Antihistimines

[Mason_Gibbs]

By the way - nothing you put on his skin or feed him will stop his misery. If he is lucky, he will get a couple of hours or a couple of days relief at best from topical solutions.

Nothing topical helps my dog - its antihistamines and also prednisolone when he is bad. Antibiotics when he has hot spots.

[stormie]

Nothing topical helps us either and we deal with contact, inhalent and food allergies.

Contact allergy isn't actually all that common. I believe Dermatologists are now using Atopica to help diagnose which one is the problem, as it doesn't work all that well in contact and food allergies.

I'm not even sure how well the allergy testing works for contact allergies, to be honest.

[menacebear]

Poor leroy.

Yes, I agree.

Poor Leroy because he is itching like crazy or poor Leroy because he sleeps outside and we won't get him allergy tested? The vet didn't recommend having him tested and simply said it was a spring contact allergy. And poor Leroy is a fully trained flyball dog who travels around everywhere with us and chooses himself to sleep outside. I can bring him inside and he will toilet everywhere over night. Put him in a crate and he will cock his leg and pee out the side of the crate. Put him in the large enclosed cat crate and he will pee all over the bottom of it and then lay in it. When I go to bring the others in they run to the gate, he bails to the kennel and stays there. I'm not going to force him to sleep in if he doesn't like it. And we are doing everything for Poor Leroy taking into consideration that neither of us are even sure if keeping him is a good idea. We have taken full responsibility for him because it's not his fault that we decided to rescue him and nor is it his fault he doesnt really fit it. It's also not his fault that we have 6 other dogs and are expecting our first baby and simply can not afford to have him allergy tested. Regardless of what he is allergic to it won't change anything. I can't pull all of the grass out of the pen and make the others suffer for his sake and nor will I have him inside constantly toileting everywhere. Poor Leroy spent the first 6 months, yes a full 6 months, of his life in a pet store. No one wanted to buy him and the glass box he was in, seperated from his only sibling has left a lasting effect on his personality. When a friend bought him and it didn't work with their dog we took him on in the hopes of giving him a better life and quiet frankly we have done exactly that for the past year. I don't need to be berated for trying to do the right thing by him.

Wow, thanks for the life story, but it wasn't neccessary.

My comment was in direct relation to the fact that he hasn't been tested and is obviously in a lot of discomfort and pain. Determining the allergy will enable you to improve his life. Without knowing what it is that sets him off he has no chance of ever having a comfortable life unless luck has it his way. I don't think much of a Vet that doesn't try to determine what the allergen is either when a dog is that itchy he is causing skin lesions and develops subsequent infections. I would change Vets.

Re-homing him will simply pass on the problem to someone else.

On a last note, you didn't 'rescue' him, you got him from a friend.

OK so we didn't rescue him even though he'd have ended up dead anyway. I think you mistake me. We have no intentions of rehoming him because he itches. It's because the only reason my OH hasn't moved him on yet is because I keep saying no. He is ment to be OH's dog and if he doesn't want him then I have to take responsibility for him and quite frankly I am not a little dog person. I already have 4 dogs of my own and do not want another to walk everyday and another set of vaccinations etc and no matter how you look at it I can not afford to have him tested at the time. I have heard I'm looking at close to 1000 for testing and with me being off work for maternity leave soon we can't do it. He has only developed infections once about a year ago, other than that his skin is red and itchy.

I'm trying to do the right thing for him by trying to find a way to stop him being so itchy all the time without needing him tested. I have no idea what to do about it. We made a mistake by getting him, we never should of. And because of his skin it is virtually impossible to rehome him because why should someone else have to deal with this all the time? I'm not proud to say that we are thinking of rehoming him since I work in a pound and see this everyday.

[stormie]

Cortisone will provide relief for both him and you. It's the only thing that's really going to provide relief, and if managed well, can still enable your dog to lead a normal life.

A lot of people say how awful a drug it is. Yes, in some cases it can shorten life. But ask the dogs and I think they'd tell you they'd rather a comfortable, itch free life, albeit possibly shorter, than a longer life of constant discomfort.

We pts an 18yo cat last week due to renal failure, that had had a long acting short of cortisone every 6 weeks its whole life. Other than the renal failure, the cat was in otherwise good health. So not all cortisone animals die young!!

[Mason_Gibbs]

Cortisone will provide relief for both him and you. It's the only thing that's really going to provide relief, and if managed well, can still enable your dog to lead a normal life.

A lot of people say how awful a drug it is. Yes, in some cases it can shorten life. But ask the dogs and I think they'd tell you they'd rather a comfortable, itch free life, albeit possibly shorter, than a longer life of constant discomfort.

We pts an 18yo cat last week due to renal failure, that had had a long acting short of cortisone every 6 weeks its whole life. Other than the renal failure, the cat was in otherwise good health. So not all cortisone animals die young!!

At the moment my dog is on half a 5mg pred tablet a day as he is just not coping. He is better now that I know what is wrong ( food and atopic) but he still struggles when the seasons change because of all the pollens. Grass pollens, weed pollens, tree pollens, plant pollens, you name it - he is allergic to it as well as mites, insect bites and some other stuff that I cant recall off the top of my head. Chicken, beef, turkey and wheat set him off too - and this was a dog I was convinced had no food allergy.

[persephone]

My old dog was on prednil most of his life..he died at around age 12 ...

[JulesP]

Does the little dog have itches all year round Menacebear?

If he is in an area with only grass and concrete, I would try locking him off the grass for a couple of days. I've noticed that contact allergies improve really quickly once the allergen is gone. My dogs have improved within a day for instance.

The antihistamine worked quickly too. The Neocort cream not so helpful. The cream was making them itch & scratch more. Quit Itch worked well (available from horse shops).

[menacebear]

No his itches only seem to flare up around this time of the year JulesP and then when it gets a bit hotter he will be ok again. I've used the quit itch on my horses before so I'll give it a go on him. I find malaseb seems to make him itch worse. I'll pop him into the vets again and have him looked at. I take the dogs to work with me a fair bit so that'll keep him off the grass a bit.

[JulesP]

Sounds like a spring 'hayfever' issue then. Do you have any trees bordering the pen? Or around the edges of the garden? They don't have to be in the pen just near it.

If you can keep him inside until about 9.00am in the morning and get him in around 6.30-7.30pm, that might help. Pollen rises early in the morning and falls at night. Wiping him down everyday to get the pollen off might help.