Dog red eyes, squinting... please help!

Rushing Zephyr · 10-23-2009, 09:47 PM

My Jack Russell Terrier is sick... at the beginning of the day, he was squinting a little bit and had slightly red eyes. As the day has progressed... over the course of about 12 hours, his situation has declined a lot. He keeps his eyes almost exclusively closed as he walks around and stuff, is acting lethargic, and is whimpering a bit. When he gives me those doggy kisses, they're pretty warm... leaving me to believe he has a fever.

I believe he's about 2 years old. I'm not certain but I think the vet is closed right now (it's 9:47 here). What should I do? Could this be a very serious condition? Is it possible he could die by tomorrow morning?

EDIT: Other notes... he has pooped 3 times today, each time a decent amount. I don't know if I'd call it diarrhea... just normal poop to my eyes. He appears to have drunken plenty of water but has not yet touched his dinner, which he was fed at about 6:00. He is shaking right now. Also I suppose it is worth noting that I haven't seen him scratching at his eyes.

spotted nikes · 10-24-2009, 01:09 AM

Call an emergency vet. Or better yet, take him to one. You don't want to risk him losing his eyes.

Rushing Zephyr · 10-24-2009, 10:14 AM

I called the one of the local vets yesterday expecting to pick up to their answering machine, but apparently they are an ER vet as well. They offered to have one of their on-call doctors call back free of charge. We talked to him and - given the symptoms and how quickly his health deteriorated, it's either a virus or a bacterial infection. If it's a virus he should be getting better about now - and he is. If it were a bacterial infection we would need to bring him in to get antibiotics. Thankfully it looks like he's going to be 100% okay