Dog Drinking alot

lori84

I am looking for a little bit advice about my brother-in-laws dog, She is 15 year old Yorkie and she has been drinking alot, she seems to drink all the water at once and then look for more. This is quite a recent thing as she used to go hours without looking at her food or water. Over the past couple of days she has also been sick with the water but im not sure if this is due to the fact that she is drinking such large amounts in such short period. Should i be taking her to the vet to get her checked or shoud i wait and see what happens in a couple of days?

Thanks

Lori

janeys

I would take her to the vet as soon as possible, as it could be a number of things and the vet can quickly diagnose the situation. Even in hot weather it is not normal for a dog to drink so much. Dont limit her water even if she is being sick, but i would strongly suggest you phone the vet now and get an appointment today.

Tropez

Definitely get her to the vets.

There is a condition in mammals called water intoxication ( hyponatremia[FONT=Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif]) which is caused my drinking too much water in a short space of time. This condition can cause the brain to swell as the cells that would normally take on the water that is consumed grow full, leading to the brain cells absorbing the water. Symptoms of water intoxication include nausea and vomiting, malaise, severe headaches and the condition can grow to be an emergency and lead to death.

I do not wish to alarm you but any mammal that is consuming large amounts of water, particularly a small breed dog like a Yorkie, is running the risk of developing this condition and it is most likely that there is something else wrong with the dog for the dog to be consuming such large amounts of water.

Any sudden change in a dog's behaviour should be brought to the attention of a vet.
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janeys

Oh, I meant to say try and get a sample of her wee and take this with you when you go to the vet. I did this when my dog started drinking a lot and weeing a lot and the vet was able to make an instant diagnosis after checking his urine. hope this helps.

pulliptears

It could be something as simple as diabetes, but she certainly needs a checkup asap. If you can catch a sample of her wee to take along with you as well that would be brilliant because they can check that too. (I find following them round with a tin tray and sliding it under mid wee quite effective!).
Also, try and monitor the correlation between how much water is going in and how much comes out. Per kilo of weight they reckon 80-120ml of water a day, so measuring that would also be a bonus.

janeys

How did you get on? Hope all is well.