[Natchoice]

Nicky is a 4 year old male Bichon epilepsy service dog of great value as a pet, service dog for my son's epilepsy and as a beautiful little soul.

As a herbalist and nutritionist myself, I have tried with the help of a holistic vet
herbs, vitamins, raw meat diet, home cooked meals and even homeopathic remedies to no avail. Benadryl was of minimal use even at high doses.
From what I have read, testing for allergies is expensive and basically useless.
How is one to protect against, molds, mites, allergies to humans, other dogs or cats or just plain dust?

My friend got his dog tested twice, 6 months apart with different results!
Then the injections turned to be of almost no use after a year or two of injections. Even the Vet Derm. told me that not every dog is a good candidate. And then, to do the testing a dog that is tearing its self apart needs to be off medication for at least 2 weeks for proper results.
In two weeks without steroids he would be a real mess.


Nicky was put on Vanectly P (steroids) for 3 months straight. Finally he got better, put on weight, peed constantly, drank like crazy and had a rock hard belly. I wanted him of the drug. My holistic vet moved to New York so I had to find a new vet.

The new vet, on my suggestion, agreed that we should try Atopica.
I read the monogram and as with all pharmas I did not like what I read.
Vomiting, diarrhea, weight loss, even lameness and life threatening allergic shock are mentioned.
To make thing worse on the 7th day of treatment the dog's back legs were extremely weak, could barely stand up or walk. Naturally it was on a Sunday
with only the emergency hospitals available in downtown Toronto miles away away being open. This scare the hell out of us. Thank God that slowly he improved through out the day. Was it related to the drug?
I called Novartis the drug company and the vet there didn't know what to say. According to her, the lameness mentioned on the monogram was
not fully "written up" and frankly it would be confidential !!!!!
Needless to say it was pretty scary.

Nicky is very lethargic , refuses to eat as normal, doesn't pee much
and still scratches away. What does one do?
This has been one of my toughest cases to solve and it affects the family
dog.
I manage to do quite well with my human clients and their health concerns.!!!!!!!

Expensive as it is, I wish I could hear from others who have had positive result with this Atopica drug so at least we can keep our hopes up.

Sam