Sick Bubba :(

Bentley (aka: Bubba) is 11 years old now & lately has definitely been showing his age :( He has been slowing way down, has trouble going down the stairs to potty & has been passing out for no reason for the last couple of months. It is pretty scary when he passes out but will usually come to after a long, scary couple of minutes.

It has started to happen more frequently so I decided it was time to make an appointment for him to see the doggie Cardiologist.

Waiting to see the heart vet :)

 

We went to Blue Pearl Vet Specialists (who are amazing by the way) & the vet tech went over everything they were going to do to Bubba to assess his heart & overall health which was an EKG & an Echocardiogram. He was back there for about 30 minutes & then the Cardiologist talked with me about his results.

 

Turns out that Bubba has been passing out due to an irregular heart rhythm called ventricular tachycardia. While he was hooked up to the heart monitor the Dr. said he was in & out of this rhythm quite frequently & definitely explains why he would pass out. Then she told me the Echocardiogram showed he had a cardiomyopathy, right-sided heart failure & coronary artery disease which is all pretty normal for an aging 11 year old bulldogs heart. Add the irregular heart rate to it & it makes for a bad combination. He is at an extremely high risk for sudden death.

 

Luckily for Bubba there is medications he can take to help stop his fast heart rate, to help strengthen his heart muscle & increase his pumping function. And lucky me all his heart medications I can get at Target pharmacy as a generic for $4.00 each - win win!!! He will be sent home with 4 heart medications & we are to go back in a month for another EKG & see if the medications are helping.

 

In the meantime, we will continue to take good care of him, love on him as much as we can & smooch those flaps until it is time for us to say goodbye!!