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Demodex mange?


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The past week, my 3 y/o BC (Just About) has started losing some hair around his left eye. It was immediate, as we saw no previous scratching or irritation. The hair loss was sudden... in the morning it was fine, and by afternoon, he looked like a raccoon!! It is now gradually spreading to his right eye.

 

He is a healthy dog, and has never had any skin irritations before.

 

I did some research and the only thing I came up with is Demodex Mange... has anyone experienced this? If so, what are treatment/prevention options and what is the approximate cost for treatment?

 

We'll schedule an appointment with our vet soon.

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Fennec had this at slightly under a year of age. I attributed his to the stress of being neutered, leaving his foster home, staying with another family for a week, then being transported in several cars in one day until I finally got him.

 

I chose to do nothing. If the spots are localized/limited to the face and there are fewer than 5, it generally will clear on its own. You can do a search and find many threads about what has worked for people.

 

I would have it confirmed with a skin scraping.

 

In Fenny's case it cleared up after his stress levels decreased....

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The past week, my 3 y/o BC (Just About) has started losing some hair around his left eye.

 

I did some research and the only thing I came up with is Demodex Mange... has anyone experienced this? If so, what are treatment/prevention options and what is the approximate cost for treatment?

 

Type demodex in the search box and you will get lots of threads, many are mine.

 

Meg went through this from August of last year till about April of this year. From my experience and research, it is not clear that in localized domodex arising from juvenile changes in the immune system, that ANY treatment will be effective on 'most' dogs. Those treatments that seem to 'work' and are indicated for the problem take as much time as the natural recovery rate for untreated dogs - which is usual, but slow. But how do you know?

 

Simple scraping DOES NOT always indicate the problem exists, we had to do a biopsy of the tissue to find it! The vet suggested this because she was pretty darn sure demodex was the problem. The usual treatment for dogs is Ivermectin, but in our neck of the woods they do not give collies Ivermectin. Revolution was the drug prescribed and it is not intended to treat demodetic mange....nevertheless, it seemed to clearly be the cause of Meg's recovery.

 

In our case we are pretty sure that Meg's immune system issue, is exacerbated by stress. She is a bit of a stress kitten in a stressful place. We had a very mild recurrence recently and she is already 20 months old.

 

Just as with human diseases and disorders, what seems to be conventional wisdom is still so often a question of local custom (even backed by statistical science) and its popular delusions. So much is still anecdotal. But we evolved to the most successful species on earth as a result of lots of anecdotal health care practices....and so have our dogs.

 

If nothing else works have your vet talk to mine, email me and I'll give you the contact info.

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Took Just About to the vet's this morning, two hours ago. (This is his first trip in awhile, he did amazingly well. Yay!)

 

The vet did some skin scraping, and the test came back negative for demodex. He looked further and noticed (and told me) that it looked like blood vessels had gotten into Just About's cornea - left eye - and he would need to futher investigate. The vet said that it might be "pemphigus" (I will do a forum search to see if anyone else has experienced this...) and he would have to put Just About under anesthesia today to look into his eye and figure out what's going on.

 

The vet said he wasn't *exactly* sure what it was yet, he'd need to look closer. He is keeping 'Bout until later this afternoon - he has a few other surgeries going on - but that it shouldn't be an overnight trip. I sure hope not... I already miss him!!

 

Anyway, that is the update. I wish I had remembered more of what the vet said, to give you guys more info.

 

Thanks for the support, and for the willingness to provide me with more information. =) I appreciate it!

 

~Lindzey

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