Big Paws Only Dog Forums
BPO Medical Forum => Medical Conditions & Diseases => : Nina April 20, 2007, 10:56:55 AM
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I think that Harley may have a hot spot in between her toes, it is really red and kinda moist in there. I called the vet but they don't have any appointments available until May! But I can drop her off in the morning and pick her up at night, which I don't mind doing they love her there. But the earliest is Monday. In the mean time I don't know what to do. Any idea's?
Nina
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bump
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i found this article, although i know sc trojans said not to use hydrocortisone cream.
1. Shave the area. The first treatment for hot spots is to dry them out and get air to the area. Hair loss is a feature of hot spots, but hair can also mat over the inflamed area, covering up a potentially much more severe and large problem.
2. Cleanse the area with cool water and a gentle skin cleanser.
3. Cool compress the area 2-4 times a day with a cool wet washcloth.
4. Additional home remedies that can be used until you can see your vet:
* tea bag compresses (black or green tea) to help dry the area out. Tea can be used as a wash or as a compress.
* Domeboro's (Burow's) solution (aluminum acetate) - available over-the-counter at pharmacies to help dry the skin out. Can be used as a compress or as a spray.
* Hydrocortisone creams - Some people advocate using a thin film of an over-the-counter hydrocortisone cream. I would recommend talking to your vet first -- in general, creams and ointments only serve to "gunk up" the area and prevent proper drying if used incorrectly. Also, if the pet licks it, you want to make sure that it isn't toxic.
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Thanks, I swear it came out of no where. We were just at the vet on Wednesday and then this morning I noticed in between her toes is all red. It's going to be some hard to shave in between her toes but I'll do my best.
I think it is because she has been really itchy lately, it is so dry here. So we have her on fish oil that we put in her food and the vet gave us some sulfur pills. Hopefully that will help but now we have this problem. Ugh.
Nina
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personally, i wouldn't shave it b/c i'd be scared to clip skin (i copied the article). the tea bags do sound like an idea though!
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I personally wouldn't bother taking the dog to the vet. There are plenty on hanural remedies for hot spots! My breeder uses this "Peace and Kindness" stuff. She said it does wonders. Good luck!
http://www.needsndesires.com/canadastore/canchrisproducts.php
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I'd rather treat her at home than make another trip to the vet, however this is my first hot spot and it is between her toes! ::) I'll check out that website and make a trip after work to our feed store, they have a people/pet pharmacy there. I'm sure they'll have some great products that I can try. If it is not better by Monday/Tuesday then I'll take her to the vet.
Thanks
Nina
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I'd rather treat her at home than make another trip to the vet, however this is my first hot spot and it is between her toes! ::) I'll check out that website and make a trip after work to our feed store, they have a people/pet pharmacy there. I'm sure they'll have some great products that I can try. If it is not better by Monday/Tuesday then I'll take her to the vet.
Thanks
Nina
When my previous dog got his first hot spot I was freaking out. I can understand you! But, like st.trojan says Hot Spots are much bigger ussues then just spots. It means that the dog's ummine system is weak. So you have to work on supplementing dogs diet or changing it.
The Vet will try to give you an injection and antibiotics which might cure the spot temprorarely and that is not what you need.
Keep us posted!
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I've also heard of people using Tea Tree Oil for the hot spots. You have to get a higher quality oil but it's used as an antiseptic, anesthetic, antibacterial, antimicrobial, disinfectant, fungicide. It can't be used on cats but it's safe for dogs.
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You can try this one as well
http://www.peoplespharmacy.org/archives/home_remedies/listerine_for_hot_spots.asp
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She's on Evo red meat diet, and now we've added salmon oil to her food. What else should I add to her diet? I'm thinking of switching to Orijen food. It is grain free and made here in Alberta. I think I may pick up some green tripe I heard that is really good for dogs and their immune systems. If anyone has some suggestions on other suppliments I am all ears. I really don't like seeing her all itchy :'(
Nina
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She's on Evo red meat diet, and now we've added salmon oil to her food. What else should I add to her diet? I'm thinking of switching to Orijen food. It is grain free and made here in Alberta. I think I may pick up some green tripe I heard that is really good for dogs and their immune systems. If anyone has some suggestions on other suppliments I am all ears. I really don't like seeing her all itchy :'(
Nina
I have never heard of Orijen BUT I would consider adding raw meat to her diet. My friend's dog had some skin issues not that long ago and as soon as he switched to raw the dog is healthier then ever! Also, feed her some garlic daily. It's good for immune system!
