Stay on the 3/8 tsp of enzymes until Bella is stable for a couple of months.... this means delivering normal looking poos about 1 to 3 times daily.... and when she does this consistently for a month or more.... that is when we claim "Stable" (with a lot of hip-hip hooray!!! ) Then at this juncture.... you can try to reduce the amount of enzymes given with meals to the least amount needed while still being effective. The process is to reduce the enzymes by 1/8 of a tsp- -watch the poos for a few days if poos look good, then reduce the enzymes again by another 1/8 tsp- -and again watch the poos for a few days... you keep reducing until you notice the poos are starting to look sloppy again.... and that is when you KNOW you have reduced the enzymes by too much... so go back to the dose that still delivered normal looking poos. "IF" Bella can handle reduced enzymes once she is stable some of these dogs can cut the enzymes in half from what they started.... HOWEVER, not all EPI dogs can handle reduced enzymes... some just have to stay on the initial dose that worked. BUT.... it certainly is worth trying
Ahhhh... the not wanting to eat/losing appetite. Usually the first thing we suspect is low B12- -this you just treat with B12 supplementation that we discuss here on B12 tab on the website. The second suspect is SID (Small Intestinal Dysbiosis) which is not as easy as B12 to manage.... as some can get this under control fairly quickly while others struggle with this off and on and sometimes forever.......This is discussed on the SID tab and this section is well worth reading because dealing with SID can be such a pain in the butt.... and lots of "try this 1st, then try that"
First we suggest adding prebiotics, then we suggest trying prebiotics with probiotics... if these don't make a dent in SID symptoms, then we suggest Tylan antibiotic for 45 days ( best) if SID keeps returning we then suggest trying a different food. If Tylan makes absolutely no difference at all after about 10 days, then we suggest talking to your vet about swapping out Tylan and trying Metronidazole just in case your EPi dog is one of those rare cases where they don't respond to Tylan like most of the others but does respond to Metro. If you see no improvement at all with the Tylan or the Metro... and your dogs has what looks like SID symptoms but nothing is helping... then we suggest you have your vet check for kidney issues......... like i said... effectively managing SID is a process ....................I know this is a lot of info.... but with SID... there really is not an easy answer.. it all depends on the individual dog and that makes it sound convoluted........
...I am sending the info to our vet as well. He is so interested in all of this. He does know about it (he was also a MD but decided he would rather work with animals ) etc., and has a German Shepherd that he thought at one time might have had EPI...but Belle is his first fur baby with actual full blown EPI. So glad that we found him!