Heraclene (dibencozide) for German Shepherds - Page 1

Hi

My 2 year old German Shepherd has always been somewhat non-food-oriented. Even as a puppy, she's not as responsive with food than my other dog. She'd rather play with me or other people instead of eat, really. 7am, she'd rather lie about and yawn than go to her bowl.

She also frequently does a lot of food drama with me throughout her life like skipping meals or being picky.
She has no problem with not eating her morning meal, just her evening one. She usually just licks her food then leaves.

It takes a lot of ingenuity and strategy-making to make sure she eats her 3 cups, and when she settles in to eating more, wait about 3 weeks of good eating and another drama comes up. I am a believer of the 20 minute rule wherein after 20 minutes, the bowl is taken away. But occassionally she's VERY willing to let 20 minutes pass by, eating her food on the next eating time. In effect she doesn't eat 1of her meals in a day.

When she has her heat, she eats half her ration only, making her lose a tiny bit of weight. Add that to her usual shedding and she kinda looks disheveled during her seasons.

She is dewormed regularly, we do ivermectin shots as well to make sure no worms. She eats 3.25 cups of Go Natural Grain-Free Endurance, gets 1 Pet-Tab a day for vitamins. She also gets 1 capsule of salmon oil for omega 3 a day. She almost doesn't get treats since it ruins her appetite.

She doesn't eat in the morning so her meals are broken down to 1 at 3pm and 1 at 9pm instead of the more conventional one in the morning and one at suppertime.

My vet therefore recommended that I give her Heraclene (dibencozide), it's an appetite stimulant that is used in babies. Essentially it's Vitamin B12, I believe.

Has anyone used this? Results?

first i would check her thyroid levels.  if not planning on breeding her, i would consider spaying her.
if her appetite still didn't improve, i would switch food or even go to a raw diet.
good luck.  pjp

Have  you thought about letting her get good and hungry? No treats period, nothing added to the food in an effort to tempt her to eat? Don't let her food sit around for longer than 10 minutes, pick up what she doesn't eat even if she still seems interested. 10 minutes is way more time than a dog needs to eat a few cups of food. Pick up the bowl and either put it in the fridge until the next time or dump it in the trash. Make sure she sees what you are doing with it. I know it sounds cruel, but no healthy dogs will ever starve itself to death.  Good luck, stand firm.

I've posted numerous times here about my issues getting my spayed female GSD (Senta) to eat; there have been many times where she has refused to eat for numerous days in a row (with 4 or 5 days being typical). I would ask your vet specifically if dibencozide has been shown clinically effective in dogs, as I thought that appetite (significantly) increasing drugs are only available for people and cats at this time. I would be very happy to be found misinformed on this topic.

Blitzen wrote a really good detailed post on how to cope with a picky eater earlier this year. I follow many of the strategies that Blitzen outlined there. Having a regular fast day (ie. she only gets water) once per week has really helped to reduce Senta's drama and pickiness (but do not fast a growing puppy).