Dr. Doug or anyone-Jesse's skin problems are back-questions

Is he itchy? If so, I'd be thinking inhalant allergies. Things started budding out just a bit here a couple of weeks ago. And right on cue my allergy dog started scratching.

Benadryl dosage is 0.5 to 2 mg. per pound of body weight, given every 8 to 12 hours.

Possible causes: stress, cleaner used at kennel, outside environmental allergy(ies), kibble fed at the kennel (if you didn't provide your own, which I always do). Did you (or the kennel) use a different shampoo, by chance? Detergent/softener for washing the dog's bedding?

So far not really itchy. It's just in one armpit at this point. He's chewed a little bit but not much. Heading to the vet tomorrow for Clindamycin (he can't handle much else) to ward off any infection. We still have a foot of snow on the ground and have had sub-zero temps lately. Highly unlikely anything is growing just yet but some of the hardier trees maybe.

xteacher, nothing different. We provided food, kennel hasn't changed anything. He's been going there since he was a pup and it's just over the last 2-3 years we've had issues. When he comes home he's definitely not stressed and shows no sign of stress while there, but drop off is like leaving a kid at kindergarten for the first time. We use non-allergenic stuff at home. Jake has no issues at all.

When our weim was a puppy, he was having horrible ear infections and had bubbled areas on his elbows. He was placed on so many meds and had painful skin scrapings. Finally, I requested that he be allergy tested.

It came back that he was allergic to venison. How in the world did he get it if we don't eat it? He was sneaking the deer droppings in our back yard.

We stopped him and he cleared up! You might try having your baby tested. As it turns out, he's also highly allergic to Calif grass.

Since we now live in cold weather, he's had no further problems.

Hope this helps.

Unlikely to be inhalant in your part of the country right now with the exception of molds and house dust (mites). Even though there is no outward sign of stress, different living conditions/routine will produce some stress response in the body.

I'd think more a contact sensitivity or allergy or bacterial dermatitis.

BTW, there is a new drug out that shows promise in treating allergy. Apoquel, made by Zoetis (formerly Pfizer) and it works a different way than anti-histamines (and much better effect in dogs). This drug will work on food allergies as well as inhalant and contact and precludes the need and use of corticosteroids in many cases.

We've had a few patients started on it (prescribed by dermatologists) and we recently started Jill on it.

For those of you who deal with chronic allergy in your dogs, it might be worth a discussion with your vet.

Doug, DVM

Thank you Dr. Doug! I looked up both bacterial dermatitis and atopic dermatitis and his spots strongly resemble the bacterial dermatitis pictures. That will explain why antibiotics work fairly well but not completely. Jesse's constantly scraping himself running up the stairs to the deck. I have to go to the vet tomorrow for the meds so I'm going to bring this up and ask for a skin scrape.