Wednesday, October 30, 2013

1136. Follow up on Bichon Frise Wed Oct 30, 2013

Wed Oct 30, 2013

At 5.30 am, I woke up and checked on the Bichon. This time the caregiver complied with my instructions to let him sleep in the sheltered area outside the kitchen so that he has access to the grass to pee anytime. He would be taken to the grass at other times in the day. This morning, he had no need to rush to the grass. I said "In" which is a command to move "forward" to any place I wanted him to. He has this habit of barking loudly whenever anyone comes to the front door as he positions himself in the living room. It is good but as some family members come home at 3 am, his loud barking disturbed my sleep. Whenever he barks in this way, I will get up and train him by depriving him of the privillege of being in the living room. He would have to go to the kitchen and stay there whenever he barks in this way in my presence. My family members do not adopt this method of training and so he is 70% trained. Yesterday when I came back in the afternoon, he barked again.

In medical dissolution of the struvite stones, the Bichon must also have access to the grass to pee and that is why he cannot stay indoors. We lock our front and back doors to prevent burglaries and so the dog will not pee for more than 10 hours per day till he is let l oose  outdoors to the grass.   

For the past 7 years, he lived indoors and would hold his bladder till it is full and go to the grass in the evenings once a day. This is quite common for dogs as they don't want to soil the inside of the house or apartment and are not paper trained. Urine stasis leads to urinary stone formation in this Bichon as he was fed mainly dry dog food and given treats by family members daily. He prefers to be indoors and so would not pee till brought to the grass outdoors. Sometimes after work past 8 pm, I would take him to the grass. His usual habit would be to raise his right leg and urine marked the lamp-post and other places. A few drops of urine here and there peed out within a second or two.    

This morning at 5.30 am, after complying with my "In" command, he gave up thoughts of coming into the house and walked down the steps to the back garden grass. He stood like a while looking at me and then raised his right hind leg and stood like a statute.

I counted "1, 2, 3......." till he stopped peeing by putting down his right leg. Today, he took just 13 seconds approximately. His urinary catheter was removed by Dr Daniel yesterday evening as it is not advisable to put it in for more than 2 days to prevent bladder infection. He is still under medical treatment as an alternative to bladder stone surgery and so he must be allowed access to the grass at least 3  times per day nowadays. The caregiver is the one who must be trained to understand the rationale of ths need to access the grass to pass out any crystals dissolved by special diet. As for today's observation, it seems he can pass urine much faster than yesterday 2.30 am at around 55 seconds from raising to lowering of his right leg.

There needs to be a lot of work to get this dog to pee and the responsibility is great.     

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