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Scout has his neuter, 2 weeks ago this Friday, 2 days after he came back he started losing hair around one of his eyes. It is steadily getting worse, slowly curving around to the top of the eye. He isn't itching it at all but it looks weird. Does anyone know what this could be and could he have caught it at the vet? Any home remedies work or is this a trip to the vet?

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I'd suggest a trip to the vet as well, or at least a call. They could be able to tell you a little something over the phone and save you the trip and the money! And they could tell you whether or not it's something to bring him in over. If you don't know the cause to the hair loss, there isn't really much you can try to do for him yourself.

 

Good luck!

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My first thought would be demodectic mange, brought about by the stress of the neuter surgery (let me clarify that--all dogs have the mite that causes the mange, and pups get the mite from their mothers the first few days after birth and normally remain untroubled by it, but stress to the immune system such as occurs with surgery can upset the "balance" and allow an outbreak). I'd take him to the vet for a skin scraping to get a diagnosis for sure. Many times demodex will clear up on its own, but sometimes it won't, and then your vet can give you something to help it along. Since it's near the eye, I wouldn't be going for any home remedies.... (Of course it could be something else entirely, but a visit to the vet will help determine what's going on.)

 

Here's a website with a good photo of what you seem to be describing: Marista vet's demodectic mange page.

 

J.

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I just called the vet and she said it could be a number of things and wouldn't know for sure unless they scraped it, but being as difficult as he is that we could watch and wait for a couple weeks to see if it doesn't clear up. She also mentioned that the heartworm meds he was supposed to start "Revolution" would clear any mites if that was what was causing it, so we will start that tonight. My hubby didn't want to start that until we actually saw a mosquito, ha!

 

Tracy

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Ditto Julie's entire post! Demodex was my thought, too, and it usually starts around the eyes or somewhere on the face, first.

 

One thing you could do to start helping it now, is boost his immune system and avoid any other stressors.

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Tracy, I have a 6 year old BC with this same problem. He has had it all of his life and it comes and goes. It seemed as he got older we saw it less. Our Vet has associated it with other skin problems and he has been treated with various medications, tiopical applications and food. We have never been able to solve it. It seems to be worse in the spring and he has a case of it right now along with flaky skin. A few weeks ago we treated him with Revolution and the problem started shortly after. I read somewhere on the net that BC,s with skin problems should not use Revolution. I will be treating him with another product in the next few days. Post how this turns out for you, this has been a difficult and expensive problem for us.

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Scout has had itchy skin his whole life. There is no flaky skin, it doesn't look dry, really no indication that he would be having any kind of a skin problem but we have given him "3V caps HP" which has fish oil and other vitamins in it with his food and that seems to stop the itchiness, but then he smells of fish. The eye hair loss is different since it doesn't bother him at all. He isn't itching there. Hopefully the revolution will help.

 

DTrain - good luck to you, so many times it is trial and error to figure out what will help.

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