Chronic Ear Problems - Page 1

I am looking for some home remedies for chronic ear problems. Any suggestion appreciated in advance. Thanks, Jeff

Jeff, Please answer some questions first and I will see if I can help. Where do you live? How old is the dog? Are the ears erect? When you say chronic ear problems, what do you mean? Infection? Frequency? Prior history? Prior reatment? If infection, have you ever had a specific culture done on the ear to see what the organism is and what antibiotic/antifungal will kill it? What food do you feed?

My female has had a chronic problem in one ear most of her life. Have been told it is a yeast or bacterial infection. Had had her on medications many times but once off it returns. I now clean down inside her ear with a Q-tip once every two to three weeks. Gets out alot of black yuck.. I also use R7 ear cleaner and then use Natural drying creme(no alcohol) which alot of hunting people use. I apply every 1-2 weeks. The week I use a Q-tip I do not use the cleaner since it does have alcohol. This works best for me but have never totally gotton rid of the problem.

Jeff, I would get Epi-Otic ear cleaner. you can either order it from the net or buy it from your vets office.

Oticalm or Epi-Otic as mentioned above are excellent. Buy a large bottle, the size normally sold to horse owners. Clean the ears every second day with it. Probably not recommended to do it so often, but has never done any harm. Keep doing it for a couple of months.

My vet told me about zymox last time I had to take my 10yr old male into her. It's enzyme based, no prescription needed and works great. He has food allergies among other things and was always getting yeast infections if he started reacting to something new. Entirelypets.com carries it. I use the cleanser (which you don't rinse out btw) and the hydrocortisone otic for 14 days. I asked my Vet about the otic cortisone versus no cortisone, also told me not to use the cortisone based one on pregnant females. It has 3 types of enzymes to eat up bacterial and viral/fungal infections. Enzymes are from milk products, Lactoperoxidase, Lysozyme, and Lactoferrin I've used this the last 2 times, and it's never failed to work. Alot of places on the web have it, just google zymox. Angela

If every 2 - 3 weeks you get black yuck out of your dogs ears, they need to be cleaned more often... Once a week would not be unusual .. their ears get just as dirty and catch all kinds of things in them as other breeds.... You really need to take the bottle of ear cleaner and squirt it down the hole that you see, which takes a complete horizontal turn.. it is there that problems start brewing..... Do this outside and not with your best clothes on.. once you've squirted, grab the base of the ear and massage very briskly, you should hear the liquid squishing around like a washing machine, do this for a minute or as long as you can and stand back, cuz the shaking will start! Then you take a qtip, see the ones the vet has or I use a hemostat with cotton wrapped tightly around the end and clean where you can see, all around the pinnae (little knobby things). Once dry and clean, you can use panalog or animax and squirt a little into the canla same as before and massage deeply to get it down as far as possible.. if the ears are really bad, I have seen peopel instructed to do this TWICE a day!! As far as what tyoe of cleaner, there are lots of decent ones, I use the VetProducts (think that's what its called.. also on entirelypets.com, white bottle purple/teal lettering - I like the smell. I am really sensitive to odor and have to smell everything before can use it) There are some hyrdrogen peroxide formulas too that foam and dry the ear as well.. these work their way down the canal.. I'm gonna check out Zymox myself. Again, it never hurts to see the vet so they can use the otoscope and check out what's in there under the microscope.....

