eary boerboel
hi there doc!<br>i have a 3 jear old boerboel bitch who suffers from a bad case of ear infection. ive had her at a local vet who sedated her and washed her ears out and gave me after care medicine to treat this at one helluva price. problem is that she weighs in at about 50kg''s and would not have me or my wife treat her. she isnt aggresive but we both cannot hold her down in order to treat her. i also do not have the finances to take her to the vet once a week for the sedation process.please help as this is going to become a serious issue!
hi wl
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<br/>all you can do is make the ear cleaning a positive experience. initially touch the ear without trying to medicate the ear and at the same time give a positive reward such as a treat...this is going to take a period of time before you can eventually put the medication in.
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<br/>the other thing that you should note is that the ears are probably painful and it might be advisable for the clinician to give you some pain relief...this will cost extra. in addition it might be a good idea to put on prednisolone / antihistamine to reduce the inflammation
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<br/>generally the most important thing is to constantly check the ears to see if they are dirty before the development of clinical signs. ear problems can be associated with skin allergies such as food anditmight be a good idea to put your dog on a novel protein diet for 10 weeks to see if there is an improvement.
<br/>eventually you should clean the ears on a regular basis with a good quality ear cleaner - i use epiotic/otoclean..it appears to give the best results.
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<br/>i hope this is helpfull
you have an older dog. arthritis was a reasonable first diagnosis. your vet did the right thing by going with the most likely diagnosis and conservative treatment. 

since the arthritis meds have not helped, that means there may be something else going on. 

you need to make another appointment with your vet and take your dog back. this time, your vet may want to do more expensive testing such as blood work or x rays. 

since dogs can't talk and tell us what is going on with them, sometimes a condition has to be diagnosed by process of elimination. a good vet will start with the most common conditions and be mindful of your budget. it sounds like you have a good vet. you've given the pain meds time to work and are seeing no improvement. that means, you need to go back and be prepared to pay for more expensive testing. 

a couple of weeks ago i took my 12.5 year old boy to the vet because he was favoring his back leg. i figured it was arthritis and best to check it out. the vet agreed and we put him on anti-inflammatory medication. after 4 days on the meds, he was not better and was even worse, feeling lethargic. i took him back and the vet suggested blood work. based on the blood work at that visit, the vet recommended an abdominal x-ray. when that was done, it was determined he had end stage cancer and his body was failing. i don't tell you this to scare you. but merely to illustrate how a good vet works. the first vet visit cost me $24 office visit. the second $245. had it just been arthritis, there was no need to incur the blood work and xray when an office visit and a course of meds would have solved the problem. when that did not work, we knew we needed to look deeper and do additional testing. that sounds rough, i am sorry you aren't feeling well. my advice is just go to a different hospital to get a different view on your situation. please don't hold off on it, this problem really needs to be taken care of. she might be depressed. judicious low dose treatment might help her.... and you. see a geriatrician. Hello Aftonilman,



  

Thank you for the question.











Abnormal discharge from the ear, accompanied by ears such as stuffiness, dizziness, and pain are indeed typical of inflamed ears. Inflammation of the ear can occur only in the external ear (otitis externa), or it can also extend to the middle ear (otitis media). Depending on the location and severity of the inflammation, this condition can be treated differently, there is enough to be given medication, extracted earwax, or in more severe cases, surgery can also be done (for example if inflammation causes the eardrum to tear or the mastoid bone becomes infected) .



  

If your condition has previously been checked by a doctor, given medicine, but it does not improve, we recommend that you check yourself again to the doctor or ENT doctor. If the ENT doctor is on leave, the general practitioner is actually competent in handling ear problems as you experience them. Not only that, so that complaints get better faster, you also need to do the following steps:







Do not put anything in the ear, including water, cotton bud, wire  

Rest and drink more water  

Stay away from substances that might make you allergic  

Don't swim, dive or go to the highlands yet



Hope this helps ... you shoud take to her pediatrician or er, she might need chest x ray just to make sure there is no fraction, give her tylenol (acetaminophen) or ibuprofen for pain, ice the sure bruised area until she gets cheched. i hope she feels better soon. good luck. see more... hi, thank you for your question. headaches are a common problem among our population. your headaches that causes you to hardly do anything can be a terrifying experience for you. furthermore, the earache that accompanies your headache must be troublesome for you.
there are 2 main types of headaches which are primary headache and secondary headache. primary headache is only due to the headache itself without other causes. examples are tension headache, cluster headache and migraine. secondary headache is due to underlying health conditions, such as sinusitis, meningitis, trauma, tumour, bleeding and medications. some of these conditions are life-threatening and needed to be treated seriously.
it is helpful for your to keep a headache diary which keep tracks on the onset, duration, timing and progression of the headache. this helps the doctor greatly to establish a diagnosis. doctor may also need to know any associated symptoms such as fever, weight loss or history of cancer. this is important to rule out the secondary headaches. for a primary headache, the headache is normally predictable tiggers, stable pattern and individual is feeling fine in between headaches.
migraine is more common among females and can be associated with menstrual period. the headache is commonly described as throbbing, on one side of the head, becomes extremely sensitive to light and sound. if the conditions still persist without any improvement, please seek your healthcare providers to get appropriate treatment.
from your complaints, we believe that your earache condition may have multifactorial causes such as:

ear infection
change in pressure, such as when flying on a plane
earwax buildup
a foreign object in the ear
strep throat
sinus infection

in order for us to provide you with an accurate choice of treatment and management, we need additional details to explore further into your current complaints. therefore, we greatly suggest that you refer this to your nearest medical doctor.
you can easily get ear problems, but don’t let it get to you.
we believe that it could be due to sinus infection from the information given. it fits earache and headache that you are having at the moment. however, this is not definitive and you may call us or seek professional help.
you should get a doctor’s consultation to find out the exact cause of this problem in order to be properly managed. to find out the exact cause of the problem you are encountering, more information is required before conclusions can be made.
therefore, you are strongly advised to refer the matter to the doctor. please click on the link (doctoroncall) to contact your doctor to speak with our pharmacist online. we will protect your privacy. thank you.
discuss your symptoms with an ear, nose and throat(ent) specialist for their expert advice. congratulations on your third baby! i did not have the test but at my 20 week ultrasound we found out that our daughter had spina bifidia! i do know that a good percentage of those test are a false positive so i know it is hard to not freak out! try to wait till you have all the test done! spina bifidia/ neural tube defect is not a death sentence, it has a set of challenges but my daughter is a very happy normal almost 7 year old! we were apart of the moms study and had inutero surgery at 25 weeks! there are a few groups on facebook that are all people with sb or parents of kids with sb! feel free to check them out and ask any more questions! they are united by spina bifida and spinia bifida fetal surgery! i can add you to the group if you are interested! i will be praying for you and your baby! You are so kind to be this active due to the distress of a stranger. I'm touched by how much you care. I can also see why you are horrified!  
  
Maybe this woman is too far along with the prolapse, but I do know that there is something called a pessary that can generally be inserted to hold the organs in place. I'm surprised this wasn't done long ago for this woman. The nursing home maybe didn't have care of this woman until it was too late.   
  
You seem to be doing everything you can, and you're right in not wanting to get the nursing home in trouble since they aren't the problem. Contacting the urology department of your local hospital may yield some results. Perhaps there's a program for people who are in such dire situations. Please let us know what happens.   
Take care,  
Carol be very careful. hydrogen peroxide can damage you ears and cause serious trouble. see more... i don't, they get the silent treatment until i need to talk to them. which is rare