Boxer Incontinence Problem

Kemptone · #1 26th September 2006, 08:00 PM

Hello, my 3 year old, Chloe, has a pee drip problem. She apparently went through a very rough time when she was spayed. We adopted her in January. She is on incontinence medicine and probably will be for the rest of her life. That helps, but for some reason, only after walks, she drips. She does not drip any other time. Not even after running around the yard or wrestling with her brother Buster. The dripping only occurs after walks! She has had cultures at the vet, they found nothing. They did an exploratory surgery to see if the ring on her bladder was large. It turned out it was, but they don't believe it is a urine pooling problem. If this were the case she would drip in the mornings and other times she has to pee. The doctor is baffled and wants us to see a specialist for yet another exploratory surgery. We wanted to check here first to see if anyone has ever seen something like this before. We don't want to put our girl through another surgery if we don't have to. Any suggestions??

Thanks,
Eric in Maryland

**gmacleod** · #2 27th September 2006, 03:10 AM

Have you tried any natural incontinence cures for her? A fairly good one is parsley - just a tablespoon of fresh chopped parsley added to her food each day. It doesn't work in every case, of course (what does?), but it works for a great many - and has no nasty side effects as most meds eventually do.

It works by virtue of being a natural diuretic, btw. Meaning that when the dog pees, they really should empty the bladder completely. And an empty bladder means less/no pee available for dripping later.

As for why she drips only after exercise - my guess would be that her bladder muscles are simply so weak that when they're relaxed a little by the exercise of walking/running, they're not tightening up enough after to prevent dripping. Or at least, not for some time after. It's possible that something like parsley may assist in this case - because at least if her bladder is completely emptied during her walk, she will have nothing left to drip afterward.

Kysha · #3 27th September 2006, 08:50 AM

Have you thought about a chiro adjustment? I know it doesn't sound like they could be connected... but with my girl Tegan she was spayed at about 2.5 years old and was incontinent at about 3.5 years old. She was put on medication and that seemed to help (but not 100% perfect). Life went on like this for another year or so when we started chiro with her. After a while we started to wean her off her meds and she was never leaked again... She lived to be 8.

The chiro and the vet can't say for sure that the chiro cured her incontinence, but it sure seems likely to me!

Good Luck!