Hello,
My name is Doc Neal and I am a licensed small animal vet(Georgia & Nevada) and I would like to TRY and establish some free website advice. I have been practicing for 7-8 years now. Born in Tennessee, raised ALL over. Went to school in Mississippi and Alabama and practice in GA! This gives me no financial gain, I just love hounds!!!
I do some pleasure hunting (raccoon and rabbit).
I would like to start with a disclaimer:
I am doing this FREE of charge. I don't mind know-it-alls, 2nd opinions or differences of opinion. Just please promise to tell the WHOLE story and things should be smooth. I DO NOT WANT ANY legal trouble from this!!!! This is a pasttime, i do it for the love of the hounds. so with that being said feel free to shoot with your questions. If you pm me, give me time to respond, as I do have a full time career, 3 crumbsnatchers and a wife! LOL
Pics and accurate medical records would also help.
You can also catch me giving out advie on www.biggamehoundsmen.com as well
Good luck and good hunting!
Doc Neal

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thats a good thing your doing. im sure i will be asking some questions.

Shane,
Thanks and feel free to shoot at anytime
Doc Neal

Hi! Im going to take you up on your free advice offer! We have a 1.5 year old BnT Coonhound rescue who is really suffering from extreme itchiness and hair loss. Vet has diagnosed her with non-specified allergies, however, any treatment/diet changes yields ZERO relief. She has had 4 rounds of Cefalexin for secondary skin infections, Ketaconazole, Prednizone, benadryl, and claritain, treated her for external parisites, changed her diet, moved to a new house... Nothing is working and we are at our wits end. ANY suggestions?

Here are her symptoms:
extreme itch - eye, muzzle, belly, feet and perianal
licking her paws
smells like sour bread/rotten corn chips
red bumps in itchiest areas
poor appetite
poor skin condition - flaky, smelly
skin darkening in affected area
hair loss in effected areas

I would love any help you can give. thanks!!

Did the vet do any tests? Such as a skin scrape or fungal culture. I would strongly recommend a skin scrape. This SOUNDS llike Sarcoptic mange but I can't see the dog? Also make sure your vet does or did some bloodwork before starting Pred and Ketoconazole. These 2 drugs are metabolized by the liver and can cause some damage sometimes.
Lemme know bout the skin scrape. One more thing...........take your 2 hands and rub one of your dog's ear flaps together, if your dog's back legs start bouncing like thumper........................................IT"S SARCOPTIC MANGE 90% of the time! Sarcoptes is contagious to humans so anyone (human) in the house scratching or got a rash?
Good luck,
Doc Neal

Doc Neal
OH Thank you thank you for your reply!! I can take pics if you want. I just tried the ear thing... she just gave me that look coonies give when they are smarter than you but dont want to say it, so she just looked at me like "Really? W-H-A-T are you doing??", so no thumper action and none of us have a rash...

Here's her history

6 months old - pulled from a meth lab emaciated and with severe staph infection, spent 3 months at vet recovering/eating before we got her. Treated for staph, vaccinated and spayed.

8 months old - (we adopted her) She started shaking ears, black gunk, split the tips. vet looked inside, said no infection, gave ear cleaner and said "these dogs with long ears just need to have their ears cleaned more often. every day or every other day... and she has allergies, change her diet and give benadryl."

9 months old- tape worms - 1 week panacur granules. Still shaking ears, still cleaning black gunk. Vomiting.

10 months old - puked up a "plateful" of round worms... did a 2 week round of panacur and 1 week metrinidazole for vomiting, ears cleared up briefly.

12 months old - red ##*%* bumps appeared on tail/anus, belly, inside ears, armpit, severly itchy started losing hair and still black gunk in ears, cleaning them every day. Took her back to the vet and Vet said allergies again, switch diet and try claritain. I asked about antibiotics, was told no, not for ear infections and allergies.

14 months - same red bumps ##*%* bumps all over now, itchy, ears seriously scabbed over from repeated splitting. Vet said "She has a severe skin infection from the allergies." gave her pred 5mg 3x a day, 2 weeks cefelaxin and butt creme (still no tests - blood, skin, fecal or otherwise).

15 months - cleared up on cefalexin, weaned pred to every other day, but after 2 weeks the secondary infection came back full force and had to go back to 5 mg pred 2x a day to find relief. Called vet, she suggested pred 4x a day and another 2 week round of cephalexin. I asked about scrapings, staph, yeast, etc. and vet said "there is no need to test for yeast or staph because they occur naturally on the skin so it wont tell us any more than we already know. Allergies can be frustrating, We just need to up the dose of pred to 5 mg 4x a day and try that." I replied but maybe if we had a better idea of WHAT we were fighting instead of throwing a random broad spectrum antibiotic, would that help? Shouldnt we do a scraping or swab? "No, I told you allergies can be frustrating. I suggest you bring her in and have her anal glands expressed" was the answer.

16 months - I refused to blow out my dogs liver so I took her to another vet... Said she was "yeasty" and also had a staph skin infection. Put her on 2 weeks ketaconazole and 2 weeks cephalexin. No pred. She seemed better but not quite itch free, so he put her on another 2 week round cephalexin (for 4 weeks in a row) but not the ketaconazole and gave her 2 shots 2 weeks apart of ivermectin for external parisites, saying he could do a scraping but it might not see any mites/mange if she had it, better to just give the shots. We also ran a cbc, thryoid on low end of normal but did not test T3 or T4 levels, said everything looked normal. Said if she was still itchy after this, we could try an elimination diet... maybe a scraping if necessacary. Oh and during this time, Ive been bathing her with a miconazole shampoo once a week.

