Hi everyone,

My 15 month old gsd has recently been losing a lot of fur. Each day I can clean out of her cage what appears to be 2 handfuls of her coat. Her fur was really greasy and had a slight white coating to it (dander I assume). She is itchy and bites some of her fur off in places. I have since been using a medicated shampoo on her once a week to help relieve her coat and skin issues called ChlorhexiDerm Max 4%. She is now biting and scratching less but her coat is a lot lighter in color since she lost most of her darker fur.

I will be taking her to the vet this week since it seems it may have been a yeast issue. Luckily I called the local k9 police unit to find which vet they use for their service dogs. Does anyone else know what other conditions or diseases may have caused this? I just want to make sure I ask the right questions or have some direction in treating the cause.

She is on a raw diet for about 4 months now. Her pic is in my signature for what her fur looks like this past weekend. Thanks.

PS - She doesn't have fleas and her skin is not red or irritated looking.

Kimberly

The vet can do a scraping (or maybe skin tape, or cotton swab cytology) and determine immediately if it's yeast.

I would keep a good watchful eye on the ears because of the common secondary ear infections (if it is yeast).

There are a lot of possibles reasons for fur loss, but the white greasiness (or what I often think looks like waxiness) sounds very much like malassezia.

I have read often that yeast problems are secondary to some kind of immune problem that allows the overgrowth.

But anyway, if you post back when you have the diagnosis, I have a lot of saved material on yeast problems (and other dermatitis).

It's good that you are going to see the vet, because the breach in the defenses from scratching often lead to bacterial infections, just to further complicate things.

It's good that you are feeding fresh food, too, IMO.

All JMO!

Connie,

As always, you're brilliant! I thought... hey it's spring. Maybe she's blowing her coat. Maybe I should bid on that skin and coat book auction!