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Help! Dog with severe allergy to grass - I think.


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The little sheltie that I am taking care of has always had problems with grass allergies. But for some reason she has gotten a lot worse in just the last few days. I started taking care of her this morning and could not believe how terrible she looks. Even her muzzle is inflamed. She has places on her leg where the hair is all gone and there is just thickened skin. I think she just itches all over. Her hair is so thin I think it is just falling out.

 

Her owner really doesn't know much. She is really nice and she really cares about this dog but she just doesn't know much about dogs.

 

I called her and told that we really needed to get her help. She is just miserable. So I have an appointment with my vet first thing Thursday - he is closed tomorrow. I can get her a better price there because he is also a friend. And money is an issue in this case.

 

Is there something that will help at least for tomorrow? I can get her Bennedril or Claritin.

 

Any ideas anyone.

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You can give a Benedryl tablet to a dog, but I am not sure of the dosage compared to body weight. I expect someone else will give you the needed information. It is supposed to be fairly effective for some allergies, and may also tend to make the dog a bit drowsy, which may help make it more comfortable.

 

What a sad situation - she must be so uncomfortable.

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My vet told my to give my 40# dog 2, 25mg benedryl every 12 hours.

 

Not a short term fix, but fairly cost effective one. Switching to a raw diet did wonders for my dog with grass allergies. She went from being on benedryl all the time to bendryl a couple times a month after I switched her to raw.

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She is just miserable. I almost started to cry just looking at her.

 

She has been on benedryl and it makes her really lethargic. I have heard that Claritin works better for some dogs. Its safe as long as you don't get the Caritin D form. It doesn't make them so out of it.

 

I have just been reading about a product called Skin Eze that is supposed to really help. But I would have to order that and who knows when it would get here. Dr. Marty Goldstein also listed some other things that really help. But they all have to be ordered.

 

Can I use Neosporin? Will it hurt her if she licks it off? I think that would help the raw places.

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My vet told my to give my 40# dog 2, 25mg benedryl every 12 hours.

 

Not a short term fix, but fairly cost effective one. Switching to a raw diet did wonders for my dog with grass allergies. She went from being on benedryl all the time to bendryl a couple times a month after I switched her to raw.

This is a very small sheltie - I'm guessing 30 pounds. So I probably could give her 1 tonite and 1 in the morning.

 

I just hate to use cortizone but I think she needs something strong just to get this under control and then we can look into some of the holistic stuff that works.

 

Her owner would never be able to feed her raw. I did get her to change over to Natural Balance Allergy food instead of Pedigree.

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If you've got a pet store nearby you could get a bottle of oatmeal or a simular soothing shampoo made for dogs with allergies. It could really help if you washed off the allergens (pollen) that she picks up from the grass.

 

IMO, a drowsy dog is better than one who is licking/chewing on herself, at least until you can get her to the vet.

 

ETA, I'd give her 1 1/2 benedryl at a time. Also look into getting her a fish oil supplement. It has anti-inflamatory properties.

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Our Duchess goes through about 6 weeks of allergy hell here in Florida. We use benedryl. Plus - we get oatmeal bath soaks - what you get for people, and sit in a cool tub with her. This give a lot of relief. She also sleeps with us. If she is having a tough night I take a icepack - well wrapped up - and put it on her itchy spot. Most recently I have used hydrogen peroxide to clean the areas of irritation - it does not seem to bother her when I put it on and significantly help the bad area.

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Even her muzzle is inflamed. She has places on her leg where the hair is all gone and there is just thickened skin. I think she just itches all over. Her hair is so thin I think it is just falling out.

 

This is me being paranoid, but is this type of reaction normal for this dog? The thickened skin and missing hair makes me think about mange? Now, I've never seen a dog with bad allergies, so this could totally be in left field, but I've seen lots of mange. I know it's not likely, just a thought.

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I was just up there and she is looking better than she did this afternoon. Her face wasn't all red anymore.

 

I just talked to a nutrition specialist that we have here. I bought some spray for her that should ease the itching - its all natural. And I gave her one benedryl which I am hoping will make her sleep thru the night without scratching herself all nite. The owner had been feeding her Natural Balance Allergy but she had been buying the vegetarian one. The nutritionist said to get her off that - she needs the meat. So she gave me a bunch of samples of California Natural Chicken and Rice to mix with her food. I think its called California Natural - anyway it is a very high quality food. Boy the dogs really loved that stuff.

 

And the owner has been giving her oatmeal baths and she said that made a huge difference.

 

Thanks so much for all of the ideas. Hopefully tomorrow will be a better day for her.

 

I was just thinking on the way home that my Ellie - who scratches thru every flea season - has not scratched at all since I have been feeding her Evo.

