Advice for dog with severe itchy skin despite repeated vet treatment

[FattyMcFat50]

Hi. My 4 year old cavadoodle (cavapoo crossed with golden labrador) has developed a quite severe skin issue. His skin is very itchy and he went from the odd scab 3 months ago to being almost covered in scabs now. He's so itchy, he leaves a trail of skin behind him wherever he goes.

He's been to the vet several times because of this since Christmas. We have done cytopoint every 4 weeks since the itching started, medicated shampoo, special vet food (single protein), a couple of courses of antibiotics and antifungal meds. I am washing all bedding etc every couple of days with extra rinsing to make sure it's not the laundry detergent. We recently did a blood test which identified he was not allergic to any of his foods. The next step is an environmental one, but the vet has said they don't recommend it as it's very expensive (approx €400) and most environmental issues cannot be eliminated.

So I've come here in the hope anyone here could give me some advice.

I seem to come across a lot of the same products when I Google. E.g. Nutripaw. But most advice is to take the dog to the vet.

So if anyone here has experienced similar and found something that helps, I would be so grateful if you could help as my heart breaks for my poor dog.

Thanks.

Piriton. Has to be piriton not piriteze. Im surprised vet hasn't prescribed doggy equivalent of apopiquel (sp).

Our dog has flare ups. I have to be stringent about diet. No chicken or wheat. No extra little nibbles of whatever humans are eating.
I add apple cider vinegar to his food.
He is fed Gentle food so very like raw

Cytopoint is an injection so needs a periodic vet visit but easy to adminster. The others are daily tablets, so that might be a consideration.

I just hide the tablet in a little dog-safe pate, peanut butter or cream cheese. I give multivitamins or other supplements at the same time so it is an easy routine for me

There is a new drug called Zenrelia which is meant to help better than apoquel, and cheaper. Might be worth a go.

Cytopoint helps but we have ended up on immunotherapy after allergy tests showed a dust mite and storage mite allergy. It means four weekly trips to the vets forever in the hope it keeps his reactions minimal.

Apoquel had no effect on my boy and Zenrelia seemed to help and then didn’t. He’s relatively stable currently and has been having the immunotherapy for about four or five months.

Is the immunotherapy something you do at home (daily?) or with vet visits?

We had a doggie with allergies
she had blood tests which showed allergies to dust trees plants etc
we managed it with vet bought allergen food
regular house spray for dust mites
daily antihistamines
weekly bath in vet bought anti allergy skin wash

The only thing that worked for my very itchy springer was Piriton, which my vet (in Ireland) eventually suggested after Apoquel and Cytopoint did nothing. Half a tablet per day for a 24kg dog did the job mostly, with the option to up the dose if she was particularly itchy. She also found Sudocrem in her itchy ears very soothing.

My dog's was a monthly injection, which I did myself at home. I had a bottle of the medication, which had to be stored in the fridge.

We never did all the tests. Our vet said to try eliminating the most common allergy causes from her life and seeing how she went on. He said tests could often throw up allergies to lots of things and you might not need to avoid everything..

We used piriton (don’t use piriteze) for our itchy dog, plus Itchy Dog supplement (lintbels). For one year, when she was particularly itchy, we gave her appoquel.

Look for something called Udder Cream -originally used to soothe cow’s udders, but often used in the equestrian world. I found it one of the best things to soothe itchy skin. It also worked well as a barrier if we did take her on grass in summer.

We were told to avoid all food types etc apart from fish or turkey flavour, and definitely grain free. Use the same principle for treats too.
Our vet also suggested avoiding red coloured rugs or blankets. He suggested an old, lighter coloured duvet cover- less dye fibres. Apparently red coloured blankets can cause issues.

We also avoided grass from May to December. Grass has the biggest effect on her than anything.

Weirdly she stopped reacting as much once she was over ten.

Funny you ask…his specialist told me we can do it at home. Our vets won’t let us! Apparently some don’t because insurance doesn’t cover them and such like. I coughed up for it expecting to do it at home after the first few goes and was then told no.

We used IDEXX and the ‘vaccine’ was made up in Europe and imported. Cost me about £450 and then vet trips to administer are on top. In theory a nurse can do it, but every third cytopoint has to be with a vet so we can’t do nurses all the time.

I can’t say I’m happy about the vets once a month forever. My boy has not had a bad experience in his life besides skin issues, but he is very nervous of the car. He is a 35kg golden retriever and literally shakes in the car. I may well see if the specialist would order it and prescribe it for us if they would let us do it at home. Although if he does need the cytopoint long term we will be stuck at the vets for that!

