staph or food allergy? - Page 2

Thanks for posting the links, Louise. 

Gold Bond medicated powder may help too.

My dog gets something very similar. It comes and goes and seems to stem from her being wet.

To me it isn't really a big deal. It doesn't seem to bother her and it clears up on it's own. She gets it, it goes away, no licking, biting the area, nothing.

Don't know and don't really care what it is. The dog is showing no signs of discomfort from it in any way.  If I took her to the vet and spent $200 everytime this happened I would have to get a second job.

People seem to obsess over every little thing when it comes to their animals. People take their dogs to the vet for what would equate to a hangnail or skinned knee on a child. 

 It costs alot of money to go to vet school. How many people get out of a vet office for under $100?

Tell your friend to stop freaking out. Unless the dog is showing obvious signs of discomfort,  the area is spreading, or it is just not going away, don't stress. If the dog is not worried about it, why should you be?

If left alone, biological beings have an incredible ability to heal themselves and/or overcome injury. They also have the inate ability to communicate to us when something is really wrong. We just have to be able to recognize it.

Staph vaccines? I have never heard of this, will someone elaborate? What are these for?

 I don't know if this dog is in distress, but I rather think the owner is. In the pictures I don't see marks from the dog scratching or biting at the area. I'm passing on all the info you all are sharing.  I don't know much about the staph vaccines but the history is something like this. When the puppy's immune system had not really kicked in yet the pup got the usual staph pimples that many of them do. I told the owner don't worry about it and explained a few things and told her to leave it alone and her immune system would get going on it's own.

 The owner took her to the vet got antibiotics instead, and that helped. Then they tried another set of antibiotics, rash went away then after some amount of time came back so the vet said she could give the dog staph vaccines. They were given once a week at first, then once every two weeks which she is still on. I think it's over a year. The vet told her it would build the dogs immunity against staph and she would then go to the shots being given once a month for life. I'm not a vet so I don't know how much sense this makes but if it was my dog, I think the first thing I would do is stop bathing her so much, change shampoos. 

GARD I have told my friend to quite freaking out and leave nature alone. I don't think it's possible for some people. I'm inclined to think that if this had been left alone in the first place it would have been over with over a year ago and not still be re surfacing. 

Wow yeah that's over vetting the dog for sure. I don't know that I would give my dogs shots every month even to keep it alive, let alone for a rash. Also after a year and the shots look to be doing what? Nothing. Uh uh, I'd nix the shots and start changing other things, maybe her food or supplement for skin ph.

GSDLVR,

I am with you 100% on that one. Sounds to me like treatment caused the problem.

How old was the dog when the vet first put her on the Anit biotoics? What was the time frame between the initial treatment and the shots? How old is the dog now?

I am not a vet nor claim to be, but don't we all know by now the overuse of antibiotics is creating resistant strain bacteria?

Most people I talk to with kids are telling me that doctors are not prescribing antibiotics for things like strep throat anymore. They let it run it's course and allow the childs own immune system to deal with it.

I have a 20 year relationship with my vet. She is not really an "upseller" but she does own her business. She has saved my dogs several times and knows I will put out large amounts of money if/when it is reasonable to do so. She also knows that after the first set of puppy shots, I do not vacinate other than yearly rabies. She doesn't even go there with me on silly procedures.

Almost every other vet I have ever been to always want an "ear culture" or cleaning, test of this, test for that. $20 here another $30 there and you walk out with a $300 vet bill.

I hope your friends dog is alright and she gets some peace of mind.

I am remembering our wound care specialist telling the nurses that anything that looked REALLY red was most likely  a yeast infection or an allergy. Given the location of that rash, I'd check for yeast before doing anything else.

Just because the dog had staph before doesn't mean this is the same thing. I'd repeat the skin scrapings and other tests to pinpoint the cause.

Again, if this were my own dog (not one of Sunsilver's human patients--whose skin pH is different from that of dogs), I would treat this as a Staph infection before going great guns for other diagnostics. GSD's have a different pH than other breeds--hence, their propensity to Staph infections.

The best thing that I have found for localized (not generalized such as 4pack's dog Baden had) Staph lesions is Happy Jack Pad Kote (you can buy it from www.jefferspet.com ). Works great on hot spots, too.

Actually, I first learned of Pad Kote from a friend who lived in Africa where her husband was in the foreign service many years ago. While living there, my friend had some sort of "creeping crud" on her own (human) skin that was unresponsive to any medications. So, she sent off to Jeffers for Happy Jack Pad Kote. Voilà, in almost no time, her skin lesions healed. Nowadays, when she has a bout of painful shingles, she applies Pad Kote to the lesions. Who cares if it stains her skin purple.

Happy Jack

Aids Healing & Toughening
Relieves Itching

CAUTION:  Not for human use.  Keep out of reach of children.

ACTIVE INGREDIENTS:  Cod Liver Oil, Cade Oil, Balsam Peru, Tannic Acid, Turpentine, Gentian Violet, Brilliant Green, Isopropyl Alcohol (50%).

Indications:  Developed especially for conditions of the feet and pads of dogs due to wear or minor skin eczemas.  Pad Kote is also a fine healing aid for moist, weeping spots due to minor skin eczemas, galls, saddle sores and other minor abrasions of the skin.  Aids healing and toughening of all types of wounds and sores. Directions:  Shake well.  Apply once or twice daily.  Allow to dry before releasing dog.  Use alcohol to remove stains from hands.

If this were my own dog, I would try another round of oral Cephalexin (at the dose I specified above) for ~1 month. Thereafter, I would treat small localized (not generalized) lesions with Pad Kote. If you need Cephalexin, you may purchase (without a prescription) capsules labeled for use in fish (as Fish Flex) at KV Vet Supply at http://www.kvvet.com/KVVet/sea