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I was just up there and she is looking better than she did this afternoon. Her face wasn't all red anymore.

 

I just talked to a nutrition specialist that we have here. I bought some spray for her that should ease the itching - its all natural. And I gave her one benedryl which I am hoping will make her sleep thru the night without scratching herself all nite. The owner had been feeding her Natural Balance Allergy but she had been buying the vegetarian one. The nutritionist said to get her off that - she needs the meat. So she gave me a bunch of samples of California Natural Chicken and Rice to mix with her food. I think its called California Natural - anyway it is a very high quality food. Boy the dogs really loved that stuff.

 

And the owner has been giving her oatmeal baths and she said that made a huge difference.

 

Thanks so much for all of the ideas. Hopefully tomorrow will be a better day for her.

 

I was just thinking on the way home that my Ellie - who scratches thru every flea season - has not scratched at all since I have been feeding her Evo.

 

Getting some meat back in her diet could make a big difference!! If the CN food doesn't quite do the trick, check out Taste of the Wild made by Diamond. It is grain free and pretty reasonably priced.

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I am glad to see that the poor little girl is doing better.

 

I just thought that I would second adding some fish oil to her diet regularly. This really does help with skin irritations and coat problems too. Obviously, this girl has bigger issues, but it may help get her back into shape.

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Both turmeric and cinnamon have anti-inflammatory properties and could help with the itching. I was giving 1/4 teaspoon of each to a ~40 lb dog, so you could probably go with a little less (take a quarter tsp measure and just don't fill it to the top). It's worth a try--I was using it for itchy skin and it was prescribed by my holistic vet, FWIW.

 

J.

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Getting some meat back in her diet could make a big difference!! If the CN food doesn't quite do the trick, check out Taste of the Wild made by Diamond. It is grain free and pretty reasonably priced.

The nutritionist put her on the California Natural because the food she is eating now is a high carbohydrate food and she didn't want to change over to high protein too fast. Boy did those dogs love that California Natural. If she does all right on that I'll go buy her a bag.

 

These dogs are rescues and the owner doesn't have a lot of money. Three of the dogs are big so food is expensive for them. She feeds them Pedigree. Lots of people out there feed Pedigree. Better than Old Roy, I guess.

 

I'm on my way back up there right now. I'll see how she is feeling this morning. She is such a cute little dog. But she is also 12 and shelties don't tend to live to be real old.

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I give Shoshone benadryl, the generic kind that you get at Costco, Target, etc. It's very inexpensive that way. And, Shonie did adjust within a week or so and got back to her normal energy level.

 

Even if she hadn't, the benedryl is such a cheap fix, and is so much easier on a dog than steroids, that I'd keep up with it.

 

Good luck to the poor little thing and the owner, I hope you find something that helps soon. And bless you for caring so much.

 

Ruth

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The nutritionist put her on the California Natural because the food she is eating now is a high carbohydrate food and she didn't want to change over to high protein too fast. Boy did those dogs love that California Natural. If she does all right on that I'll go buy her a bag.

 

These dogs are rescues and the owner doesn't have a lot of money. Three of the dogs are big so food is expensive for them. She feeds them Pedigree. Lots of people out there feed Pedigree. Better than Old Roy, I guess.

 

I'm on my way back up there right now. I'll see how she is feeling this morning. She is such a cute little dog. But she is also 12 and shelties don't tend to live to be real old.

 

You're an angel!

 

You may want to suggest the owner look into Diamond foods. The ingredients are a little better than Pedigree (IMO) and around here it runs a little cheaper.

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I think she is quite a bit better. I gave her another benadryl this morning and sprayed her with the skin spray. She is still biting her feet. I'm still looking into some holistic products that work and that won't be too expensive for her to use. There are several that Marty Goldstein talks about. Some are natur; hydrocortisones that work as well as prednasone and don't have all the side effects.

 

Thanks for the tip on Diamond. I wonder where we can buy that around here? I would feel a lot better if all the dogs were on something better than Pedigree. The bigs dogs are overweight and I'm sure a lot of that is poor diet.

 

One of these dogs is this really funny little pug cross. She found him thrown out with the trash. And he is the dearest little guy. He is just one of the most joyful animals. He is just ecstatic about everything. I'm nost sure where the other big dogs came from but they were all just throw aways - 2 lab crosses and 1 chow cross.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Tommy Coyote,

 

You might want to look at this website http://www.tdlpathology.com/index.php?opti...&Itemid=228 on cross-reactivity to see if there are any foods she's eating that may be cross-reacting with the grasses she's allergic to.

 

We've dealt with cross-reactivity with our daughter and one dog, it made a huge difference knowing which foods our daughter should avoid during birch pollen season.

 

Kris

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