I have a question for anyone who has their dog on anxiety medication. It was suggested by our vet yesterday that we put Phoebe, our 2yr old Deaf Dane on anxiety meds. She went for her spay yesterday as well as surgery on her front ankle. The vet did xrays and it showed a very minor bone spur, however he said that the spur is not causing her to chew her leg as it's too minor and really wouldn't cause any pain or irritation. Before Phoebe came to us in August she had injured her front leg, cutting the ankle open on a broken deck at her previous home. The previous owner only ever used a topical spray and due to the laceration, and irritation caused by the wound healing, drying and itching Phoebe began to chew obsessivly at her ankle causing the wound to get worse each day. So it would appear that while she was nursing the would the chewing became a habit. When we had her seen in August the vet said it was likely either a bone spur beneath causing the pain, or an arthritic sist causing her aggravation, thus he said we needed to get beneath the wound and remove whatever was causing the irritation to solve the underlying cause. So now the xrays have been done showing that really there's nothing beneath causing pain or otherwise and said that because Phoebe chews at her tail, nipples and ankle that he feels very confident that she has anxiety issues and recommended we put her on an anxiety med.
We haven't started her yet on anything because he sent off a growth he removed from one nipple for biopsy as well as the large mass he removed from her injured ankle just to see if we were dealing with anything else...cancer I would guess.
Right now we're letting Phoebe recoup from the spay and take it easy while her ankle heals. She has numerous stitches on her ankle and it's wrapped to prevent her from chewing. We wrapped it in the past but she chewed the vet wrap off so hopefully she leaves it alone long enough to allow it to heal. For those who have dogs with anxiety and are on meds does it help? What meds are your dogs on? How do you get them to take the medicine?
I was told that St. John's Wort can be used as a natural alternative to vet prescribed medication, and works just as well. Has anyone used this for their dog, and does it work? If so how much do you give? How do you get them to take it?
I've been trying so despretly to make toys fun and get Phoebe playing with them to divert her obsession with chewing on herself but she's never played with toys. She does chew on bones but won't go out of her way to chew bones. We got her a Kong and filled it with frozen yogurt and peanut butter but she won't touch that. I'm stumped for ways to keep her from this form of self mutilation. Once her leg heals I figured we'd take her out for lengthy walks and tucker her out so that she's too tired to do much aside from snooze. I don't know what the answer is, and from having one pet parrot that plucks it's feathers due to anxiety (the parrot has been through homes before us as well), I know that anxiety problems can really be a lengthy battle.
Any advice, help or insight would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks!
