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Mange - Your Experiences?


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Just curious - has anyone had a dog with mange (demodex)? What was the long term prognosis? If a dog has mange as a pup and it takes 10 months to get rid of it, is it likely to be an ongoing issue? Any advice much appreciated. :) Oh and this is not one of my dogs. :)

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Electra has a bald spot on her face that I thought was allergies, but after a few weeks and it was growing in size I took her to the derm. After a scraping I was told it was juvenile demodex.

I was told that no treatment was necessary, because it was juvenile, and to watch it for 6 - 8 weeks and if no improvement or if it got worse than treatment would begin.

Luckily, a couple of weeks later, the hair is starting to regrow already :thumbsup:

I was to stop any form of steroid use, including creams & spray.

She never had it as a pup though, so I guess I'm not really much help. :o

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The long term prognosis would depend on several factors including the age of the dog at the time of diagnosis, whether the dog has localised or generalised demodectic mange, the treatment protocols and any underlying medical conditions etc.

I have had good success using an induction course of oral ivermectin followed by weekly injections of doramectin. I usually treat for a minimum of 12 weeks unless there is very rapid clinical improvement, but even then I treat for at least 4 weeks past clinical resolution. Most of the cases that do not respond to treatment are due to incomplete treatment (not turning up regularly for injections) or underlying disease that requires further investigation.

The occasional dog will require long term treatment (even life long).

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The dog is a rescue and has had mange since a young pup. The carer is a vet so I think its safe to assume they followed correct protocol. :) I was just wondering if the fact that it has taken so long to clear up (approx 10 months) means there is some systemic weakness with the dog that might mean the mange will come back?

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I was just wondering if the fact that it has taken so long to clear up (approx 10 months) means there is some systemic weakness with the dog that might mean the mange will come back?

There could be an underlying problem, it might come back, but not necessarily if it's been treated beyond resolution. How's that for a non specific answer :D

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The dog is a rescue and has had mange since a young pup. The carer is a vet so I think its safe to assume they followed correct protocol. :) I was just wondering if the fact that it has taken so long to clear up (approx 10 months) means there is some systemic weakness with the dog that might mean the mange will come back?

When I ran a kennel in Perth, I had a boarder (blue heeler) from the goldfields who had awful, awful mange from early puppyhood. The poor owner had taken the dog to Murdoch for special diagnosis and treatment. She had already spent $11,000 on the dog and taken a second job to pay vet bills. Murdoch did $3000 of tests and came up with no definitive answer. The poor dog ended out with stitches all over its body where they had done a sort of sampling that is deeper than normal scrapings . . . he was on a complex schedule of pills and lotions. I'm not a vet, and I don't know all the details . . . but it can be a bugger of a disease.

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Just curious - has anyone had a dog with mange (demodex)? What was the long term prognosis? If a dog has mange as a pup and it takes 10 months to get rid of it, is it likely to be an ongoing issue? Any advice much appreciated. :) Oh and this is not one of my dogs. :)

Dante had it for about 3 months last year and the skin took a long time to come good, actually in some areas it's still not great but he doesn't have Mange anymore.

Dante is on Cortisone and any increased Cortisone use could potentially have us facing Mange again so it's a pretty stressful time when his allergies are really bad and aren't responding to anythign else.

10 months is a very long time to have Mange, I presume the immune system was a bit crap and therefore it could be more likely to return in the future?

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