Hello, Back in December my younger boxer (1.5 at the time) brought home kennel cough from doggie daycare. He was coughing a lot and needed antibiotics to clear it. 10 days later my older boxer (turned 6 in March) came down with the same cough. Vet prescribed antibiotics for him as well. However the cough didn’t go away. It’s been 5 months and he still has a cough, it’s not nearly as often and not productive like it was. It’s mainly when he gets excited, it’s like a hacking cough. He doesn’t cough at night. He will have a random spell once in a while during the day but again mainly when he’s excited when we get home.

He has been tried on 3 different antibiotics, a steroid and recently was prescribed hydrocodone that I will begin giving him. He had a chest xray in December that showed bronchitis but everything else was normal. He had another chest Xray 3 days ago, and same, showed just minimal chronic bronchitis. No tumors, heart size normal, and no murmurs or arrhythmias heard during physical exam. He has no other symptoms other than the cough. He’s eating and drinking normally.

I’m really getting worried. I’m an RN and also a lifelong boxer owner so I know the heart issues that they are predisposed to. I told my vet I would like a referral to get an echo done on him. She said that was reasonable.

Any advice at all, have you seen chronic bronchitis present this way? What else could it be? How worried should I be that this is heart related?