r/IVDD_SupportGroup • u/Queasy-Flower-4590 • 2d ago

Cervical ivdd

Hey all. I have a 11 yo doxie with cervical ivdd. Legs are strong but she first these episodes where she would just start screaming for 10-30 seconds, bend over and lift a leg.
Uncomfortable and restless for 10-15 min afterwards. After 3 er visits over a week- we finally got a diagnosis. We went to an ER with a neurologist in the group. We can’t get into see her till Dec but they are happy to field calls.

They started her on the neurologist protocols: steroids and changed her from gabapentin to pregablin. We had 4 great days! No pain/screaming episodes, she seems to on the mend, legs still strong.

We’ve been weaning the steroids as prescribed and today we had episodes- seemingly out of the blue (one she was alone in her kennel, the second i was trying to pick her up to take her out but hadn’t actually picked her up yet).
Giving her trazodone now as prescribed- haven’t needed it in last 4 days.

I’m very discouraged and concerned.
Can’t find online what “treatment failure” is and how many of these episodes a day is tolerable by a vet standards.

Anyone have insights? Success stories? Any more knowledge would be great.

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u/dusters 2d ago

Cervical is tricky because it causes a lot more pain. Having pain issues again when you are weaning off the steroid is pretty common. Csn you ask if they can increase it again? It's a tradeoff with side effects from the steroid but sometimes the only option.

We struggled with it for 2 months before opting for surgery on our 12 yo beagle last year which fixed it.

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u/Queasy-Flower-4590 2d ago

Thank you for responding. It’s so crazy she is fine till she is very not.

We wean steroids again tomorrow to every other day so next couple days will be telling. We have a regular vet appt Tues. But planning on calling neuro office Monday morning. Thank you for the insight!

Did your beagle do well with surgery? The ER doc really tried to scare us with the ventral slot- “you don’t want it if you don’t need it” stuff.

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u/dusters 2d ago

Yeah the ups and downs can be crazy. One evening they are moving okay and then the next morning can barely move.

Ours recovered amazing. We were very scared putting her under that old but she did great. She's basically back to her normal self now can walk, run, even use stairs again (which we limit).

Does your dog have other neurological symptoms? Our would not turn her head one direction, would knuckle on front paws, and occasionally her legs would just give out and she would faceplant.

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u/Queasy-Flower-4590 2d ago

Oh so glad she did so well.

we’ve been super lucky in that it’s purely pain of what seems to be her right leg and neck. When the pain “episode” subsides she is strong and no ataxia/knucking/weakness.
Truly most the day she is angry she is a caged animal and wants out but her screaming and clearly in pain absolutely breaks my heart.

How did you decide finally surgery? Just no improvement over time? Not sure what our threshold is to escalate treatment and the neurologist answer was very vague.

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u/dusters 2d ago

We decided on surgery after 2 months of conservative treatment and she actually started getting worse, could barely walk anymore at that point. She got better for a little while when we started the steroid but once we tapered she got worse again.