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  #1  
Old August 6th, 2004, 09:13 AM
annabanana annabanana is offline
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Dog with horrible rash - skin problems - Answered by Dr. Slome

We have a 3 year old lab/ridgeback type cross (Pound special). Brandy is covered with angry looking red spots again. This has been an on again off again thing since February.

Her poor little feet are painful for us to look at never mind for her to have. We have had her tested for mange and treated - that didn't work. She has been on coritizone twice now and antibiotics twice. She has even been to a dog dermatologist (we have already spent an easy grand on this but still do not know anything). The horribly itchy rash settles down and the flares up really bad again. She is heading back to the vet again tomorrow but I do not have a lot of confidence whatever she has will be discovered.

The next step, I guess, is allergy testing but I cannot think of what has changed from last year and last year she would get a bit of a rash in her armpits somethings but nothing like this.

Is there anyone with any suggestions. We are getting quite desperate about this.

Last edited by annabanana; August 6th, 2004 at 09:18 AM. Reason: title not descriptive enough
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  #2  
Old August 6th, 2004, 09:59 AM
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Have there been any changes in the environment such as cleaning solutions, lawn supplements, chemicals, etc?
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Old August 6th, 2004, 10:07 AM
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Sneaky2006 Sneaky2006 is offline
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I don't know what is wrong with your dog but I wouldn't rule out allergies. It could very well be allergies, and I do hope for your sake it is. I really don't think anything has to change year to year to develope allergies. My mom had a dog for years with no problems and then out of the blue he had horrible rashes. They did allergy testing and found he was allergic to a lot of things! From bird feathers, to cats, to weeds in her yard! Good luck with this, I hope you find an answer soon.
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  #4  
Old August 6th, 2004, 11:38 AM
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Cactus Flower Cactus Flower is offline
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I would call the vet and ask how much Benadryl your dog can have per day, according to her weight, and if there is anything in her medical history indicating she shouldn't take it. If the vet gives you the go-ahead, give it a try for at least two weeks to see results.

Allergies in dogs, just like in people, can develop over time or in a manner that seems "sudden". Usually it isn't as sudden as people think, it just hasn't created extremely obvious symptoms for some time. Same as in humans. I didn't think I had allergies because I don't sneeze or have itchy eyes, but it turns out that my frequent ear infections were caused by allergy-induced congestion in my ears that was always getting infected. Now dogs don't usually have sneezing-type symptoms related to allergies, either (usually it is skin-related), so it could be that Brandy has had allergies for a while and only now is having a severe reaction.

My vet recommends Benadryl for dogs with allergies. You can even buy the generic brand as long as the active ingredient is the same.

Wouldn't hurt to try this while you're waiting for her next appoinment.

Bless you for being persistant in trying to help Brandy
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Old August 6th, 2004, 11:49 AM
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Afterthought: She may have also developed an allergy to her shampoo. The folks here can recommend the mildest brands to use. I distinctly recall something having to do with oatmeal....
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  #6  
Old August 6th, 2004, 06:52 PM
annabanana annabanana is offline
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Unfortunately we can't even look at the allergy issue with Brandy until we get the newly developed "vasculitis" under control. She had a prednizone shot today and is on at least a three-week run of prednizone pills. She is also on Clindamycin. They took a swab to check for Staphy but the vet think the vasculitis is as a result of the staph, or a drug reaction, or... or... or...

The allergy testing can't be done now because her poor immune system is already in a tailspin.

Does anyone have any comments or concerns about this? Has this happened to anyone else?
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Old August 6th, 2004, 09:50 PM
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I meant give the benadryl to her before having her tested for allergies......like right now. The vet can tell you if she can take it with these other meds.
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  #8  
Old August 12th, 2004, 08:08 AM
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Dog with skin problems

I would be somewhat surprised if between all the Vets you have been to, that you have not received somewhat sound counselling. I commend you for going the extra mile so far but one often loses sight or has selective hearing or memory when caught up in being so upset and desperate when the condition does not appear to be resolving.

I somewhat suspect, reading between the lines, that the courses of antibiotics and cortisones help significantly but the condition reoccurs with a vengeance periodically although nothing in her environment has changed. If it is allergies, they often get worse from year to year and the body's immune response is more violent with each exposure.

I am sure you have tried a hypoallergenic diet for a couple of months? I must say though that often people think they are doing it right, but unless the dog is eating 100% only this food and not a single morsel of anything else then this diet will not be effective or diagnostic.

