Hypoglycemia

Hypoglycemia or low blood sugar is a very common problem in toy breeds. The liver stores energy and in a small dog it cannot store enough for long periods of activity. Low blood sugar is often brought on by a missed meal, improper diet, playing hard for a long period of time, or being chilled. When you bring your chin home for the first time your kids will naturally want to play with the new puppy. In their excitement over their new friend and after playing for a long period of time they tend to forget to feed the puppy. This, combined with the stress of a new home and getting used to everything new, can lead to hypoglycemia. For the first few weeks I would recommend monitoring playing time and also make sure your puppy is fed on a regular schedule.

Just recently we had a puppy that had hypoglycemia. This puppy was the runt of the litter with three littermates that were twice his size. I noticed one evening that he was staggering around and acting sluggish. I couldn't figure out why he was acting this way, and I never even thought about hypoglycemia, until I mentioned this puppy's condition to one of my friends the next morning.  He asked me if I had considered that it could be sugar shock. Immediately I knew that was the problem. So I took the puppy and gave him Karo syrup and put him in a box all by himself. What had happened was his littermates just pushed him out of the way when he tried to eat and he was so much smaller than they were that he had no chance. I soaked his food in water and fed him every few hours for about a week. He got hypoglycemia at about 4 weeks old and he is now 7 weeks old and doing very good. He's been able to eat by himself for at least a week and a half. But he really likes if someone feeds him. :-)

If you ever see symptoms of hypoglycemia, immediately give the puppy something high in sugar. I used Karo, but you can also get nutro drops for them. After that you'll need to give them soft moist food every few hours to get nutrition into them.