Understanding A Dog’s Urinary Tract Infection

A lower urinary tract infection can lead to several problems for your dog, including incontinence. The painful condition can result in your dog having daily problems. If you suspect your dog has a urinary tract infection, here is what you need to know.

What Are the Symptoms?

As the urinary tract infection worsens, your dog will show a range of symptoms, including an inability to urinate. If your dog can urinate, the amount could be smaller than usual. In addition to this, your dog could experience fever, pain while urinating, and vomiting. There could also be changes to your dog's diet and activity levels.

A urinary tract infection is a serious medical condition. If your dog's condition is not immediately treated, the infection could travel to the kidneys. When this happens, the dog's life could be at risk. The bladder could also rupture, which could also lead to death.

What Can You Do?

It is important that you schedule dog treatment with a veterinarian. After diagnosing the urinary tract infection, your dog will likely be prescribed antibiotics. Dietary changes might also be necessary. The vet will likely recommend increasing your dog's water intake.

Some foods, such as those high in protein and calcium, can play a role in developing urinary tract infection. Eliminating or reducing foods that contain those minerals can help in the recovery process.

Your vet will want to re-examine your dog after the antibiotics have been completed. At that point, the vet will determine if the antibiotic therapy needs to be continued or if a different antibiotic needs to be taken.

What If Your Dog Will Not Take the Antibiotic?

One of the challenges you could face while administering antibiotics to your dog is a reluctance on its part to take the medication. There are some ways you can ensure your dog is getting the treatment it needs to recover.

For instance, you can ask vet to prescribe a prescription dog food that contains the antibiotics that are needed. The dog food can also help lower the chances that a urinary tract infection will recur in the future. Another option is to hide the medication inside of food. If you are concerned that your dog will catch on, try to feed the treats to it quickly to avoid less time for examination of the food.

Talk to your vet about other ways you can convince your dog to take its medication and to prevent a urinary tract infection in the future.


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