Can my pet's seizures cause permanent brain damage and what to do?

Oh no, poor Lou Lou! You will need to seek emergency veterinary care if her seizure lasts five minutes or longer. This is the point at which brain damage can occur, and she will need treatment right away to prevent that. I hope this helps!

Hi there and thank you for using pet coach to address your concern. For any seizure lasting longer than 5 minutes, I get very concerned about irreversible neurologic damage. During a seizure, the brain tends to overheat due to misfiring of neurons. This can lead to neurological abnormalities related to brain damage from the excessive heat produced by the seizure. If a seizure lasts for an hour I would most certainly expect irreversible neurologic damage to ensue. I would seek immediate veterinary care if this were the case so that the most appropriate Diagnostic and treatment recommendations can be made. I hope this helps guide you in the right direction. Please feel free to contact me if you have any other questions or concerns and I would be more than happy to help you further.

Thank you for using Petco Pet Education Center, formerly Petcoach! Seizures can result in lasting neurological damage, especially when the seizures are prolonged or severe. You can also have transient deficits in the post ictal (after -seizure) period that may resolve. You should bring your pet to a veterinarian for evaluation. Certainly seizures can be the result of a toxicity but, they may also be due to metabolic problems or primary neurologic issues. in addition, if he is having continual problems, there maybe treatment needed. I hope he is ok!

I am sorry to hear you are going through this with milo. Just like in humans the brain is hard to predict. I have seen patients get better slowly after these types of episodes but I have also seen them not recover. I do get worried about permanent brain damage. I think you will know if it's time to put him to sleep. If he is not making any improvements in a day or two speaking with the veterinarian about his quality of life might help.

Seizures can be due to a few different causes. It can be due to certain diseases, organ failure, or imbalances in the blood. It can also be due to diseases, or tumors that primarily affect the brain. Without knowing the details of his condition, it's difficult to tell how severe this is. If Buddy is otherwise acting normal now, then this indicates that he is not experiencing a severe disease at this time. There are other conditions that may look similar to seizures, so it's possible that something else is causing the episodes that you are noticing. The most helpful thing to do is take a video of him when he is doing it and take that to the vet. In order to find the cause of this problem and get the most appropriate treatment, Buddy will need to see a vet. Unfortunately, there is nothing that can be done at home to prevent another episode. Preventing future seizures/problems is dependent upon getting an accurate diagnosis and treatment by a veterinarian. I hope that helps and all is well with Buddy.

Poor Chubbs. Seizures in dogs can be caused by a primary brain lesion, infectious disease, underlying liver problems (hepatic encephalopathy), metabolic imbalances (sodium), or in most cases they are idiopathic (no underlying cause). Chubbs needs baseline bloodwork to rule out most underlying causes of this. Once those are ruled out, then the vet will place Chubbs on anti-seizure medication to help manage his seizures and prevent permanent brain damage. It sounds like Chubbs needs to be regulated right away, especially if he is having more than 1 seizure a month and/or they are lasting for more than 2-3 minutes at a time. Best of luck controlling his seizure activity, I hope things work out for him.

I'm so sorry about your dog. I know this is a very scary time. There are multiple causes of seizures. I'm not sure how old your dog is, but in dogs under 5 years old who are completely normal in between seizure episodes, epilepsy is the primary cause of seizures. In older dogs it could be inflammation, a brain tumor, and infection or problems with the organs (particularly the liver). I always recommend blood work first to look for any problems there. If the blood work is normal, the next step is to evaluate the brain by doing an MRI. If blood work has not been done, I would highly recommend it. If problems are found in the blood work, then you should treat that. If everything is normal in the blood work, I would recommend starting seizure medication. Some dogs will have seizures very infrequently like your dog started out. Those dogs don't usually need medication. But when they become more frequent and are clustering (multiple in a 24 hours period) then I would definitely recommend medication at this point. There are multiple different seizure medications to choose from, so talk to your veterinarian about that. Many times the seizures will be manageable with medications, but it takes consistent medication multiple times per day and blood rechecks for the drug levels. Honestly, some dogs will be very difficult or impossible to control and will continue to have seizures despite being on multiple medications. So to answer your question, yes, there is something you can do to help your pet and based on the number of seizures he is now having, he needs to be put on medication. I hope this helps!