If you are reading this, it means your puppy has parvo and you are noticing diarrhea or you suspect the cause of your puppy’s diarrhea is parvo. Well, keep reading to find out.
If your puppy has parvo it is not your fault, it is a very common disease in young puppies.
I know you might have thoughts like “I did not keep his surrounding clean enough”, “I did not take him for his vaccines on time”, or “I did not stop him from playing with street dogs”. Don’t beat yourself up dear, it isn’t your fault.
In this post, we would be learning how to combat parvo diarrhea because a lot of treatments focus on only the parvo virus and do not help with diarrhea that is also causing harm to the puppy.
what does parvo diarrhea look like
Diarrhea caused by parvo would initially be brown and they might also be a presence of mustard-colored hue or mucus but will gradually become redder as the disease develops because of the significant amount of blood in the feces.
The blood in the faces is a result of the severe damage in the gastrointestinal tract caused by the illness.
Parvo diarrhea also has a strong rotting smell in the late stages.
What should I feed my puppy with parvo diarrhea?
I would give you a feeding guide that would help your puppy’s parvo diarrhea.
When it comes to feeding, the first thing to feed your puppy with diarrhea is nothing.
I know it sounds strange.
For the first 24 hours, you should not give your puppy any food to eat.
Food should not be given within the first 24 hours that you notice diarrhea so that the intestinal tract can rest completely.
It also gives time for the inflammation to subside.
Although food should not be given to the puppy within the first 24 hours, water is very necessary.
You have to ensure your puppy is well hydrated.
Your puppy should be granted free access to water. If your dog does not drink water I advise that you force it to drink.
If your puppy is not drinking enough water, I suggest you talk to your vet so fluids would be administered to your puppy
When you want to introduce food to your puppy after 24 hours, I recommend that you introduce something that is especially bland.
My number one choice of food after the 24-hour wait is plain white rice.
You should give your dog ¼ cup of rice per 10 lbs.
Plain white rice helps firm up your puppy’s mucus stool.
White rice is low in fiber, which helps in not promoting bowel movement.
White rice is low in fiber because the bran, which contains most of the insoluble fiber, has been processed away.
Low-fiber food allows the bowel to form instead of promoting its movement.
Plain rice is also easy to digest, which saves the bowel from doing a lot of work which is good because it is not in a good state at the time due to the damage the parvovirus is doing to the gastrointestinal tract.
I recommend your feed your puppy plain rice for 2-3 days.
Treatments for a puppy with parvo diarrhea
These treatments do not cure your puppy from parvovirus rather they help in treating diarrhea which is caused by the damage that the virus has done to the gastrointestinal tract.
I advise that you should also be treating parvovirus while you are using these treatment methods for diarrhea.
Most of the treatments I would provide are natural remedies that are effective for puppy parvo diarrhea.
Chamomile tea ( ½ cup per 10lbs twice a day)
It is good for diarrhea. It helps in calming the inflammation in the intestinal tract that is caused by damages the parvovirus is doing.
It also relaxes your digestive muscles.
A study in rats found that chamomile extract prevented diarrhea.
You should give your puppy the dosage above for 2-5 days.
Probiotics for parvo diarrhea
Probiotics are really good bacteria that are lost during diarrhea. Your puppy would need this good bacteria to help with the damage parvovirus is doing.
Probiotics help your puppy digest food, they keep bad bacteria from getting out of control and making your puppy sick.
They also create vitamins and help support the cells that line your puppy’s gut to prevent bad bacteria that you may have consumed from entering your blood.
When the cells that line your puppy’s gut are well supported, it could slow down the rate at which parvovirus damages the gut.
One food that is high in probiotics is plain natural yogurt.
The majority of natural plain yogurts are quite high in acidophilus and lactobacillus and are very effective for diarrhea and gut strength.
You should give your puppy 1 tbsp per day for 2-5 days.
Diatomaceous earth (food grade) for parvo diarrhea
Diatomaceous earth is made of single-celled honeycomb-structured algae organisms with silicon exoskeletons called diatoms.
It is a type of algae mineral that is rich in silica.
This aquatic food can help heal and repair the gut and enable good stuff to proliferate.
This food grade of diatomaceous earth decreases some of the inflammation.
It also binds some of the toxins that would be causing the results of diarrhea.
It binds the fluid in the stomach and firms up the stool.
It is also said to have antiviral and antibacterial properties which could help the strength of the parvovirus.
It also has some other benefits for your puppy’s gut which include:
Detoxifying the gut,
Cleansing the intestinal walls and digestive tract,
killing parasites, which would be helpful because your gut might develop a low resistance to endoparasites due to damage done by parvo.
Increasing mineral absorption, and
Reducing gas and bloating.
At the time of publishing this blog post, this product cost $5.29.
If treated with the methods I stated above, you could begin to see improvement in three days but I can’t say how long it would last.
Conclusion
I suggest that you take your puppy to the vet if you suspect they have parvo, the treatments I have stated below are to combat diarrhea, not the virus.
If your puppy has parvo don’t panic, it would overcome it.
A lot of puppy parents don’t know that treatment of parvovirus focuses on the virus and might not help their puppy’s diarrhea.
Leaving diarrhea untreated could cause a lot of harm to the puppy.
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