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Lily - My English Setter became an angel April 24, 2021
Jesse-26 lbs - 16.5 years old ,11 years diabetic, one meal a day homemade and a vitabone snack . 3 shots of Novolin( under the Relion name ) a day . Total insulin for a 24 hour period is 6.5 units of NPH insulin .
Jesse earned her wings on 6/21/2021
I'm back with an update on Lily's itching. The itch is back and this time she has developed crust and inflammation on the outer edges of her ears. Her hair is also thinning and shedding.
Her vet scraped her skin and checked for mites and infection. It turns out that she has a bacterial infection and is being treated with antibiotics for two weeks. The vet also gave me some medicated shampoo to rub on the crusty areas.
Both the vet and I are thinking that everything may be related to a change in her hypothyroidism, so the vet has increased her thyroxine dose from .3mg to .45mg twice daily. If there is no improvement in 4 to 6 weeks, we'll have a full thyroid panel done.
We'll also continue with the Apoquel for itch relief, but it won't completely work with the bacterial infection going on.
I'll also need to monitor her BG levels more closely with the increase in her thyroid meds.
Otis Farrell dx'd 12/10, best friend to his dad, Bill, for over 14 years. Left this world while in his dad’s loving arms 10/04/13. Sonny Farrell dx'd 1/14, adopted 5/15/14. Left this world while in his dad's loving arms 9/06/16. Run pain free, you Pug guys, til we're together again.
just reading the first paragraph i would have came up with the same assumption with the thyroid and maybe the medication for it
glad your on top of things with lily mike .
Jesse-26 lbs - 16.5 years old ,11 years diabetic, one meal a day homemade and a vitabone snack . 3 shots of Novolin( under the Relion name ) a day . Total insulin for a 24 hour period is 6.5 units of NPH insulin .
Jesse earned her wings on 6/21/2021
Looks like you're on top of it, Mike. Lily is quite fortunate to have you as a dad.
Dogs aren't dosed levothyroxine in anywhere near the dosage humans take. That's one of my meds, and I take 75 mcg / day.
Thanks Bill and jesse girl. I hope and think we're on the right track with this.
Bill... this is from an article by Dr. Dodds that explains why dogs require more thyroxine than humans. Lily currently gets .45 milligrams(mg) twice daily, which converts to 450 micrograms(mcg) twice a day.
The typical thyroxine dosage is 0.1 mg per 12 - 15 pounds of a dog’s optimum body weight. Bear in mind that these doses are significantly greater – as much as 10 times greater – than human doses.
The half-life of both T3 and T4 hormone is much faster in dogs than in people (every 12 – 16 hours in a dog versus every 5 - 7 days in a person). It’s critical to recognize this difference in metabolic functioning in order to understand canine thyroxine dosing.
Otis Farrell dx'd 12/10, best friend to his dad, Bill, for over 14 years. Left this world while in his dad’s loving arms 10/04/13. Sonny Farrell dx'd 1/14, adopted 5/15/14. Left this world while in his dad's loving arms 9/06/16. Run pain free, you Pug guys, til we're together again.
Hey Mike. Thought I'd mention that I have seen a handful of diabetic dogs over the years, including ours, who wind up with crusty lesions on the ears and/or eyelids. In our case, it was the eyelids.
Despite a thorough workup with a dermatologist and a consult with the big guy in veterinary dermatology at the time, we were unable to pinpoint a cause definitively. But it acted like an autoimmune disorder that affected delicate skin like the ears and eyelids.
The lesions get secondary infections - our dog was on antibiotics off and on for a long time because of his lesions.
What worked for him was an immune-suppression drug, Tacrolimus, given as an ointment.
I'd say it was just Chris doing his thing, but he's definitely not the only dog who had this sort of thing happen. Very similar in all cases. Could be diabetes-related or the tendency of a dog with one auto-immune disease to have other auto-immune diseases as well.
And our dog was white with black spots... though not as many. White dogs do tend to have sensitive skin.