FRUSTRATED!!
So, In the last month, I have started her on probiotics myself because I figured at this point we have totally blown out her gut flora balance and I put her on a low sugar diet as best I can... And strangely, she is the best shes been since we started this mess. Right now she is totally off the pred, antibiotics, antifungals and antihistamines and ONLY on probiotics and digestive enzymes and her weekly baths for the last 2 weeks. She is 90% clear, but still not 100%. I feel like were somehow "on top of it" but not "over it" if ya know what I mean. Sooooo... Does this help any??

Cindi and Hanna, the Handy Helper Hound

PS - We also found out her full sister/same litter is suffering from the same symptoms and still at the shelter.

Get that dog scraped!!!!!!!!!!! No if's and's or but's about it!!!!!!!!
Hell get a 3rd opinion, that's ridiculous, all that Pred FOR A PUPPY! I mean don't get me wrong I have misdiagnosed some things before myself but a skin scrape won't hurt anyone. Make sure the vet scrapes in at least 2-3 diferent places. I just had my wife read the post (she's a vet too) and we looked at each other like............................... this sounds like DEMODEX! The ivermectin should have worked but sometimes Demodex is difficult to treat. Also make sure they do an ear swab on the ear. You can't treat something if you don't know what it is.
Long story short:
Skin scrape: Demodex is easy to find but difficult to treat.
Sarcoptes is difficult to find but easy to treat.
Ear swab: Either yeast, bacteria or ear mites.
If your dog has none of these your pup needs to see a skin specialist, maybe CSU! Feel free to post or pm me some pics
Good luck!
Doc Neal

Doc Neal,

Again THANK YOU! Will do on the skin scrapings... What should I be looking to hear from the vet after he takes them?? What should I make sure he looks for/looks at in the scrapings?

Here's some pics for you. Her ears have been clear and healthy looking since the 2nd round of cefalexin. YAY, and I check them every few days. No mung so far. But her appetite is off and shes just lethargic and miserible most of the time. She sleeps a lot for a 1.5 year old puppy. The bumps are usually fairy hard and always itchy. She also has bumps on her topline, down her spine, thickest on her rump but no major hair loss there so far, just flaky dandruff.

I cant tell you how much I appreciate you even looking at this. I want to find a direction to go in since apparently Im not getting anywhere. I just want to be an informed client so I can ask the right questions and find an answer for her. And as the first vet said "this is only allergies, some dogs just don't respond to treatment, here more pred" is NOT the answer Im looking for. And (because if one itchy sick dog isnt enough) we are trying to foster her sister, who is still in the shelter and worse off skinwise and not responding at all to allergy shots.

SO...
This is her tail/anal area today. The hair is finally growing back some here, and its not nearly as bad or itchy as it was a few weeks ago even, but not 100% better.

Her eye today, its extremely itchy and obviously irritated, the worse part for her right now.

This is her belly today, you can see the red bumps on the outer edge of her leg and down the centerline and the white spots are healing from previous outbreaks.

You can see thinning patches under her neck, legs and armpits here

Just how thin her hair is depsite our efforts to beat this, figuring its winter, she has no winter coat to speak of.

Here is a shot of her hair thinning/loss... mostly her belly, armpits, under her neck and tail but it is starting to get peach fuzzy and growing a bit.

This is her eye, usually very itchy and inflammed, usually with a bump or 2 above her eye.

Oh, other holistic things to add: Been using a rinse of 10% vinegar and hydrogen peroxide weekly along with the miconazole wash. She gets fresh crushed garlic with meals and 1200 mg fish oil and well as flax seed daily. All with the intent to boost her immune system and help her skin.

Thanks for the pics! I have to admit she looks better than described but a scrape is still worth it. You'll want to tell the vet that your are concerned about Demodex or Sarcoptes. If indeed it is allergies it can be HARD to treat. Sometimes a 8-12 week diet trial is necesary. The diets I recdommend for suspected allergies are Hill's Science Z/D, Royal Canin Hypoallergenic diet and Purina something (can't remember the specific name). Allergy shots can take up to 2 years to see results.
Good luck,
Doc Neal

Our dogs reacted to a LOT of different dog foods with similar symptoms, especially the horribly gunky ears. We finally found a brand that worked for them, Purina One in either chicken & oatmeal or chicken & rice. We used it for a long time but recently when they changed the formula our dogs began having some nasty problems and I can't even recommend it (we've used Purina at least 40 years) because I think it may be the cause. I did notice our hounds had the most problems with beef and lamb foods while with other kinds of dogs I keep hearing that it's usually the chicken that causes the problem. They can eat actual beef and lamb but something in the processing of dog food changes it. This is just my own experience.

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me english has a yeast infection in his ear. whats a good thing to use to treat it. ive been useing vinager and alchool mixed to geather it. thanks shane

Vinegar, diluted will usually do the trick. Alcohol is kinda rough. You will want to use something like a turkey baster or that things our parents use to clean our nose with(bulb syringe) and insert the diluted vinegar into the ear, then massage the ear at the base till you hear a squishy sound and then let your dog shake. Next wipe clean with a cotton swab. This is usually followed by a salve of some sort from the vet, which I do recommend by the way. Do this once a day for 7-10 days and let's see.
Good Luck,
Doc Neal

SKIN SCRAPING

Have a real problem. My male walker age is unknown and he just yesterday lost all energy and started coughing till he gags and he has shallow breathing. Today he puked up blood once and has just laid around. I'm lost and am really not wanting to take him to our town vet cause of expensiveness. Oh and he has goop in his eyes any ideas?

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