Great dane seizure

Question
I have a 4 1/2 yr old male great dane.  He was playing with my other dane and then started going into what seemed like a mild seizure.  I assumed he must have taken a blow to the head.  He was running sideways and almost into a fence, then his legs were buckling a little bit.  His eyes were dialated and he was shaking his head slightly.  He was still responsive when I spoke to him but couldn't focus his eyes.  After he calmed down he returned to normal, had a long drink of warm water.  I took him home and gave him some kibble (I read that the dog would be hungry after a seizure).  I thought that this was an isolated incident but when I came home this evening he was on the couch and when I looked at him his head was slightly shaking again and his eyes were again dialated and darting from side to side.  I fed him some ice cream (2 tbsp - again I read to do this)and then a small meal.  After eating the ice cream he was again completely normal.  Even during the 2nd episode he was walking (slightly staggered) and carried a toy to me in his mouth.
He has had no recent past medical concerns and has always been in great health.  He was hit by a vehicle that was moving slowly when he was 6mths old but it struck him in the shoulder, that is the only thing I can think of that has ever caused him trauma.  Any ideas what is going on and what I can do?

Answer
Hi Adriane,
It sounds as if your Dane is indeed experiencing mild to medium seizures.
There are two kinds of basic seizures, grand mal and petite mal.
They cover pretty much what they sound like, ie: grand mal are whole body seizures with the usual stiffening of the legs and body, the mouth usually clenches and they foam, eyes roll back into their heads. That describes a pretty intense, but fairly common type of grand mal.
The petite mal on the other hand, is more like one part of the brain fires off differently so only one part of the body is affected, such as the dog stops what it is doing and may stare into space, howl, head shaking, eyes rolling etc.
Regardless of what kind of seizure it is classified as, the thing we need to focus on is the fact that he is now getting them out of the blue at almost 5 yrs old.
Now while not the common age for this, many dogs do get epilepsy at an older age. The average age, however, is under five in the small to med large breed.
Having said that, I would be concerned about other brain abnormalities going on at this age. Four and a half is about half way for a Dane as you probably know. Large breeds age much faster than the smaller ones.

I would definitely take this boy in for a check up and have the doc look his eyes over and maybe do some tests for blood sugars etc.The reason I say that is maybe he is having some hypoglycemic episodes and not seizures at all. They can look very close to one another.

I hope you can find some answers soon. Please keep me informed.