What is enteropathic arthritis in dogs? Could my dog have that?!?
First i would like to say, my dog was diagnosed with ibd 2 weeks ago, and she felt a lot better after giving her medication from the vet and changing her diet to hills’ prescription d/d diet for dogs with ibd. She seemed to be doign well, until a few days ago she fell down the stairs and started to walk weird, her two hind legs seemed to give in. The morning after i brought my dog to the vet and he did a thorough examination on her legs, only to end up doign an xray. There he showed me that Mini had spinal arthritis based on the xray. He gave me glucosamine to prevent other joints to become inflammed. And no more stairs for my dog or too much activity. Mind you she’s a 6 year old min pinch chihuahua cross. So it’s pretty rare for her.
I was wondering if she has enteropathic arthritis then? And if she has that does that mean it’d go away?!
There is a form of immune mediated arthritis that is called enteropathic arthritis and also called Type III non-erosive arthropathy. This affects approximately 15% of dogs who have non-erosive arthritis according to Hay and Mansley, writing in “Saunders Manual of Small Animal Practice”. A connection between gastroenteritis from food allergies and arthritis is also made in an issue of the “Veterinary Clinics of North America”, (Blakemore, July 1994). This condition is also discussed in the “Textbook of Veterinary Internal Medicine” by Ettinger and Feldman.
There appear to be two theories for the simultaneous occurrence of enteritis and arthritis. The first theory is that the disorders are both caused by the same underlying immune system abnormality, which probably does occur in some cases. The second theory is that the body’s reaction to the chronic bowel disease and to immune complexes in the blood stream from this cause the arthritis. This probably also happens in some cases. Regardless of what the actual cause is, it does seem to help a great deal to successfully control the gastrointestinal disease so that should be the main thrust to the treatment effort. If the enteritis can be controlled then the arthritis should either resolve or require minimal treatment. In the meantime, if non-steroidal anti-inflammatory medications help with the arthritis and don’t make the gastrointestinal disease worse, they are probably the best medications to use. The other choice is to use corticosteroids. It is pretty important to be reasonably certain that this is an immune mediated arthritis and not osteoarthritis or infectious arthritis prior to using corticosteroids, though. On X-rays non-erosive arthritis usually causes very little changes to the bone so the joints look pretty normal except for soft tissue swelling. Aspirating fluid from the joint can also be helpful in making the diagnosis of immune mediated arthritis.
It is hard to be sure that there is a connection between these two problems. The X-rays will help some and joint fluid aspiration might help, too. The best evidence would be if the arthritis clears up when the digestive problems are resolved.