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Thanks so much for all the advice! It is so dry here it is making Tim and I miserable! I think that we are going to buy a humidifier. And for the garlic how much do you give? We've given her tripe before and she loves the stuff, but that was a while ago, I am going to start giving it to her again.
I think that it maybe the red meat diet that is causing the skin issue, on the other evo food she never had this issue, that coupled with the dry air.... well it's a bad combo.
Nina
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Thanks so much for all the advice! It is so dry here it is making Tim and I miserable! I think that we are going to buy a humidifier. And for the garlic how much do you give? We've given her tripe before and she loves the stuff, but that was a while ago, I am going to start giving it to her again.
I think that it maybe the red meat diet that is causing the skin issue, on the other evo food she never had this issue, that coupled with the dry air.... well it's a bad combo.
Nina
2-3 cloves a day for 50-70 lb dog. Start slowly...There are some weird dogs out there who don't like garlic...like mine. Most dogs love it!!!
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Thank for all the info, I'll be out shopping with Harley aka Princess LOL ;D
Nina
Edit- I'll keep you all posted on her progress.
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Well here's an update.
We went and bought some tripe for Harley gross but she loves it. And we got some hot spot powder called Miracle Dust. The stuff is amazing, her spot is almost all cleared up. It's not bright red anymore, there is still one little area that is oozing (sp??) So don't have to make a trip to the vet.
We think that her itching maybe food related. So we stopped feeding the Evo Redmeat and are feeding her the Reduced Fat Evo food that we have. She wouldn't eat it before but with the Salmon (Omega 3) oil she has been eating it. So hopefully this will clear up her skin issue. Finger crossed. ;D
Thanks for all the advice.
Nina
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Oh hot spots. YUCK and OUCH!!!!! I'm super glad to hear that Harley is getting better and glad for you too. I know how hard it is to have to care for those and it's never easy to see the pups uncomfortable. Good news to hear all is getting better. :D
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I've never heard of Miracle Dust, but I'm so glad it's helping Harley! I'll keep my fingers crossed she has no more skin issues, hopefully the food change will help!
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I've never heard of Miracle Dust, but I'm so glad it's helping Harley! I'll keep my fingers crossed she has no more skin issues, hopefully the food change will help!
Miracle Dust is made by the Urban Carivore
http://www.urbancarnivore.com/uc_online/pages.cfm?ID=26
They are a Canadian Company, I bought some of their Tripe too. It comes in patty form so it is less gross. :D.
They have lots of natural products, and raw foods available. So if I want to feed some raw food all I have to do is go buy a box of the stuff ;D Nice and convenient. ;D
Oh and the dust can be used to stop bleeding if you cut the quick during nail trimming.
Nina
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OK so Harley is still itching like mad, to the point where she exhausted herself, she was over heating! :'( And not her hot spots are on her front paws and her other back paw! I think that she is allergic to the carpet cleaner that I used, that coupled with swimming in the river at the dog park. So the first hot spot was almost healed until she started licking it again. She has socks on all her 4 paws along with hot spot powder. I am going to buy her some booties today. And buy some of the old carpet cleaner that I was using. I am also going to check the ingrediants in the evo food and see if there is anything different between the regular evo and the reduced fat. And I am going to call the vet take her in tomorrow. Or today if possible, I know she is in pain the poor girl. :'(
Nina
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Awww Harley!! Jenn has got a GREAT idea with the Solarcaine, I love that stuff! Hopefully she'll stop with the itchies soon, no fun at all! Get better Harley!
