Quote: Mychal Scott

Thank you for the info on the steroid injections, i had no idea.

As Lori said, and I think so too, a vet will turn to the injection sometimes to give the owner a near-miraculous fix and to give the dog almost immediate near-complete relief. I get that.

But having adopted two dogs in the past with chronic steroid-related conditions, I'm super careful about Pred, etc.

This is not to say I don't use them ... not at all. I have used and will use a low dose of Pred to get an allergic dog out of a bad cycle of itch-scratch-break skin-sleeplessness during his worst season, for example. And I have had a dog who needed Pred pretty regularly (along with Hydroxyzine and fish oil with E and probiotics and frequent bathing to help the itch as well as wash off accumulated allergens). It's just that I want to use the least amount that is still effective, and also, of course, never rely on it as my sole tool.

Well the inflammation has gone down in the right ear, still more sensitive than the left slightly. Looks "yeasty" in both ears again. Doesn't see any middle ear issues, which is a good thing.

Gonna do a swab/cytology in both ears, if he doesn't get the answers or at least see some definitive results, he recommended send them off to get a culture done to see exactly what is going on,

Switched drops to Tresaderm, thinking maybe the other drops (Mometamax) were not having the right effect, or causing some issues.

He was nipping at his hind quarter and tail again while we were there.

There was mention of maybe doing a switch of food as him having an allergy to food....didn't go farther than that, then mention of meds, antibiotics, environment, etc.

Something is going on, and I'm frustrated at the whole thing. From a fox tail too two weeks of appts and infections and still not knowing exactly what is going on.

Hopefully the results from the swab today will show a positive for something, I will be getting a call around 5 today for those results.

Let us know what you hear, and here's some great reading material:

http://leerburg.com/webboard/thread.php?topic_id=33423#378718

I'll check out the link. Thank you.

So the swab he took, shows what he says is normal yeast in the right ear, but definitely a few different foms of bacteria. He described them as seeing round ball and rod type. He had a few hunches what they were, but with a few things going on he wants to send out for a culture to be done. From what I understood, the culture results will show exactly what types of bacteria, etc are showing up.

The left ear showed an abundance of yeast.

The culture will be back in a few days and we will go from there.

He is really hoping, as well as I am, that we can knock this out and be done with it. He was explaining as well as all of you have the process and pain of dealing with chronic ear and allergy problems.

I also asked if the foxtail was just a coincidence, and after thinking about it, he agreed that this was probably in the works for before the foxtail, we just happened to catch it because of the foxtail. Blessing in disguise I guess.

That's what I have for now. So the antibiotics, antihistamine, and new ear drops for now I guess. Probiotics didn't show up yet, but will start those as soon as they show up. Oh and also the flea battle

Good (about the culture).

I started a post earlier, and then decided to wait until you had the swab results, since it was already in the works.

A culture will tell you what bacteria is present (and nothing else will). So ... good step.

JMO.

I hope you know how much empathy you have here. Those of us who have been there (and that's many people here) know how frustrating for the owner (and rotten for the dog) all this is.

The flea battle could actually attack a main trigger here.

" .... after thinking about it, he agreed that this was probably in the works for before the foxtail, we just happened to catch it because of the foxtail. "





"He is really hoping, as well as I am, that we can knock this out and be done with it. "

Me too.



JMO.

bump

Kippy had an ear infection and I learned something great from my vet.

Instead of counting drops in a dog who may be moving around because the drops sting or feel funny, she uses a small syringe. The exact amount of liquid medication is pulled into the syringe using the needle. The needle is removed. You now have something that easily fits into the dogs ear - NOT ALL THE WAY IN - but you can get to the top of the ear canal easily. You push the plunger, and you're done. Kippy had different things in his right and left ear, so I used a specific syringe for each ear. You can buy extra syringes and needles if you're really worried about cross contamination. I've used this method on one of my cats, and its wonderful.

Its worrisome and difficult to watch our beloved dogs in distress. I hope you and your vet an get this figure out soon.

Good luck!

I've used a no-needle syringe too, when I had drops that weren't in a good applicator-tip bottle. Very useful.

Even when I do have a good applicator-tip bottle, it help a ton to shake the fluid down into the tip before you even get the dog.

Little update, been working like crazy so haven't been on lately. Anyways.....culture came back negative for any bacteria. So that is good news. When I was in for that update I was telling the vet how my dog absolutely hates when I put the drops in the right ear. Even the new drops. Which makes me think either he is sensitive to the drops, or something else is going on that we can't see. So we decided to stop the drops for a few days and see if things got better. Still continue the antibiotics, etc, but lay off the drops. Well, it's been a few days and he has just about stopped the shaking. He still does it when he first comes out of his crate, but that's about it, I have another appt scheduled for we'd for a check up, so we will se if he finds anything abnormal in the ears. Hopefully this is the end of the ear drama.

Still working on the fleas....was reading another post and the mention of cats next door. The neighbor has an s-load of cats that just roam all over the place out here. I wouldn't doubt if that's where they are coming from, or at least contributing to the mess.

Edit.....just read the above post about the syringe to put the drops right in the canal instead of counting the drops and it stinging or feeling funny dripping down. Sounds like a great idea. Where can you get the syringes at?
Thanks.