TristateK9, please examine a thread I started several months ago at this link: http://www.pedigreedatabase.com/gsd/bulletins_read/58676.html#58811 I have a male who suffered chronic ear problems for much of his young life. Each time, the diagnosis was either a yeast infection or a bacterial infection. Both yeast and bacteria will always be in the ears, and are typcally held in balance by each other and the body's immune system. The treatment usually consisted of flushing the ears twice daily with T-8 solution, followed by an application of a gel marketed as "Vetamax". Both require a prescription for use. Both are antibacterial and antifungal, so they can work for both scenarios. Making the treatement as instructed by the veterinarian, the infection would go away, only to appear again within six (6) to eight (8) months. This dog's ears were always dirty, and required continual cleaning when they were not infected. This past summer, the ear infection reappeared. As I was not employed at the time, for once I had plenty of time to deal with this issue. I decided to forego using the T-8 solution, and instead saturated the inside of each ear with the Vetamax gel. Each following morning I would use cotton cosmetic pads and long cotton swabs to wipe the softened wax from each ear. I spent two (2) weeks doing this, and for the first time in this dog's life his ears were spotlessly clean. They have remained clean to this day. I attributed his problem to two (2) things, and think that I was wrong about both of them: (1) The heavy oak pollen where we once lived (2) The overproduction of ear wax. Since my earlier thoughts on both of these, I don't think that either of these were the real issue, and perhaps the root cause was the possibility that I never made his ears 100% clean after the first infection. The T-8 solution is very watery, of course, and its purpose is to correct the pH of the ear tissue and act as both a mild antibiotic and antifungal agent. It is slung from the ears when the dog shakes his head, and this is followed by application of the Vetamax gel. I think the T-8 solution was slung from the ears and evapourated before it could do any good as a wax softener. Hence my thoughts about using the gel alone, as it did not evapourate. In the end, it worked and this dog's ears remain clean and fresh t this day. While I still have a bottle of T-8 solution, I will probably never use it again except to flush ears that may have a bit of dust in them. The real solution came from using only the gel, as each following morning more wax (and dirt) had softened and migrated away from the ear canal while the dog slept on his side. I must say, he was very happy when the treatment ended! Good luck, Bob-O

Clean the ears with vinegar - If your pet's ears are filled with brownish-pink wax, there is a good chance that allergies have triggered a yeast infection. You can clear up yeast infections by cleaning the ears thoroughly. Veterinarians often recommend using white vinegar, also called acetic acid, because it removes dirt and debris and helps restore a healthful chemical balance in the ears. Diluted vinegar works well. When using vinegar, pour a small amount into the ear canal, massage the area, then gently wipe the inside of the ear with a cotton ball. Do this once a day until the ear is better. Stop infections with pau d'arco - Also called Inca Gold, the herb pau d'arco, which comes from the inner bark of a South American tree, is a natural antibiotic that quickly kills fungi and bacteria. Mix equal parts pau d'arco tincture and mineral oil and put several drops in your pet's ears at the first sign of infection. You can give the drops two or three times a day for several days. Reduce inflammation with vitamin C - The adrenal glands produce a natural steroid that can help reduce inflammation when ears get infected. Giving pets vitamin C can help the adrenal glands work more efficiently. Cats and dogs weighing under 15 pounds can take between 100 and 250 milligrams of vitamin C a day. Pets 15 to 50 pounds can take 250 to 500 milligrams a day, and larger dogs can take 500 milligrams two or three times a day. Vitamin C can cause diarrhea, so you may have to cut back the dose until you find an amount that your pet will tolerate. Eliminate toxins with a healthful and natural diet - Giving your pet a healthful, homemade diet or high quality commercial food that doesn't contain wheat, corn, additives or preservatives (such as Life's Abundance by HealthyPetNet) can vastly reduce the amount of wax that the ears produce, while also helping the immune system work well. Air out the ears - Increasing air circulation inside the ears can control the growth of bacteria, yeast and fungi. Periodically trimming or plucking hair inside the ears will allow more air to get inside. Strengthen the digestive tract - Supplements such as bromelain and quercetin (with bromelain) can help prevent an allergic response in the gastrointestinal tract, making food allergies less of a problem. Stop ear mites with oil - When an infection is caused by ear mites, putting a few drops of almond oil or olive oil in each ear will smother the mites and may allow the infection to heal. You usually need to continue the oil treatments for three to four weeks, putting three to seven drops of oil into the ear canals each day. Cleaning wax and other debris from the ears before using oil will help the treatment work more efficiently.

Home remedies... Ear Cleaning can be done with equal parts vinegar and water. Vinegar has a drying effect. Use to wipe the ears clean... do not use to flush them or pour directly into the ears. If your dogs Chronic problem is BACTERIA or YEAST... you really need medication from your veterinarian, HOWEVER, for assistance with a Yeast Infection, you can feed your dog Yogurt and/or give ACIDOPHILUS CAPSULES. Both of these have a "good bacteria" the same as what women take for Yeast infections. As well as detering yeast problems, Acidphilus is good for the skin/coat, AND for the intestinal flora. Acidophilus can be purchased at your grocery store or Pharmacy. I do recommmend that you inquire with your vet as to dosage. There is a new Acidophilus capsule that contains Probiotics that you would not have to give as many capsules. Just be sure that your dogs ears have been checked first and that you are treating the proper infection. Wouldnt want you treating say ear mites or a bacterial infection with supplements for yeast.