The other problem is that once you see that they are doing better, you forget and feel sorry and feel that just a pea size treat will not affect anything and then when nothing does happen, more and more is given ( even if they remain small quantities ) and at some point you just cross that threshold to cause problems. We, as dog owners, then become adamant that we did not cause this as for the past 1 or 2 months or sometimes longer, nothing happened, so nothing that we did changed the situation. Frustration starts all over again.

Let me add now, skin disease has got to be one of the most frustrating chronic diseases to treat. They flare up overnight and take forever, if ever, to treat properly. That is the keyword 'if ever'.....Skin disease may be managed OK but never cured. There may be a food allergy on top of other allergies and the combination of their stimuli are needed to set off an episode.

A biopsy of the skin and skin allergy screens sound as if they are the way to go. It may end up that desensitization with allergy serum injections may be required or an option but even then do not think for a minute that you may not need the occasional course of cortisones or antibiotics or medicated washes. You can only hope to achieve that the outbreak of skin disease becomes less and less frequent and hopefully stops completely over a period of months to years.

The aim in skin disease is to help maintain comfort rather than a cure in the beginning, and hope that a cure is found over time. Very frustrating I know...

Martin Slome DVM

Centre Street Animal Hospital
7700 Bathurst Street
Units 40-42
Thornhill, On.
L4J 7Y3
Tel: (905) 771-9855
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  #9  
Old August 17th, 2004, 06:01 PM
laika laika is offline
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My dogs skin problem was solved

I am not sure what is going on with your dog but I can tell you that I have a blue Weimaraner and at about 3 years old she developed horrible skin problems which included sores on the bottoms of her feet that would bleed. We tried everything that you have tried and we kept looking for answers. We finally found a Veterinary Dermatologist that was an expert with gun blue dogs. We found that she had an immune deficiency to a skin staph infection. We have been giving her a drug called Staph Lysate for a year, an injection that started twice a week and is now down to once a month. We are told that at the end of this round of treatment that it is likely that she will be cured and that we will not need to give her anymore injections.

All I can say is keep looking for the answer and test for Staph skin problems
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Old August 17th, 2004, 06:53 PM
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If it's the same as it is with humans, if the dog is going to be allergy tested, use antihistamines sparingly or not at all in the meantime. They can (and do -- it has happened to me) affect the outcome of the allergy testing. It can appear as though your dog is allergic to nothing, even if that isn't the case.
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Old August 17th, 2004, 07:08 PM
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Good point!

When my son was going in for allergy testing, they said no antihistamines for at least 24 hours.
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  #12  
Old August 17th, 2004, 07:18 PM
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Cactus Flower -- they said the same to me, but after taking antihistamines daily for years (yep, i'm gonna get cancer), 24 hours was totally not enough. I didn't even react to "histamine" which EVERYONE reacts to!!!
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  #13  
Old September 27th, 2004, 06:30 PM
she-rasuperdog she-rasuperdog is offline
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I completely understand what you are going through and wish I could help. My puppy is almost 6 months old and has had a terrible rash from about
2 months old. She chews on herself until she bleads and itches non-stop 24-7. She has been to the vet about 7 times and was given medication and lotions everytime that did not seem to help. We have tried changing her food, lotions, shampoos, taken out trees and plants in the yard, tested her for mange, skin tested, etc. It's just a nightmare for her and us both. We are so frustrated and it makes us so sad when she walks around the house yelping and scratching. We have spent a total of 2500.00 on this rash so far and are monitarily drained. We are not giving up.
We tried the benadryl thing for about a month and all it did was make her sleepy and didn't help with the itching or with the rash. We tried the plastic cone around her head and put Neosporin with pain medication all over her and it seemed to make the bumps scab up like they were going to go away. Unfortunately we could only do that for the weekend as she could not get out the doggie door on monday when we had to return to work. I am in the same boat as you and would love to hear any information or suggestions that anyone has. I will also keep you updated on things we have tried.

Good luck.

I also wanted to know if anyone has heard of a dog being allergic to themselves. I was told by a friend at work that she had to put her dog down for this reason and wondered if anyone had any thoughts or info.
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  #14  
Old September 27th, 2004, 07:01 PM
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lilith_rizel lilith_rizel is offline
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Have you changed his dog food at all? gotten any new pets? if so, they might be the problem. Lamb and rice formula dog food is good for dogs with allergies.
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  #15  
Old September 28th, 2004, 04:46 PM
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I only wanted to add the I am not sure about your dog but you say treated for mange.... my dog has mange and he has been treated for 6 months and still will be until it is gone. No way of guessing when that might be.

