Early this year I got a phone call from a dog owner who had lost his beloved pet to Leptospirosis. It’s a story no one who loves their dog should have to tell:

On a mild weekend late in December, a young Jack Russell Terrior female named Charli and her owner Don Kushon went on a trail run near Philadelphia, the Wissahickon. On the evening of Dec. 30, 2018, her symptoms began.

“She developed a sudden onset of stiffness throughout her body, and was making a low whimper,” he said. “She was not able to fully raise her head up or jump up to the couch as she usually would.”

He and Charli made a trip to an emergency vet. There, the veterinarian felt that Charli’s stiff neck and pain had been caused by her earlier physical activity and prescribed predisolone. No lab work was done.

The following day, Charli began vomiting. The following day she was still vomiting, with mucous and a blood tinge. They returned to the same emergency clinic Jan. 1. No lab work was done. The veterinarian thought the vomiting was caused by the prednisolone.

“For the remainder of that day, Charli continued to have no interest in food, drank only very little, minimal urination, and had a couple episodes of diarrhea,” Kushon said. “The next day (1/2/2019) I took her for blood work at a different ER facility where a test for lepto was positive.”

Charli was transferred to another facility for two rounds of dialysis, but on Jan. 4 started bleeding into her lungs and arrested. She was resuscitated but arrested again and was let go.

In the past, Leptospirosis was mainly considered a necessary vaccination for hunting or farm dogs. But just ask Charles Houser, Tamaqua, if that’s true. His beloved Bichon/Maltese mix, walked daily in downtown Tamaqua, recently survived a Lepto challenge. His dog was treated by Tamaqua veterinarian Kathryn Kropp, Companion Animal Hospital, who said she’s recently seen some Lepto cases.

At the clinic, technicians can do a “rapid screen” test for Leptospirosis and other diseases; Houser brought his dog to the clinic because he had been vomiting the previous evening, the test came back positive.

“I’d never heard of it,” Houser said. “Luckily he was responsive to antibiotics.”

“The number is higher in the warmer weather and even more so when it is wet weather,” Kropp said. “There are different strains, about six that can be found in dogs, and it can also be a problem for humans – Lepto is a bacteria and can be passed from dogs to humans.”

“The problem with lepto is it can mimic other diseases and vary - sometimes I think we see dogs with milder cases where they present with vomiting and diarrhea but aren’t extremely ill,” she added. “Those dogs often aren’t tested and are treated with symptomatic therapy that can include antibiotics which treatslepto; they get better and we may never have even suspected lepto.”

Should your dog be vaccinated for leptospirosis?

“Yes,” Kropp said. “I would rather try to prevent diseases if at all possible and I also worry because lepto is a zoonotic disease, which means that infected dogs can infect people.”