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New 8-week-old puppy has diarrhea. Vet and rice didn't help. What now?

Updated On September 23rd, 2025

Pet's info: Dog | Mixed Breed | Female | unspayed | 2 months and 2 days old | 6.7 lbs

I just adopted an 8 week old lab mix puppy on Sat 4/8 and she has had diarrhea several times a day since she's been home with us. We took her to the vet on Mon 4/10 and they started her on a probiotic, but the diarrhea continued. So Today we stopped feeding her her puppy food and started feeding her just plain white rice. Her diarrhea slowed down with the white rice, but as the day has gone on her stools have progressively gotten more loose and watery. What else can I do for her?

2 Answers

Most Helpful Answer

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Answered By Claudia Fioravanti

Veterinarian

Published on April 12th, 2017

I think you need to exclude parasites possibly causing this such as giardia for example. Best to check for nasty bacteria too.This will involve just a feacal test, poo sample, ideally getting a small amount of feaces once a day for three consecutive days and a culture and sensitivity test. Once this has been excluded, you can think about dietary intolerances. If the diarrhoea is still quite bad, it's best to have Ellie rechecked asap to make sure she is not getting dehydrated and that other medications can be started to help her current status.

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    Answered By Destini R. Holloway, DVM

    Veterinarian

    Published on

    Poor girl. There is probably an underlying intestinal parasite problem or bacterial imbalance causing Ellie's diarrhea. If the vet didn't do a fecal exam, I would start there. If certain parasites are in the her system then they should be treated for with the appropriate dewormer. The most common dewormers used are Pyrantel Palmoate or Fenbendazole. I would also have her checked for Giardia (via a Giardia specific snap test), as this parasite can cause loose watery stool as well. Both relatively easy to treat issues in puppies in most cases. If an underlying parasite is not the issue, then I would ask your vet if they would prescribe an antibiotic for Ellie. Some pets have an antibiotic responsive diarrhea, which basically means the diarrhea will resolve with a short course of antibiotics (i.e. Metronidazole). That should help you resolve Ellie's diarrhea problems. Then thirdly, I would not just give her rice because that is nutritionally deplete in the protein she needs. I would recommend adding in boiled plain chicken in with the rice so that she gets the protein she needs. I hope things get better for your puppy Ellie!

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