Home fecal exam (nope, not kidding)

[SoloRiver]

Hey all (especially you, AK!) --

 

My bitch Fly has chronically soft stools. Not watery or loose, mind you, just weirdly soft. She's more prone to diarrhea than Solo is, but I wouldn't say she has diarrhea particularly often, unless you consider large, soft (not cow-patty like, then I'd KNOW something was wrong with her) stools to be diarrhea. She's in excellent condition and appears to be literally bursting with health.

 

She's seen the vet for her annual and the vet, a holistic vet, gave us an herbal supplement (Gastriplex) that cost a fortune and some digestive enzymes, neither of which did squat for the soft poops. The next suggestion was a fecal to rule out parasites (some little voice in my head says, "Shouldn't that have been the first suggestion?" but never mind) and that brings me to my question. I teach a biology lab and have plenty of access to slides and compound microscopes. Is there any good reason that I can't just grab a veterinary parasitology text and do a fecal exam myself? Obviously if I can't identify what I see, I'll take a sample to the vet instead, but I know how to use microscopes and I know something about tiny vermin so all things considered I'd rather save the money and the trip.

 

Fly is on Interceptor, by the way, but on the "extended schedule" that gives protection against heartworms but not whips or hooks (i.e., every 45 days instead of every 30). I have not noticed any worm parts in her stool. She has recently started dragging her butt on the floor, which is not very charming. Her anal glands don't seem to be the issue. Maybe her butt is just itchy.

[Tassie]

Hey Melanie ? you really, really need to get a life, girl. This dissertation writing is really getting to you!

 

Sorry ? couldn?t resist that. And do get your dissertation out of the way so you can start on the books about the dogs. I love reading what you?ve written about Solo and Fly.

[AK dog doc]

I'm telling you, Melanie, you are one dedicated owner! (Those of you with delicate stomachs should put down your sandwiches and/or avert your eyes... poop instructions coming...)

 

To do a fecal (which, I will agree with you, I'd generally call a first-wave test for any stool abnormality, but as you say, never mind!) you CAN do a direct smear with a saline solution, but unless you have a pretty high egg load in a given sample you can easily miss somthing (however, if you try this, you might note whether or not you see a lot of motile bacteria - this can sometimes be an indicator of bacterial imbalance). We generally do a fecal floatation, which requires a salt solution (we use something called "Fecasol") that has a particular specific gravity which allows eggs to float to the top of the solution. You might be able to get some from your vet (an - um - unusual request, shall we say, but maybe not the weirdest one I've ever heard... twice I've had people ask me to save the testicles from their freshly neutered dogs... Now, WHY, I ask you, would these hold any fascination for the owner? - though perhaps it's best not to know. But I digress.)

 

If you can't get a floatation solution from your vet (you can tell them it's for a school project, which you could easily make it, come to that, depending on the - er - intestinal fortitude of your students), you could ask the same of a local human hospital lab. There are different types of solutions - to look for giardia (notoriously difficult to find on a fecal), usually a special solution is used, as they're tricky little beggars.

 

To do a fecal, you need a large-pea-sized bit of stool, a fluid column (we have a special little device for this, but you could use a test tube - depending on the volume, you might want to use a bit more stool), the floataion solution, a slide, and a slip-cover. Suspend the fecal material in the floatation solution (fill the column only part way for this), then once it's a niiiice uniform shit slurry (pardon my French, and try not to make too many bubbles in it as this makes the fecal hard to read) top the column/test tube off til it just over-tops the lip of the tube, so that you have that little fluid bulge just above the edge that stays put only by virtue of fluid surface tension. Place the slip cover on top (this may cause your fluid bubble to lose its tension and leak, but that'll be okay). Let it sit for 20 minutes (that's for our fecal float solution... others may have different timing.) Take the slip cover off, put it on a slide, and go through it at low power. Coccidia and giardia (the protozoan parasites) will be a lot smaller than the roundworm eggs (including whips and hooks). And don't forget to wash your hands, since I don't know for sure, but I'm betting this would be a lot more embarrassing if you had to go to YOUR doctor with this problem, and these are "transmisable to people" kinds of guys.

