# Effects of High Fever?



## Amanda Jones (Mar 6, 2013)

My lab had complications from surgery in February and required a blood transfusion. His body rejected the transfusion and he ran a fever of 107.8 for about 36 hours. 

Initially, the vet said he didn't appear to have any neurological damage though it was completely possible. About 2 months later, now I'm beginning to think his short term memory is on the fritz. 

Has anyone dealt with this before? What were your experiences? 
Is a delayed onset of symptoms possible?


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## Sarah Platts (Jan 12, 2010)

I've seen humans who ran high fevers and, yes, it can fried their brains a bit. One gal who had a high fever due to menigitis was seriously scatterbrained and constantly needed mental assistance. Frequently forgot stuff if pressured to much or gave to much info at once. Was always asking "now what was I doing?". She was pretty certain that it was the fever because she wasn't like this before it.


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## Amanda Jones (Mar 6, 2013)

Sarah, that sounds like him.... he starts doing something really well and as long as he finishes it we are fine. If he has to restart for any reason, he seems to have no clue what's going on.


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## Sarah Platts (Jan 12, 2010)

The woman was really nice but we never interrupted her if she was doing a script. You just waited till she was done. Otherwise she would have to start all over.


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## rick smith (Dec 31, 2010)

age of the dog ?
working level/capacity ?

the biggest problem is you probably never actually tested the dog to confirm its level of short term memory before the problem. probably all you can use is past training sessions and i don't think that is always indicative of short term memory capability

the example you gave seems like it could easily be evaluated too subjectively to be definitive (other factors involved that affected the behaviors ?)

comparing anecdotal experiences of others will never confirm your dog's actual neurological level of short term memory ability

maybe try a DMNP session or two ?
- it is used in short term memory research. here is a related study :
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2275342/

if you are really serious about confirming this you might need to develop some controlled methods to test short term memory, but they would also be hard to measure without having a baseline to compare with. i'm guessing you could probably get a baseline now to see if it degrades over time

i doubt you will find someone who has had a dog with a similar experience as yours that you could compare with, but you can sure try.

maybe you would qualify to participate in a test study, but that would take some degree of effort to find out who's doing what in the canine research field

bottom line : it all depends on how serious you want to investigate this situation
- if you hear something about someone else's dog that "sounds like your dog", and that satisfies your curiosity, so be it 

good luck and let us know where you go with this


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## rick smith (Dec 31, 2010)

// typo // 
....should be DNMP, not DMNP....sorry


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## rick smith (Dec 31, 2010)

also something to consider ....

if dogs had great short term memories, timing would not be so important in training //lol//


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