so today I wanted to talk to you all about how to look after a pet having a
seizure what you should do if your pet has a seizure when they're actually
fitting as well as afterwards when you should consult your vet hi I'm dr. Alex
Avery from ourpetshealth.com helping you and your pet to live a healthier
happier life so if that's something you're interested in then consider
subscribing and hitting that Bell notification okay so first up it's
incredibly stressful to watch your dog to watch your cat have a seizure especially if
you've never seen one before they lose consciousness they can crash violently
they can lose control of their bowels they can urinate everywhere and it's
it's a really distressing upsetting thing to see seizures are actually only
an emergency if they're lasting for longer than five minutes or if your pet
is having multiple seizures throughout the day or they're having more than one
seizure without really recovering in between so those are emergencies
otherwise most seizures they actually only last a matter of seconds up to a
minute or so and although that will seem an awful long time when you're sitting
there watching your pet it really is not a long period of time it's not
dangerous if it's that length and so it's not a true emergency that gives us
a bit of time to think about what we're going to do during the seizure and also
afterwards okay so my first main point of what to do when your pet is having a
seizure is to watch out for your personal safety so you might be thinking
well I don't really care about myself I just care about my pet I just want to
help my dog or my cat as best as I can but really there's no point in you
getting bitten if you get a really nasty bite to the hand to the face then you're
not going to be any use to your pet so really personal safety is key so
avoiding the head end so don't try and pull tongues out of mouths or anything
like that don't try and pin your dog down they may
be very disorientated certainly while they're fitting their jaws maybe kind of
clamping open and shut and inadvertently you could get your finger your hand in
the way also when they're coming around from a seizure they can be very
disorientated and so can potentially even bite quite out of character so we
just need to be really mindful of our own safety so that we're then best able
to help our pet cope with having a seizure okay so my next point
in looking after a dog with seizures or certainly an epileptic dogs especially
who's had seizures in the past is to actually look out for the signs that
your dog might be about to have a seizure or your cat might be about to
have a seizure some pets this can be really obvious they might start pacing
they might be really anxious they might be really clingy you might just notice
that they do one particular thing in the build-up to having a seizure and this is
known as the pre ictal phase or the before seizure phase and if your
pet shows a clear sign then that can give you a really good clue that they're
about to have a seizure and take steps to to help them cope while they're
actually having that seizure now in some pets the like I say these signs can be
very obvious in others they can actually be really subtle and so quite difficult
if not impossible to pick up and others don't seemingly show any signs that
they're about to have a seizure so this might not be applicable to you but if
your pet is one of those who does show signs then that's something really great
to look out for because what that then allows you to do it allows you to remove
your pet from any dangerous situation so you might be crossing the road you might
be down the beach kind of going into the water you might be doing something that
really it would be best to avoid them doing while they're having a seizure
also you can move them into a safe area so one where there's not lots of things
that they can bump into bash into and hurt themselves so those are all things
that you can consider if you notice the signs that your dog is about to have a
seizure okay so next up is what to do when your pet is actually having a
seizure so your dog or your cat they've lost consciousness they might have lost
control of their bowels they might start thrashing around
what should you actually do well the first step as I suggested before it's
actually to move anything away from them that they might hurt themselves on so
that might be a table leg chairs it might be you know big rock or something
like that that's next to them so just if there's something that that's nearby
that they might bash into then just move that away the next thing to do is
actually don't try and move your pet so unless they're in real danger so
crossing the road in the water then actually just leaving your pet where
they are is is really the thing to do so if you try and move them then
you know it's really difficult you're likely to hurt yourself you're
potentially going to hurt them although it looks really distressing they're
actually they're not conscious and they're not in pain they're not in
distress while they're having a seizure and it's best just to leave them be and
then the third thing is actually just let them have that seizure so don't try
and hold them close don't try and cuddle them don't try and pin them down and
stop them moving because that can just make things things worse it can
cause muscle strains it could hurt us and like I say your pet is is not
conscious so they're not in any distress obviously if your vet has if you're if
your pet has had seizures before and your vet has advised you to give something
like rectal diazepam or what have you then obviously give that but again be
very careful going back to my first point that we really need to be to watch
out for for hurting ourselves and getting injured ourselves there's no
good if we get bitten okay so next up is the recovery period now depending on
your pet and depending how long the seizure was this recovery can actually
sometimes only take a couple of minutes sometimes they can take several hours so
your pet might be disorientated and I mean really tired so thrashing around
like that uses a lot of energy and they're likely to get very hot certainly if the
seizures are a long one so they might be disorientated some can
even appear blind it might be really staggering and appeared as though they
drunk when they're walking they might even be unable to get up but don't worry
too much about this just leave your pet nice and quiet don't stimulate them if
they're really looking for reassurance then absolutely kind of reassure them
stroke them cuddle them but if they're just wanting to be quiet by themselves and
that's often the best thing to do just in a in a kind of a dim quiet
environment and let them recover from their seizure by themselves so
another thing we can do in the follow-up period is actually to keep a seizure
diary and this again is very important for our epileptic dogs and our
epileptic cats although it's much less common problem in cats so we can write
down what our pet was doing when the seizure started were there any signs
that they were showing what were they doing before that seizure we can also
write down how long that seizure lasted and the exact time and date so that will
then give us a picture of is is this a developing problem are they getting more
frequent are they getting worse it might also allow us to pinpoint some of those
behaviors that they might be showing before they have a seizure to give us
just that early warning sign that we were talking about before okay and so my
last point is should you consult your vet well like I said at the beginning
seizures itself as long as they're short are not an emergency but there are
definitely things that you should consider when it comes to calling your
vet and ringing for advice I would certainly say that any pet who has not
had a seizure in the past you should definitely be contacting your vet just
for advice likely going for a general check just to check there's nothing else
going on so if your pet's never had a seizure before I definitely would be
getting in touch with your vet it doesn't have to be absolutely at that
minute but that's something that you should be thinking about also if your
pet is otherwise unwell so if they're showing other signs of illness if
they've been off their food for a bit maybe vomiting diarrhea you know they're
just seemed dull and depressed then you should definitely be contacting your vet
because that might be a sign that the seizure is part of its a bigger picture
another illness so you should also be
calling your vet and calling your vet straight away if the seizure is lasting
for more than five minutes after that point it starts to become dangerous and
emergency treatment might be needed so that should definitely be something
a time that you should be calling your vet and again if your pet is having
seizures even if they're only short but they're not recovering fully between
those episodes so they might be having one seizure they might stop that fiting
activity but they never really recover before they go into another
seizure and again that's something that is potentially an emergency situation so
you should be calling your vet any time of day or night and that's where it
helps to know where your emergency vet clinic is and another reason to call
your vet is if you're worried that they've eaten something so if you know
you've just put something out in the garden if they've been into your pantry
or into your garage your garden shed then they might have eaten something and
you should definitely be calling your vet because again seizures can be a
sign of poisoning and sometimes that might be the only sign or the initial
sign that we're seeing so that is another reason that you should call your
vet okay so I hope this video helps you look after your pet while they're having
a seizure be their dog or a cat it's a very distressing situation but if we can
understand a little bit more about why it happens and if we can give ourselves
some steps of things that we can do it can help us cope better as well as
helping your pet while they're having that seizure so if you've got any
questions then please leave me a comment down below otherwise until next time i'm
dr. alex from our pets health because they're family