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Damaged paw pad - help please :-(

4 replies

MrsL123 · 30/01/2010 16:34

This is not my week for animals!

I've just noticed that our older dog is licking at her front paws a fair bit. I've had a look, and the highest pads (the ones where her leg bends at the wrist, not the ones that touch the ground) have cracked - nothing particularly new there, she's always had dry pads - but this time they're actually peeling, and quite badly. The right one is particularly bad, it's as thought the whole top layer of it has peeled off (it's still hanging on, so is now like a flap about 1 or 2 mm thick), and underneath looks raw blacky-pink and very 'wet'. The left one looks like it's going the same way, although hasn't actually peeled yet and is just a deep crack that looks quite raw. I'm not doing a very good job of describing it - icky pic of her right one here (not very good quality, sorry).

What can I do for her? We're at the vets on Monday night with the cats, so I can take her along if need be (or call the emergency vet today if I need to - don't want them to get infected). I've got tea tree healing balm for the pup's wounds but I don't want to use anything that would sting her as they look so raw - I've also got some aloe vera vaseline which I could put on, and then wrap her wrists with vet wrap - would this help or hinder? I'm not sure whether I should leave them open to the air so they toughen up, or cover them to stop her licking. I'm a bit worried about this flap getting ripped off and causing more damage, as it's just dangling (but still attached a fair bit)

Her other pads are fine, and she seems OK in herself apart from these pads obviously hurting her - if I hadn't seen her licking, I wouldn't have known there was anything wrong.

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MitchyInge · 30/01/2010 16:39

am not sure about right now, but longer term she might benefit from some boots like these

MrsL123 · 30/01/2010 16:48

MI she had something similar to those for her front paws a couple of years ago when she injured one of them on broken glass (and hated them!) but the pads that are damaged are the ones at the back of her leg, that sit just above the top of the boots. It's so strange because her pads have actually been softer later because of all the snow and ice, so we'd stopped putting her paw wax on - the other pads are still soft, so I don't know why these ones have suddenly flared up, and to such an extent. It can't even be anything she's stood in, because they don't touch the ground. She does suffer with allergies occasionally so I've given her a piriton incase something has flared it up, but I'm not sure what to do about the damage already done

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MitchyInge · 30/01/2010 16:52

we've had a few mystery pad injuries like blisters and grazes - some things that have helped have been trimming the fur around and between them, so mud can't get in and sort of fungate or just irritate and using the boots to keep them clean and dry

my vet is a fan of colloidal silver which you can add to their water or dilute and spray direct onto the sore bits

MrsL123 · 30/01/2010 17:01

Thanks for that MI, I'll ask the vet about that on Monday. In the meantime I've just applied some intrasite gel (forgot I had it) and vet-wrapped her wrists to stop the licking (she can get a bit obsessive - caused a lick granuloma after her glass incident).

BTW just googled to find the proper name of the pads in question and it's her carpal pads - might have been helpful to find that out first

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