Our specialist (Dick Whites in Cambridge) were not a big fan of immunotherapy. Said that dogs like this usually become allergic to other things once treated for this allergy. I’m just hoping if that does happen we end up with something seasonal. My poor lad has been in bits at all times of year.

My old dog had dermatitis, was losing hair and had bald patches. I had tried loads of things from the vet to no avail until a fellow dog walker suggested Evening Primrose. The hair started growing back within the week it was amazing. I told the vet and he said to carry on with it. After some time the dog started refusing it but the dermatitis never came back.

My Goldie is on Apoquel - and has been for years now. We tried everything suggested by the vet - did tests, changed foods, washed bedding etc etc and never discovered what was causing the issue. 1 Apoquel tablet a day and it has solved whatever the issue is - every time I try to wean her off them, she gets hot spots and scratches herself raw within about 12 hours 🤷.

Our dog is allergic to everything poultry, if it’s looked at a feather he’s allergic to it. We had him on apoquel for 6 months to dampen the itch and break the behaviour of constantly scratching. He’s also fed entirely raw now and he only has a fish based diet. No treats that aren’t fish are allowed. He’s so much happier

Is hid food chicken and grain based. Loads of spaniel crosses have allergies to poultry and grain.

Mine was very bad early last year. Our vet out him on apoquel for six weeks to get the flareup under control, we had dermaease (didn't do much). We had shampoo routine to do as well. Vet saw him weekly, then every two weeks to monitor.

I didn't want him on meds forever, our vet agreed, so he now has the shampoo routine as standard. One wash he has zincoseb and the next wash he has malasab. The shampoo washing made a huge difference in his skin. We have apoquel tablets as a standby if he has a flare.

I also cut out chicken so he now has Burns Duck and brown rice, massively cut down on the quantity as well, I was overfeeding him 🙈

His food is a single protein one for sensitive dogs, skin and stomach. He used to have stomach problems, frequent diarrhoea, but that is fine on the food. I believe the protein is fish based but it's not explicit on the package. It's calibra brand - not sure if that's an Irish brand maybe.

The shampoo we were using until recently was malaseb. That was unavailable the last time so we got malabeze most recently. We bath him at least twice a week, leaving the shampoo on for a minimum of 10 minutes at a time before rinsing, as per the vets instructions. I was wondering if that's too severe and drying out the skin though given that his skin is getting worse.

Then cytopoint every month at the vet. He's had various injections at various stages too, as well as oral antibiotics and antifungal pills.

We try to go the injection route as much as possible as the only way we can get tablets into him is stuck in a sausage, which obviously we're trying to avoid.

Our pug tried apoquel, cytopoint, steroids and various other treatments/hypoallergenic food/prescribed shampoos to no avail. He had to have a blood test done which showed his allergies and was treated via immunotherapy, which was always injected at the vets. Initially he was in very frequently on a low dose to build up his tolerance, then gradually the dose increased and the injections were spread out to every month. It was the only thing that helped him x

First 2 paragraphs exactly our experience too! North West

I was going to say, my last dog was a whippet and had such sore skin around the groin area his thin fur was completely gone all over his belly, tried lots of vet things but what cleared it eventually was Aveeno skin lotion, it rapidly cleared up and the fur grew back, problem never returned. It was a desperate notion and I’m still amazed it worked.

I'm another one wondering if this is mange.
If the vet hasn't taken any skin samples, you won't know either way.

I would certainly want a 2nd opinion. I would have expected her to take skin samples and prescribe steroids by the 2nd appointment tbh.

Mine had skin scrapings taken to check for mites. Non found and the cause was never found but I am pretty sure it was a flea allergy. It's horrible to see them scratching 24/7. I didn't find the vet great to be honest.

Anyhow, what worked for mine and appreciate it may very well not with yours but just an idea, is to put a physical barrier between skin and nails. I used an old shirt. And then I used loads and loads of cream, Sudocrem, aloe vera, Stinky Stuff, Dermacton... I went through tubs and tubs. Also gave her fish oils and some other supplements. I don't know if they helped at all but I think giving the skin chance to heal and moisturising it I think definitely did.

Thanks all for the suggestions on here. I had my dog at the vet again today. Skin scrapings were examined but no sign of mites. He was given a steroid jab today and we've a course of antibiotics for the skin as it's quite sore looking. She said he could get regular steroid injections but thinks he's too young to start them just yet without being certain so she is referring him to a specialist. In the meantime we'll keep up with the vet food and malabeze baths etc and hope to hear soon re the specialist.

Nutripaw - it’s helped my Labrador