My old dog had a seizure post-surgery. What tests are needed now?

I am sorry to hear about Barney. A seizure shortly after the surgery can be related to either recent anaesthesia (and for example some degree of brain injury from the anaesthetics) or to the surgery (for example a blood clot could travel from the surgical site to the brain and produce seizures). Anaesthetic-related seizures often will get better by itself, and in many instances after 4-5 days the dogs are back to normal. Blood clot is often a more serious complication and only MRI or CT can given the answer of the extend of the damage to the brain.

I am sorry to hear of your loss - it is very upsetting to have to put a dog to sleep following such a traumatic illness. There are unfortunately many potential causes of seizures including parasitic, inflammatory and viral infection of the brain, tumours and birth defects. A full post mortem exam would be required in order to determine the exact cause. There are blood tests for diseases such as toxoplasma and neospora but be aware that you could test for multiple possibilities and still not find the cause or could indeed have a sample test positive for exposure to a disease which had no influence on the condition

Personally I would have done another blood test to see if things had changed in the time Tysin last saw her vet, but since your friend was watching her while you were out of town, it may be the vet didn't do it because the primary owner wasn't there to give permission. You could see if the neurologist will do blood work for her, but it may not show anything. The most common cause of seizures in dogs is idiopathic, meaning there is no known cause. That could be another reason why the vet didn't do bloodwork. I hope this helps.

In my experience it is not common, although possible, to have seizures after anesthesia and surgery. However there are many diseases that can cause seizures. Many of them are unrelated to surgery and could be coincidentally be causing your dogs's seizures. Some medications are such as ketamine, acepromazine,and related compounds are known to contribute to seizure potential. It is possible, but fairly rare, that something related to the surgery, anesthesia, or medications precipitated the seizures. You should keep looking into these things with your vet and consider referal to a veterinary neurologist if you and/or your vet are still concerned.

Initially it will be important to make sure they were seizures and not heart related (syncope/arrhythmia) as these can appear similar. Try to catch an event on video for your neurologist and document what happens before, during, and after the event. You are right the most common sign of a brain tumor is new onset seizures. But we do also always rule out any other causes like systemic issues, heart issues, and any other cancer elsewhere in the body. There are also other problems that can occur in the brain like inflammation. Ultimately what your neurologist will recommend will be based on the exam and information you provide but is likely to include chest xrays, an abdominal ultrasound, and MRI +/- CSF tap. I hope this helps and thank you for using Petco Pet Education Center, formerly Petcoach!

Thanks for the picture! Unfortunately the way they have it printed out, it doesn't include what is normal for their lab machine, so I still can't fully interpret the results. From the lab that I use, the liver values that you have gotten would be considered normal, or very close to the normal range. Did the vet that ran the bloodwork give you any indication that they were abnormal? Seizures in a young dog could be caused by many things, including portosystemic or liver shunt (which may need ultrasound or bile acids testing to diagnose), epilepsy, hypoglycemia, kidney disease, intracranial disease, infection, among several others. I would recommend that you discuss these possibilities with your vet and see what other testing can be done to look at these other systems.

So I am very unsure as to what you mean by "chewing gum attacks" but I will try to address the rest of your question as best I can. In terms of seizures post-surgically, I have read and seen occasionally animal that after being exposed in to inhalant anesthetic have seizure activity. Whether or not it was due to the anesthetic, or because something was already wrong with the brain and the anesthetic triggered it, is not very clear. To obtain more information on a possible cause, you would need to obtain a diagnostic MRI by a neurologist at a specialty hospital. They would be able to assure you there is no structural issue that is the cause of the seizures. As far as the phenobarb dosing, your veterinarian should be taking blood in order to check and see if the levels are actually therapeutic.or not. He can adjust the levels accordingly, or potentially add in a second drug if needed. I can very much relate to how stress seizures are for the dog and the owner as I have an epileptic dog myself! It can be scary! However, I promise, with appropriate medication, as long as the seizures are kept under control and to a minimum, dogs can lead relatively normal lives. Hope this makes sense.