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I'm so sorry to hear about poor Harley :-[
I hadn't read the post before because I know absolutely nothing about hotspots and didn't think I could add anything - but I just have to let Harley know that we are thinking of her !!
Feel better soon!!
Randy & Harley
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have you given her any anti allergy meds? That might help! I am so sorry she's in so much pain! :-[
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I gave her a benadryl yesterday to help with the itching. I just feel so helpless seeing her like this. :'( I really think it is the carpet and she may have gotten something from the water when she went swimming. So we are going to get some advantage, that worked for her last year when she had the itchies after swimming. But I think the hot spots are from the carpet, when she came in she was still all wet so her paws would have absorbed what was in the carpet as well as her belly.
So I am going to clean the carpet with some hypo allergenic cleaner. Hopefully that will solve the problem. :'(
Nina
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i hate that things aren't getting better! axle has a reaction to some carpet stuff too, but his hair on his tummy / legs just falls out (awesome, huh?). i can't imagine if he would get hot spots from it. i sure hope things get better soon!
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WOOHOO, Harley is going to seeour vet tomorrow morning. They are coming in early to see her. They are so wonderful! :)
Nina
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Well Tim took Harley into the vet. The clinic owner was the one to see her. He said it could be a reaction to the carpet cleaner and to her food. He said it is like she is having an allergic reaction to grains in her food. Tim told him we feed her no grain food. He said dry food, even if they say it is "grain Free" will have some type of grain in it! :o I checked the evo ingrediants and Lecithin is in it which is a seed, therefore a grain. Orijen has psyllium seed and yeast extract (MOS) which looks like grain to me. Ugh how frustrating huh. So he gave us some sample Raw food and we are going to go get some from store that we got the tripe from and get some raw food patties (Urban Carnivore makes them). So raw we go, I'll have to read up it to know if we have to give supplements ect. Any advice would be appreciated. :)
We also go some hotspot spray, some herbal medication, and she got an accupuncture treatment done. When he was poking her she was like what the heck, then she ate one of the needles! :o He said she would be fine and pass it.
I am glad that she is fine, and will be feeling better soon by poor girl.
Nina
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Well they spray is working wonders! Her back feet are almost all healed up. The front are doing better, she isn't licking them as much.
She is still itching, the vet did say that it could take 3/4 wks for the herbal medicine to fix that.
And WOOHOO she passed the accupuncture needle LOL ::)
Nina
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I'm glad she's healing up so nicely! AND I'm super glad she passed the needle, I would have been freakin' out!
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I was so freaking out when Tim told me she ate the needle. But he said it was a really flimsy needle and the vet said it would float right through, no damage. The vet said she is the first to ever do that though. LOL leave it to Harley ::)
Nina
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Glad to hear Harley's on the mend and OMG - I would have SO freaked out too over the needle! ;) SO glad to hear she passed it though without any problems - whew!!!
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I'm a little late reading this, but it caught my attention as my dog Toby got a "spring hot spot" for the second year in a row. I think he has some allergies related to things growing in the spring and he licks a spot bald on his "forearm".
I don't have any good ideas, my vet gave me an anti-itch/anti-inflammatory spray and I couple that with blocking access to the area (Toby has been wearing a modified shirt for the past week - the neighbors are starting to question us), therefore breaking the habit.
Anyway, the real reason I wanted to chime in was that I noticed a post about garlic. I'm no doctor or vet, so take this for what it is, but I just completed my master's (on Monday) and as part of that prepared a paper on the toxicity of common "table scraps" to dogs for my environmental toxicology class. It was interesting research, although I really only scratched the surface. Here's what to consider re: garlic...
Onions and garlic contain sulfur compounds that hydrolyze into thiosoulfinate s when chewed then decompose into disulfides. The short version is that these cause anemia. While there are not many reported cases of garlic toxicosis, garlic contains more disulfides on a mass basis than onions - it is simply thought that dogs have less access to quantities of garlic than they may have to onion. This "onion/garlic toxicosis" can be lethal without treatment.
