Tuesday, April 24, 2012

FINALLY - A Megaesophagus Training Treat for Sidney

Since the day Sidney was diagnosed with MegaE, we knew it would be difficult to find treats for Sidney.  Since he can't eat anything horizontally, what were we going to give him?  We ended up using little licks of honey on our finger.  This has worked well (for Sidney).  For us, especially when we were traveling, we tried carrying little mini-honey bottles around or putting honey in a syringe, etc.  This, as you can imagine, can get pretty sticky and messy.

Well we finally found something called Lickety Stik.  It comes in a container that resembles a roll-on anti-perspirant bottle (with the roller ball on the top).  It has a lid that screws on and off and comes in flavors of Chicken, Liver and Bacon.  So basically, Sidney licks the roller ball on the top and gets the taste of the flavor - but doesn't actually eat or ingest anything - he just gets the taste.  I kind of equate it to the same as when he swallows saliva at any point in the day.  It's not messy for us and is easily portable without getting our hands all sticky too.  It's been almost 3 years until we found this solution.  I cannot explain how much this makes us happy!!  I'm sure it may not work for all dogs - since there are varying degrees of ME - but for us it seems to be a success!

Here is a link if you were curious:
http://www.petsafe.net/products/liquid-dog-treats/lickety-stik