Thanks for the info. Lily's itching has gotten worse and her vet has referred us to a veterinary dermatologist who is supposed to be very good at determining the root cause, including auto immune issues. Her appointment is on January 17. Wish it was sooner because she is going crazy. Her only relief is while sleeping. I'll keep you posted.
In the meantime, she is wearing a cone and tee shirt.
Just to bridge the gap to your next appointment you might want to bump up the dose of Apoquel back to the loading dose. We have done that (with the vet's blessing) a couple of times for a few days when Eddie has had a flare up and it has just given us some time to get back on top of things.
For Eddie's particular form of itching (feet, ears, tummy) we have found that the base cause is yeastiness and we can usually control it with Malaseb shampoo. He has been on a lot of antibiotics for secondary infections in the past but since we have been rigorous with the Malaseb he has had a lot less of the infections.
Hope you can sort it out.
Antonia
Eddie - Lab x golden retriever. Weighed 63lbs. Ate Canagan. Diagnosed October 2012. 13units of Caninsulin twice a day. Had EPI as well as diabetes. Died 20 June 2017. Loved forever.
She's been back on the loading dose of Apoquel for 2 weeks now. To get her through until our next appointment, She is also on 75 mg of Benadryl every 8 hours, which really helps her sleep.
Thanks for the info. Lily's itching has gotten worse and her vet has referred us to a veterinary dermatologist who is supposed to be very good at determining the root cause, including auto immune issues. Her appointment is on January 17. Wish it was sooner because she is going crazy. Her only relief is while sleeping. I'll keep you posted.
In the meantime, she is wearing a cone and tee shirt.
We went to the veterinary dermatologist today and Lily has Sarcoptic Mange (mites) and bacterial dermatitis
The itching and hair loss is awful. She is being treated with a topical medication for the mites and got a Canine Atopic Dermatitis Immunotherapeutic (CADI) injection for the itch and a stronger antibiotic for the bacterial skin infection. The CADI injection is from Zoetis, the makers of Apoquel.
I'm really disappointed that her vet didn't catch this back in early December.
well at least you have an answer and its treatable .
I am stating to feel itchy poor lily
hope things clear up soon
Jesse-26 lbs - 16.5 years old ,11 years diabetic, one meal a day homemade and a vitabone snack . 3 shots of Novolin( under the Relion name ) a day . Total insulin for a 24 hour period is 6.5 units of NPH insulin .
Jesse earned her wings on 6/21/2021
Oh goodness! Glad you sorted out what it is - but yes, agree, too bad the vet didn't figure it out in December! Ugh.
Poor girl...
Soaphie = 15 yr old Border/Berner mix dx 07/08. ~8.25 units a.m./p.m. vetsulin, blind/deaf. Ultra Senior, Vital Beef/Bison, Brown Rice and lots of loving. Soaphie passed on October 29, 2015. Sydney = 14.5 yr old Aussie/Shar Pei mix dx 11/10. NPH-varies w/ predinisone a.m./p.m., blind/deaf. Sydney passed on June 3, 2014.
Oh poor Lily!
I hope her meds are kicking in, so she feels better soon!
Bazzle - My sweet German Shepherd Chow Chow boy, born approximately 6/7/2002, adopted 8/7/2002, diagnosed with diabetes 12/28/2012, lived happy and healthy on Novilin 70/30 and Hill's Science Diet WD... Continued his journey into the next life on 5/15/2016. I miss you baby boy; you'll stay in my heart forever.
Thanks for your concern everyone. Lily keeps getting better every day and goes back to the dermatologist in two weeks. Not sure how the mites transferred to her. More than likely it was from another dog. Another less likely possibility is coyotes! We have a pack of coyotes that frequent the woods next to our house and she may have brushed up against something during one of our walks.
The mites also transferred over to me, so I got a prescription for Permethrin Cream to combat the itch. Hopefully we are both rid of the nasty critters.
Her cone is gone now. She still needs the tee shirt to protect her legs and stomach from infrequent periods of biting. Hopefully I can remove that soon.
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