Skin scraping do not always find the mites, Blaze had 8 scraping and found 1 mite. But he has it forsure and I tell you it is a bad thing to watch and not really be able to help.
Benadryl did help for Blaze and he has 2 per day from the time he was 9 weeks old. We hope he grows out of it on his own but sometimes they don't. Good luck and hope you find out what is wrongbut again mange takes a long time to heal and they hack every 21 days and even the died mites drive the dogs nuts.
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  #16  
Old August 27th, 2005, 07:08 PM
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Barclay Barclay is offline
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Question Dog with horrible rash

I have a 4 year old Golden that is scratching himself raw .He has been to the vet manytimes and put on steroids for it.His vet says it is an allergy .I have had him on antihist.therapy since july as he starts in mid august.This year nothing is really working and we are puzzled .He also loses alot of fur with the meds so my house is like one big dust bunny.Is there anyone out there that has any suggestions as to what else we can try??
Thanx
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  #17  
Old August 28th, 2005, 06:50 PM
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coppperbelle coppperbelle is offline
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Skin problems

What kind of dog food are you feeding? Is it a food for dogs with allergies? There a number of newer more natural foods on the market that contain meats that most dogs can tolerate.
For example: Natural Balance, Duck and Potato and Wellness. Foods that contain exotic meats such as bison and salmon are also sometimes tolerated better.
Avoid foods that can be purchased in a grocery store as they contain ingredients that can aggravate allergies.
Coincidentally tonight I read on another message board about a dog that has improved since he began taking a natural ingredient called Colostrum.
www.canadiangoldens.com
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  #18  
Old August 28th, 2005, 10:25 PM
Prin Prin is offline
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Jemma's feet get ripped apart in mid-August too. RAGWEED!! She gets a cortisone shot in July and it reduces the symptoms but they definitely aren't gone. I started feeding Solid Gold Wolf King and this year she chews her feet a lot less.

Not much else to do but change the diet and hope it helps and remove all the ragweed you can from the area...
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Old August 28th, 2005, 10:40 PM
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Sometimes even when the cause is gone, the dog will still continue the licking/ chewing. It had become a formed habit.
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Old August 29th, 2005, 11:52 AM
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Is that so? Then how much chewing is normal?
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  #21  
Old October 16th, 2005, 11:01 AM
crazibutrue crazibutrue is offline
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Dog with horrible rash - skin problems - Answered by Dr. Slome

After reading this thread I would like to know...are the mites dogs get similar to scabies that humans get? Sure does sound like the same symptoms. If so, is there a medicated shampoo for dogs? Denise
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  #22  
Old March 17th, 2006, 05:11 PM
RosiePosie RosiePosie is offline
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Allergies

We have two Cocker Spaniels and one has allergies and the other does not. Our allergy dog was obsessively licking his feet and then he started chewing his rump until the hair was gone or matted and the skin was oozing blood- the vet recommended we switch from the lamb and rice to a limited-ingredient dog food like duck and potato, which we have done. He stopped chewing in three days. For variety I tried the same brand with fish and potato but it has chicken fat added and he was back to chewing again so we are now sticking to the duck and potato religiously. Benadryl did help him and us get some sleep at night too.
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Old June 7th, 2006, 09:11 AM
SugarbearPaws SugarbearPaws is offline
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Skin Problems

I've just joined the Pets.ca and would like to give two suggestions regarding the skin problems mentioned.

First, when my dog was a puppy he also had similar sounding problems. The worst being that he chewed himself bloody. We did similar treatments that everyone has mentioned. Nothing worked. I decided to give him Brewer's Yeast tablets and I believe they may have helped. Either these tablets helped or he just grew out of whatever the problems was. I can't be sure, but I do know that nothing else we tried worked. After a few years, I discontinued the tablets because I was worried about oversupplementing him. He eats a high quality commercial dog food.

Secondly, try a paste of termeric and neem leaves. There is a website where you can get all kinds of neem products including the actual leaves (I'm not sure if I'm supposed to mention the site here). I've read that the leaves tend to work better than the oils or powders. I used to volunteer at an animal shelter and we had so many skin problems, and the drugs didn't really help much. Then there is the health issue regarding taking so many drugs. I tried this on a number of the puppies and dogs, most with mange, and had good results. I ground one part termeric with three parts neem leaves, mixed with water, and rubbed it on the dogs once a day for one week (the hairless and irritated areas). You will probably have to confine the dog for a while until the paste drys because the termeric will stain. It won't hurt them to lick if off either because the neem is good internally as well. I don't know if it will work for other skin problems, but we had good results on the mange dogs.

