My wife took him to the vet Friday morning who suspected poisoning.

Last Thursday evening our Norwich Terrier was fidgety. Sending pets home with vitamin K after exposure to brodifacoum is far less stressful than hospitalizing them for severe neurologic dysfunction without a way to reach definitive diagnosis and no antidote in sight. I hope bromethalin poisonings do not increase as a result of the ban on brodifacoum. He was lucky, if he had eaten more of the poison or had been brought in even a day later, I probably wouldn’t have been able to save him. It was touch and go for awhile, but he was much improved after a few days of hospitalization, and a follow-up phone call to his home in California revealed that he had made a complete recovery. Since I didn’t have a definitive diagnosis for my patient, I was limited to symptomatic and supportive therapies. My guess is that someone may have put out a bromethalin-containing rodenticide around the barns.ĭecontamination (e.g., inducing vomiting and giving activated charcoal) is very helpful within a few hours of ingestion, but once symptoms develop treatment for bromethalin poisoning revolves around trying to decrease swelling within the brain, dealing with symptoms as they arise, and patient support. We suspected that he had gotten into something at the horse show, but could never determine exactly what that might have been. My patient was brought into the clinic with a weird panoply of symptoms, some of which fit with those mentioned above. This dog belonged to an owner who was in town for a horse show. With hindsight, I think I may have treated one dog for bromethalin poisoning, though I didn’t know it at the time. Testing for bromethalin exposure is not readily available so diagnosis is dependent on a history of exposure (if that is known) and a pet’s clinical signs. Pets typically develop some combination of the following:

When a dog gets into a large amount of bromethalin, the symptoms are more severe. At relatively low exposures, symptoms include unsteadiness, weakness that starts in the hind end and can progress forward, muscle tremors, depression, and vomiting. The symptoms that develop depend on the dose of the poison that an animal ingests. The swelling puts pressure on nerves, which inhibits their ability to transmit impulses. It causes fluid to build up within the brain.

The third active ingredient on the EPA list, bromethalin, is more concerning. Any pet poisonings that are caused by these products should be comparatively simple to diagnose and treat, as long as pets are seen by a veterinarian in a timely manner.

Two, diaphacinone and chlorophacinone, are short-acting anti-coagulants similar to warfarin, which we touched upon yesterday. The EPA provides a list of rodenticides that meet their safety standards and are approved for homeowner use on their website. Supportive treatments are available but they are intensive, and animals that survive are often left with neurological deficits. There is no definitive diagnostic test and no antidote, note veterinarians Lee Pickett and Jennifer Coates. Bromethalin is the active ingredient in Assault, Fastrac, Gladiator, Rampage, Talpirid and Vengeance, and it causes brain and spinal cord swelling characterized by weakness, incoordination, seizures, paralysis and death. Pet owners using rodenticides should be aware that cats and dogs are susceptible to the products’ poison, and veterinarians fear an increase in bromethalin toxicity in pets because of a ban on brodifacoum.

Rat poison antidote for dogs