Symptioms include pale mucous membranes, rapid respiration and heart rate, lethargy, and onion odor on breath. Vomiting and diarrhea may also develop. There are certain dogs with genetic predisposition to being more sensitive to these compounds. But, currently reports indicate that signs of toxicosis may be evident in dogs fed onions weighing more than 0.5% of their body weight. There's no dose related data (that I could find) relating to garlic, again because it is less often reported.
So, for a 60 lb dog, 5 oz of onion could be an issue (60 lb x 16 oz/lb x 0.005 = 4.8 oz). I don't know how much a clove of garlic weighs, but the reports I read suggest it would take even less garlic.
So, like I said, I'm not a vet or an MD. Just an engineer who wanted to research something interesting for my last scholarly project ever! I think dogs are much more interesting than most engineering subjects, right??? :)
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Yeah, a seed isn't the same thing as a grain. Grains come from grasses. Lecithin is typically derived from soy (a bean, not a grain), but it can also be derived from eggs. Yeast isn't a grain, either. It's a fungus. Psyllium, on the other hand is a grain.
Good luck finding the source of the problem. From all you've said, I still think the carpet cleaner is the culprit.
Yeah I kinda figured the carpet cleaner was the source, I think she may have spring allergies too. But she also wasn't digesting the Evo very well, she is doing much better on raw food.
I'm not saying Evo is not a good food, my cat is on it and we've used it for over a year.
I just assumed that soy ect are all grains oopps LOL :) Thanks for the correction, it's good to know what they are. ;D
Nina
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ooh i'm so sorry i was late in reading this too!!! fumble has awful allergies and it comes out in ear infections and staph skin infection. did this happen recently?? could be seasonal allergies too??? fumble gets the domboro treatment if it's bad, and then he uses this herbal stuff that is absorbed immeditately, ti's derma dream from halo... orrrr... we just started this holistic stuff called "clora clora" from a pet company in CA... i can't remember the name right now but if you're interested i can get you the info. we found that none of the antibitoics really work, and just topical stuff or extra herbs and vitamins.
I hope htat Harley is feeling bETteR!!! :)
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Thanks,
Harley is feeling so much better, Her hot spots have almost all cleared up! She is still itching a bit but she is back to her normal self. The vet gave us some herbal powder that we put in her food, and that is for her skin. She has improved on it, although he did say that it can take up to 6 weeks for her to fully stop itching. I would love to know what you are using on fumble as this stuff cost $70.00 but this stuff also will boost her immune system. I don't want to us antibitotics as it causes liver damage.
She loves the raw diet and is doing so well on it. The best thing is her stool is super small and doesn't smell! ;D
Right now she is on turkey with bone and veggies in it and chicken with bone and veggies in it. She also gets green tripe and we are going to add organ meat too. I am also going to add some beef bone as well. But so far so good.
Nina
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Hi, I was just searching the net for info on allergies/hot spots for my dog and came across this forum.
We have an 11 month old labradoodle who started getting little 'pimply' bumps on his back and then red, oozy spots around Christmas. He licks and scratches quite a bit too.
We have had him in and out of the vet the last 5 months or so but it doesn't seem to help.
At first they had him on antibiotics and some other pill and it cleared it up for a few weeks but then he broke out again. The second time in the vet gave him antibiotics and steroid pills that caused him to lose control of his bladder...they said this is common on steroids?. The vet also had us switch to Medi-cal Hypo allergenic food (from Nutro)and started us on a monthly flee formula (cant remember brand). He broke out again a few weeks later so took him into vet and this time they gave him a shot...not sure what. But it didn't work at all.
Now he is really bad, big red oozy spots all over his groin, thighs and belly and itchy bumps on his back. I really dont want to go into the vet again...they just seem to pump him full of drugs that dont solve the problem.
I am in the process of switching his food to Orijen and have started adding salmon oil supplements. Also, bought a hot spot herbal spray (Canyon Meadows)so we'll see how it goes. Its only been 3 days so haven't noticed any major changes yet but keeping our fingers crossed.
The vet also suggested shaving him down for the summer so we may do that soon... :'( I love his shaggy coat though.