Good luck. If you try either of these ideas and they work, I'd appreciate hearing about it.

SugarbearPaws
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  #24  
Old June 8th, 2006, 07:20 PM
sways_bodyguard sways_bodyguard is offline
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http://www.pets.ca/forum/showthread.php?t=26651

please take a look at my post about the problems my dog is having
sounds very similar, she actually chews her pads off and i have provided images...
she has to wear that damn cone everytime i leave the house and it sucks, its been an ongoing thing with my vet for like 9 months and like you, i have spent about 2 thousand dollars on random solutions...
hopefully we can figure these problems out!
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  #25  
Old April 11th, 2008, 05:35 PM
juliefrasier juliefrasier is offline
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My pup has skin coloured bumps on her stomach

My puppy is 2 mon. old and has just developed some skin coloured bumps on her lower stomach around the inside back legs looks like a rash but she's not itching. Her urine is really bright yellow so I was wondering if she's having some type of problem with her Urinary track and if this could be related to this new rash. She's been on her dry puppy food for a mon. now and hasn't shown any problems with it. Im feeding her the Nutram puppy food and she gets no human food at all. Thank you so much.
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  #26  
Old April 14th, 2008, 05:07 PM
MaO3 MaO3 is offline
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My golden has the same kinds of problems. He was diagnosed with yeast infections, put on medication for that, but they never seemed to go away completely.

I was about to begin allergy testing and shots, when it was suggested that I should seek a second opinion. I did, and was surprised when the "new" vet asked if my boy had ever had thyriod function tests. He hadn't, we had the blood test done, it came back with his level being 0.04 he immediately went on medication 2x daily. 30 days later his level was 2.7 - after doing some research on my own I was able to find out that the level suggested is between 2.5 and 3.0.

His skin has cleared up, ear infections went away, he's 100% better.

Of course this may not be the cause for any of your dogs, but if they haven't been tested its something to consider.
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  #27  
Old April 15th, 2008, 08:32 PM
Hogansma Hogansma is offline
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I had a similar problem with my dalmatian, Molly, who has since passed away. When she was 6 months old, the allergies started. She had the testing and de-sensitizing shots and I spent a small fortune on her and a skin specialist, customized serums and shots. She too, would chew the pads off her feet, have unending ear infections and general itchy skin. She was allergic to almost everything. She was on Eukanuba fish and potato food which was the only food I found that she tolerated. Unfortunately, the de-sensitizing shots did little for her. We ended up putting her on prednisone for life, but just a small amount daily and after fully researching the side affects. It was a last resort and we went for comfort and quality of life for her. She lived in peace to 11 years old.

Many people are totally against prednisone but in severe cases, it is a miracle drug. Hopefully you'll have better luck than we did if it is in fact, allergies.
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  #28  
Old April 11th, 2009, 09:41 PM
mom2sofi-brodie mom2sofi-brodie is offline
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skin issues

We have boxers and I swear they are the most skin sensitive breed I've ever encountered...You haven't said if you have brush growing in the yard your dog goes into....Id look at the weeds and plants around...You may be surprised to find the plants are the issue....Second check out your food ....Im shocked the doctors have not put your dog on a special diet...good luck...
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Old October 3rd, 2011, 06:32 PM
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Rash on my dogs under area,below his butt area.

My dog Moloaki is a rescue (we are told Collie/Shepard mix). Mo is 107 lbs. From time to time he gets rash's and Benadryl seems to help. He is 1 and 8 months,healthy otherwise and very active. There is a area under Mo's butt (my wife calls it his vagina). Right now it's red and raw. He acts like it is bothering him sometimes (when he is scratching the area), he does not do this a lot and also does not act like he is in discomfort. We are still giving him Benadryl and putting ice on the area. So my question is,is there some type of lotion or powder to put on it that area,to help make it heal? I read most of all the comments above and I agree that a $100 vet bill (the visit and meds) will solve the problem. Also,I live in San Francisco so he is a city dog? Any and all suggestions are appreciated.
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  #30  
Old October 17th, 2011, 03:27 AM
1report 1report is offline
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Hi my dog has a stomach rash

Quote:
Originally Posted by glasslass View Post
Have there been any changes in the environment such as cleaning solutions, lawn supplements, chemicals, etc?
We did use a different kind of carpet cleaner. What do i put on his rash.
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