. So it will come as no surprise to you when I tell you this is an extremely dangerous condition in your dog and often escalates very fast without any previous waning. Although the chances of a fatality are greatly reduced to around a 90% survival rate in recent years, in years gone by this same rate may have been around the 30% mark.
The cause of this condition is unknown but happens when the gases within the dog’s stomach cannot be removed via burping on by wind. Normally in dogs this is a regular occurrence and happens quite a lot during the day as many of you will know all too well, but in some dogs and for unknown reasons the dog becomes unable to remove the gas and their stomach becomes more inflated and painful. As this happens the dog may start to try and burp the gases out so they can resume normal life and rid of the annoying pain, but as they do this it actually traps more wind and the stomach inflates further.
From this the dog may become panicky and start to become very agitated and nervous, trying to vomit and retching may follow but often with no results. This then becomes a desperate situation because as the dog becomes more frightened about what is happening the more air that gets swallowed making the situation worse and worse.
As the stomach gets to its most bloated stage it makes more discomfort for the dog because the stomach may twist and push against other organs and begin to make further problems. From this point in the condition is not solved fairly quickly and the symptoms are not shown to a professional then the life of the dog may be greatly at risk.
If on the other hand the dog is taken to the vet straight away then the vet will probably pump the dog stomach of all its content to reduce the pressure and relieve the dogs pain and then continue to monitor the condition over the next few weeks, and possibly suggest a few tips to prevent it occurring again such as not eating before walks or not eating in large portion and instead use more portions of a smaller size.
James
