[corvuss]

<_<

Over the past 5 days or so, Minnie has taken to peeing indoors, pretty frequently. This is very abnormal behavior for her. Before this, she would only pee indoors once in a great while if it was raining hard for many hours, and that would be a lot of pee in one place. This is small amounts anywhere, several times a day regardless of the weather. My wife and I suspect some sort of urinary tract or bladder infection. What we have of her Vet history before we got her shows that she has had these type infections a few other times.

I called the vet to make an appointment, and as I suspected, they need a urine sample. Their advice: carry a small bowl and follow her around. When she squats to pee, stick the bowl under her real quick and catch as much urine as we can.

Needless to say, this sounds difficult, time-consuming, and likely to fail.

Anyone had to get a urine sample from their girl hound?

Any succesful strategies would be most welcome!

Thanks in advance,

Paul

 

[Betsy Iole]

Your vet needs to perform a cystocentesis to obtain a sterile specimen. This is a procedure where a needle is inserted through the abdominal wall into the bladder, kind of like a blood draw.

 

[woebgon]

We use an aluminum pie pan that has been washed in the dishwasher to collect samples. It's not as difficult as it sounds. The vet may still wish to take one as Betsy suggested.

 

[BubbaLeroy]

Sending healing drool to Minnie. Good luck with the urine catching, males seem to be a bit easier in that respect. Keep us posted on how Minnie is doing.

 

[Emma and Doris]

I use a cake pan too,
when they sit down - just showel it under! :blink:
I did that for months with Soffi, no problem -
I guess it's more difficult with a male.

PS: I don't use it for cakes anymore...... :lol:

Drool for Minnie!


--------------------
<span style="color:#009900">The one that drools rules,
Steinar - daddy and foodslave to Emma and Doris!

http://www.basset-hound.net.tf</span>

 

[copsmom]

We thought Dolly had an UTI a couple months back and our vet used a soup ladle with the long handle.

 

[corvuss]

Thanks for the drool & good wishes!
Appreciate it, everyone, those are almost all good ideas. We'll see what happens at bedtime.
Minnie is very particular about a lot of things, but especially does not like any person or dog near her genitals. She thinks the number one job of her tail is to protect her parts! She doesn't like Duds sniffin', or people inspecting. In her old life I guess that always meant more puppies, poor thing.
She doesn't get mean, just wants to escape a few feet, turn and give the "hurt feelins'" look.
It will be quite interesting to see how I'm gonna do!

 

[Beverly Anne]

I have no advice but I wish you a lot of luck!!

 

[corvuss]

Well it was an adventure, but success was achieved. I ended up using a very shallow plastic bowl. She is very short and leaves little to no room between herself and the ground when she squats, so it had to be shallow.

First I tried following her around in the back yard at bedtime potty trip. That didn't work at all.
Since we normally just send both dogs out then by themselves, I messed with the routine and neither of them would do their business. They just hung around looking at me; "Whatcha doin out here Dad?" <_<
I got them back inside, Jeannie distracted Dudley, and I took Minnie for a walk.

She knew it was a weird situation, but she did her usual marking. Since it was marking and not a real pee, I had to stick the dern bowl under her 25 times (guesstimate) to get about 3 tablespoons of urine.
As predicted, she didn't like it. I got this reaction the first 5 tries: "HEY! Whatta you doin back there?" and no urine. But after that, I got results a few drops at a time. Of course I also ended up with pee on my hands, jacket, and who knows where else? :lol: :lol: :lol:

I'll update later, but I suppose I should add that she doesn't seem sick at all. Regular ol' Minnie, except sprinkling our rugs! :angry:

 

[corvuss]

Now I'm fairly ticked off. :angry: I will never again listen to the people who answer the phone at my vet's office when they tell me what to do in preparation for an appointment.

I called the vet to make an appointment, and as I suspected, they need a urine sample. Their advice: carry a small bowl and follow her around. When she squats to pee, stick the bowl under her real quick and catch as much urine as we can.[/b]

I listened to this, went through all that silly pee-collecting listed in my posts above, when in reality...

Your vet needs to perform a cystocentesis to obtain a sterile specimen. This is a procedure where a needle is inserted through the abdominal wall into the bladder, kind of like a blood draw.
[/b]

...this is exactly what the vet did. He seemed puzzled when I relayed what his employee told me, but didn't comment. I hope he trains his employees better in the future.

Yes, Minnie has a bladder infection, she will be on antibiotics for several days, but should be just fine.

Betsy, you were correct all along. I'm sorry for not completely believing you from the start, My Bad.

 

[Beverly Anne]

Heck, if Betsy says it, you can pretty much put it down as law. A urine culture needs a sterile collection set up and a centesis is as sterile as it gets!!!

 

[Betsy Iole]

Glad to hear that Minnie will be feeling better shortly.

 

[BubbaLeroy]

So glad to hear Minnie's problem has a solution that antibiotics can cure. Did anyone have the video camera going while you were collecting?? :lol: I'm sure it would get some laughs. :lol: :lol: :lol:
Keep us updated on her progress.

 

[corvuss]

Yeah, everyone thinks it's pretty funny, including me! :lol:
If you can't laugh at yourself, well you probably don't have many friends!

Minnie seems fine already, no more pee in the house. I know it's important to give her the whole course of antibiotics, so she'll have to take them for a few more days. She doesn't mind, we wrap the pill in a piece of cheese and she gulps it right down.

All is well and I have a funny story to tell when everyone gets together for Thanksgiving! :lol: :lol: :lol:

Not at the table, of course...

 

[Rubydoo]

Many years ago, when Ruby was a puppy, I had to bring a piece of POOP in to the vet for them to do fecal testing.

Ruby's daddy had a big laugh when I was following Ruby around with a pie pan lined with foil. Then we had to use MY car to transport the specimin to the vet. I recall having the windows down in a snowstorm to get that thing to the vet; just so I wouldn't stink up my car.

Arrrggghhhh! :blink: