Wednesday 9 November 2011

Food Allergies in Dogs!!



Star is now 3 yrs and 6 months old, she has always suffered with pink looking skin - but over the last few months it has got much much worse we took her to the vets and they said she had a skin infection on her back legs where she'd been nibbling the skin - she was put on antibiotics and steroids and it cleared up lovely, her skin in general looked so much better and she had completely stopped scratching and biting herself - but then as we reduced the steroids the scratching and biting started again and her skin looked so terribly sore, she just couldn't settle down at night - we decided that enough was enough and took her back to the vets who asked if we had considered Allergies and did we want to get her tested - using the allergy test "The York Test," we wanted to get to the bottom of this so we agreed and went ahead, the vet did the test there and then took the blood and filled in the form then off it was sent with the results guaranteed to be back within 2 weeks - in the meantime we just kept everything normal.

On Monday evening we recieved a phonecall from the vet she had the results already - it had only been a week!

The results show that Star has No allergies to anything in the environment either indoor or outdoor But she does have several FOOD allergies

These are - Chicken, Turkey, Duck, Lamb, Beef, Potato, Oats, Corn/Maize and Cows milk

So then came the fun of searching foods that were going to be ok for her - after hours of looking at dog food ingredients online - theres is only ONE diet in the UK suitable (apart from prescription diet) and that is James Wellbeloved Ocean White Fish and Rice - obviously the same will have to apply to the treats that she has, luckily Fish4dogs treats are 100% fish - But we have to be strict and exclude all of those ingredients from her diet to enable her skin to heal - another symptom was her skin always smelt very cheesey another symptom of an allergy I now know, but until you are aware of allergies and their effects its difficult to know what is wrong.
We are so glad that we went ahead with the test as now we have the answers, we know what has to be avoided to help star enjoy life.

7 comments:

  1. Very good article ,hope Stars skin heals soon. Almost wish Willows allergies were food rather than externalas it may be easier to deal with although as we found looking for a food for Star their isn't much out there for her particular allergies. Sharon xx

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  2. Thank you Sharon and yes your help monday night was very much appreciated xx It highlighted to both of us I think didn't it what a gap there is in the market for food for animals with such allergies - wish they could come up with something for Willow too - Becky x

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  3. Hi! Sounds just like our 3 year old - the vet thought it was a summer allergy but the scratching is dragging on...am thinking of taking him for a proper allergy test.

    Quick qu - are the photos of the skin infection? Oscar has a spot on a front paw which looks just like that!

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  4. Hi there in response to your question this is what Stars skin looks like due to the allergy these patches are dotted all over her in her groin, on her stomach, back legs and under her front legs - I just thought by posting the pictures people may see them and recognise them on their own animals - certainly was worth getting the test done even after a few days she is much more settled in herself - Becky x

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  5. Ooh poor Star - hope she feels better soon.

    Oscar has just the one patch - we're willput antiseptic on it from now on.

    Thanks a lot for posting the pic - I thought it the patch was normal pigmentation.

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  6. That's an interesting result. It really is difficult pinning down what the problem is when there are so many things it could be. Brude had a skin complaint for over 12 months and had all kinds of treatments, so we effectively did a 'reset'. Looked at anything that we'd changed, and unchanged it - so he was back on the Baker's we didn't like feeding him. It turned out to be that the additive free food we'd been giving him was the source - he's allergic to fish, and we'd been feeding him salmon flavour!

    He suffered terrible wind if fed chicken as a pup... but why is ALL puppy food chicken flavoured?!

    Glad you got to the bottom of this one. It's horrible when you have to see them suffer :(

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    1. Thank you for your comment - it is really hard finding what is causing the allergies but now we know and we completely avoid the problem foods her skin is completely back to how it should be and she's much happier in herself too ;-)

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