Beagle pup with flaky skin and itchy - Page 2

 According to Dog Food Advisor, Iams Smart Puppy's main ingredient is probably not really the main ingredient. www.dogfoodadvisor.com/dog-food-reviews/iams-proactive-health-smart-puppy/ It would be the most dominant source prior to cooking, but when cooked down loses the bulk to water loss, so corn meal is probably the most dominant ingredient, hence a 3 star rating. Not a food I would give to a pup, with skin issues or not.
We had a male GSD imported from Germany last year, within a month of being here he had lost weight and had serious skin issues. We took him to our vet, who prescribed shampoos and RX, but it wasn't helping. I had a feeling it was a food allergy so we tried another vet who is a DVM and also a holistic vet. She agreed that it was probably a food allergy, that even though we were feeding a top quality food, he may have been allergic to the protein source or any one of the dozens of other ingredients. Instead of spending a fortune on testing, she switched him to Wellness Simple Solutions, a food with very few ingredients, so easier to tolerate as well as pinpoint specific issues. She suggested the Salmon and Rice. We switched him(just did it, didn't do over a course of days or weeks since he was having the runs anyway), within 5 days he was a different dog. We kept him on the Simple Solutions for a couple of months and then put him on Natures' Variety Instinct Chicken(the original food he was having issues with was Beef based)  since it has Tapioca instead of rice, corn or whatever as the second ingredient after the protein source and tapioca is generally believed to be beneficial for dogs with diet issues.
Anyway, if you want to save some money then try the Wellness Simple Solutions to eliminate the bulk of questionable ingredients. Of course, a raw diet would be a great option, but not for everyone. The Wellness is not to be fed to the dog forever, but is a way to kind of test and cleanse the system before introducing another food into the scenario. 
Oh, and here is a page on the vet we ended up consulting. www.susanwynn.com/ Some serious credentials here, we were thrilled to find her. Plus she loves the working GSDs!
Annette