 

You may have to repeat a fecal a few times over the course of a few weeks, since if the worms are not in a big egg-laying mood that day you might miss something. You might also think about what type of fiber your dog has in her diet (for some reason Finn did better on a beet-pulp fiber than some of the other kinds in puppyhood, though now it seems not to matter). A mild bacterial overgrowth might be cause for a soft stool with few other symptoms. And you're right that the sit-and-scoot move beloved of dogs (especially if you have white carpeting and the vicar over for lunch) is usually an anal gland issue rather than worms (the reason people always think that's worms is that pinworms - common in horses and people - DO cause a certain - er - tingling sensation, shall we say - that would give any human victim a LOT of sympathy for the sit-and-scoot move, vicar or no. Or so I hear, having never had any first-hand experience with this. I swear.)

 

Anyway, that's a place to start... or you could just do a course of Panacur (fenbendazole) which is a fairly agressive wormer, though toxicity to the host is quite low, and see if that straitened things up for you. Not as interesting, but a lot less smelly.

 

Some of the mushers up here do their own fecals, but it's nearly always scientific types, because not that many people have a microscope at home. Go figure. So I'm sure you could do this if you wanted to. (However, I'll go on record as saying this is just one reason out of hundreds I'm glad I have nursing staff!)

[Pipedream Farm]

Melanie (& AK Dog Doc),

being a lab geek myself and working in diagnostics R&D you might be surprise what the general public can buy if you know who to call. Many supply houses and manufactures will sell you diagnostic kits even though you are not a physician/vet. For example, try Vet Med Direct to see if you can buy Fecal Float Device, Parasite Diagnostic - 50 Tests.

 

Personally I've been interested in obtaining Snap 3DX Test Kit or Snap Canine Heartworm PF Antigen Test Kit since these are the types of kits I help develop for human diagnostics. My wife has been trained to draw blood from dogs and I am very well versed in running these types of tests.

 

Mark

[SoloRiver]

Wow!

 

AK, you rock.

 

I have a labmate who studies ground squirrels in the Canadian Rockies. Part of her project involves analyzing squirrel turds for parasites so she may very well have some spare Fecasol to give me. Or, the product link that Mark gave is probably cheaper than paying someone else to do the fecal for me, and then I still have enough stuff to do 49 more fecals!

 

Of course, this may be starting to fall into the "more trouble than it's worth" category. For some reason I thought I could just kind of water down some poop and smear it on a slide. As you may guess, parasitology is not my specialty.

 

I'll see if I can get the supplies together, and if so I'll let you know how it goes. Thanks!

[Pipedream Farm]

Melanie,

 

at $16.95/gal you too can own your own Fecasol; I just figured that the test kits might be more useful.

 

Mark

[juliepoudrier]

Melanie,

When I was a high school/college student and working for a vet, I was taught to read fecal exams and heartworm tests (this was before vet techs were a dime a dozen), and it's really not hard. Of course it would be easiest to have a vet or vet tech show you what to look for and let you practice under their supervision at first, but you could probably teach yourself with enough perserverance.

 

It seems to me that back then (I'm probably dating myself here) we didn't use products like Fecasol. We made up our own saline solution, put some stool in a medicine vial, added the saline to the top of the vial, stirred well, covered with a slide and let sit for a while. Then took the slide, put it under a microscope and read the sample.

 

So anyway, my point is the vet I worked for, who by the way was a good vet in my opinion, was comfortable teaching people like me to read fecal samples, and so it should be possible for you to do the same.

 

I believe that many folks who raise sheep consider it a good investment to buy a microscope and check fecal samples on their flocks so they can keep a check on their worming program.... So your idea isn't as far-fetched as you might have thought.

 

J.

[emmetteabrakai]

Melanie what great idea! I know you can do it, you have the perfect set up. You just need some materials and you will be set.

AKdogdoc where were you when I was learning to run fecals ? So simple and concise, any Border Collie, er Border Collie owner can do it. Between your directions. A good book to identify the little guys and Melanie will be all set. I would recomend asking a vet to see the fecal device provided in the kits and I would bet she could rig up the same thing in her lab. I have long thought it would be nice to run fecals at home in the past, but I didn't have that microscope thing . I used to run all the fecals and the old heart worm tests, the old gel digestion tests on exposed film. Ok now I aging my self.

Good luck Mealanie!

Andrea D.

[AK dog doc]

Ooooh, good idea, Andrea - maybe I'll just make Finn run his OWN fecals from here on out! (Strangely, he has a lot more interest in smelling dog poop than I do. Hmmm, now, why could that be...?) (And BTW, it's a good thing you didn't see me fumbling my way through my first few fecals, or you wouldn't be so impressed!)