Anyway, just wanted to see if anyone had any other recommendation s?
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i'd shave him down, just so you could keep a better eye on it and it could air out some. also, if you don't want so many medicines, look for a holistic vet in your area. they'll go for more natural methods before they think about medicines. also, a new vet might know something your vet doesn't, and your vet may be treating it in the complete wrong way. seems like something would have worked by now from the sounds of it. so sorry your pup is going through this, it sounds AWFUL! maybe you could post pictures of your baby so we could get a better idea what you mean is going on. does it look anything like the pics in the link below?
http://www.nzymes.com/Testimonials/blizzard_cotton_itchy_skin_rash_chewing_feet_hair_loss.htm
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Could be that he was allergic to his food. You should be good with Orijen as it is a grain free food. The main thing with healing hot spots is getting them to dry out. You don't need to shave him to get rid of the spots. The spray should work. We got a spray from our holistic vet and within a week all her feet have pretty much cleared up. I sprayed the effected area twice a day(not sure what the directions say for you). Also you can use benadryl or sulfer pills(which you can get for a holistic vet, not sure if stores sell them but they might) and that will relieve the itching. I think that you are doing the right thing with the food switch and with the spray all should be good. The spots should heal within 2 weeks and for the itching it can take up to 6 weeks. That is what my vet said for me.
Oh you may also want to add some tripe to the diet, it is great for the skin. Gross stuff but great. ;D Don't worry I am sure he will be healed up in no time.
PS - Harley was allergic to her food too so I am just going by my experience.
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Thanks for your input. I went to the sight about nzymes and it actually could be yeast...never would have thought. He isn't nearly as bad as the pictures but the symptoms sound similar (smelly, face rubbing etc).
I've made him an appointment with a holistic/western vet (they say they do a combo of both beacuse in some cases modern medical procedures are required) for Friday. So hopefully she can help him. They asked what I was feeding etc and when said I was switching to Orijen she said it is a very good food but it contains chicken and a lot of dogs are allergic to chicken...
Anyway, I will try to post pictures of Cache for you to see.
Thanks again
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If it is the chicken then Innova Evo (also grain free) has a red meat diet. But I think that it might have been the grain in the other food that was causing the problem. Oh and from reading up on skin issues with Labs, they are prone to yeast alleries ect. But usually with a change in diet it clears up.
Good luck with the new vet. I look at the name of the powder that our vet gave us (it's for her itchy skin) it has worked wonders. She hardley ever scratches anymore.
Nina
Edit to add- We have to see some pictures of Cache! We love pictures here. Added one of Harley(Lab mix)
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Just an update on Cache...we took him in to the new vet on Friday and she was great. Very attentive but very expensive :-\. Turns out it is yeast, quite a bit apparently with some bacteria. She said it could be from anything...the shampoo the groomer was using to allergies.
She said the Orijen food is excellent and is actually going to bring it into their practice, her only concern with it is if it is baked or dried? We have to keep him on a strict grain free diet and only chicken protein for now. We are adding salmon oil to his food and a probiotic to help clear up the yeast. She also gave us a shampoo with benzoyl to use once a week for the next 3 weeks and then a topical spray and some ears drops as the yeast was causing an ear infection as well. It seems to be clearing up but no great results as of yet. I guess it will take a few weeks though.
I tried to attach a picture but it keeps telling me the attachment file is too large. Sorry.
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It's great that you are getting some answers. Our first pyr (17 yrs ago now) had problems with ear infections and hot spots. We went from vet to vet and no one really could figure out what caused them back then. One vet thought that she as allergic to wheat, so we gave her wheat-free food. That helped, but she still had problems. We were told to irrigate and clean her ears with a special solution. We did that and they improved, but she still occasionally had issues. The hot spots we learned to treat fast (like the very first time we saw her start to bite at a spot) and we kept them under control, with fewer problems. I so wish that we'd had a vet back then that could have gotten to the bottom of it so that she would have never had any problems with them, not just less often. You're doing a great job for Cache!!! :) Keep us posted. I'd love to know more about this in case one of our pack now ever develops them.