My Westie has finally been diagnosed with the dreaded Westie Itch. After treating her for years with anal gland problems it seems that wasn't really the cause of her discomfort. It became apparent that after having her anal glands expelled the only thing that really calmed her discomfort was the accompanying steroid injection. Since steroids have serious side effects long term we were eventually offered a fairly new drug, Apoquel tablets, for skin disorders and allergies, which seem to have totally cured the discomfort and surprise, surprise, the anal gland problem seems to have gone away too.
The only problem is that it seems she will have to be on Apoquel for the rest of her life and at £1.00 a tablet from the vet (£0.70p online) and one tablet a day, it is going to be expensive.
My question is, does anyone else use Apoquel and if so, is it necessary to use them every day. I have read reports of them being administered every other day or even not at all during the winter months if the allergy is a summer problem (we have not been able to establish that yet).
Also, there are possible side effects but not as serious as steroids. Has anyone noticed any side effects in their dogs?
Hi Bob
I can't help answer your question but I am wondering if my Cairn could be suffering with the same condition. He scratches quite a lot and every now and then pulls his coat out near his back end. We don't always notice he is doing this straight away due to the thickness and colour of his coat. We have his anal glands expressed regularly and we have changed his diet as the vet advised. We also have stopped all treats in case there was something in them that was causing an allergy. He has been ok for the last few weeks but wonder if it is an environmental allergy and the vet has suggested trying Piraton once a day when the weather changes as Spring approaches.
Quote: Originally posted by Monks on 12/11/2016
Hi Bob
I can't help answer your question but I am wondering if my Cairn could be suffering with the same condition. He scratches quite a lot and every now and then pulls his coat out near his back end. We don't always notice he is doing this straight away due to the thickness and colour of his coat. We have his anal glands expressed regularly and we have changed his diet as the vet advised. We also have stopped all treats in case there was something in them that was causing an allergy. He has been ok for the last few weeks but wonder if it is an environmental allergy and the vet has suggested trying Piraton once a day when the weather changes as Spring approaches.
Hello Monks...there is a good possibility your Cairn has the same problem. Cairns are the same family as Westies although any dog can get allergies. Your description sounds very similar to the way our Westie behaves and she also started biting her legs, nibbling the inside of her thighs and pawing her face more recently. This led us to believe she had dental problems but it turned out to be just an itchy face. She was also rubbing her bum on the ground leading us to believe it was anal gland problems.
It got to the stage where I had a right go at the vet because they didn't seem to be getting to the bottom of the problem (forgive the pun) and were simply treating her for anal glands month after month. It was only when she started getting red and sore at the base of the tail that they guessed it might be skin problems.
I think vets like to try the simple solutions first like changing diet and the use of piriton before resorting to the hard stuff. We did all that and more recently tried Omega 3 for dogs at £12 a bottle online (would have been £16 from the vet). I am not sure if any of that actually worked.
We were also given some steroid tablets to begin with which were cheap and seemed to work but caused the dog to drink more and pee more...sometimes accidentally indoors...so we had changed one problem for another.
Apoquel is supposed to be the new wonder drug with few side effects. I believe it was only released to vets in 2012 so it is early days yet. I gather it can cause a few health problems but is safer than steroids. I was given a prescription for 100 of them by my vet today so I can get them cheaper online. The prescription cost me £12 and can be repeated once. I have just ordered 100 of them from Animed Online at a cost of £70, so they don't come cheap but a previous trial seemed to suggest they work.
There are two women in my life...the wife and the dog...and they are both trying to bankrupt me
When Sonny first pulled the hair out on his back leg we took him to the vets who emptied his anal glands and gave him a steroid injection along with antibiotics because his wound was a little infected. This seemed to solve the problem for a short time until he did it again. Back at the vets the same process was repeated but we felt that they weren't looking at other causes, the second time was around May this year. I was also reluctant for him to keep having steroid injections.
In August we noticed he had been nibbling again and there was a bald spot on his back. This time we took him to another vets but we're less than impressed! She said she would do some tests and she did some skin scraps for analysis. She then recommended we bath him every couple of days with this shampoo which she gave us, flea him (I had only just flea'd both dogs a couple of weeks before so I knew he didn't have fleas) and change his food. We have John Burns so I gave them both a variety (duck and brown rice) which they hadn't had before and stopped all other treats. The final bill from her was 120.00. My husband nearly fainted. When I got home I looked at the shampoo she had sold us and it was 15.00 online she had charged us 28.00. The other thing is Cairns shouldn't be bathed regularly because of the natural oils in their coats. When she rang me with the results of the test she said it was probably environmental. I took the shampoo and flea treatment back and got a refund. I wasn't very happy I felt like she just wanted to rip us off.
After doing some research into the new vets practice we had been too it turned out that they were part of a massive chain and had recently taken over our normal vets practice. So we decided we would no longer be going to our normal vets again.
A couple of weeks ago we went to a new vet recommended by a friend this practice is an independent vets. It was only for their yearly injections but we spoke to the vet about Sonny's skin he seemed to think it's a seasonal allergy. We are going to see how he goes and keep our eye on him once Spring arrives. If it does flare up again I will talk to the vet about Apoquel.
The more I read the more it sounds so similar to the problems we were having. With a bit of luck Sonny's problem will be seasonal and you may get away without having to treat him in the winter.
I was first given Apoquel three weeks ago and given two week's supply at two tablets a day. This seemed to work almost straight away. I was due to run out of them last Sunday so contacted the vet by phone and decided to have a break from them to see what happened. Sure enough within a few days the dog was rubbing her backside again. I wanted to make sure for certain it wasn't anal glands so took her back to the vet on Saturday. He stated the glands were not too bad but he emptied them anyway. He then gave me two weeks supply of Apoquel at one a day and a prescription to get more online. When I got home I decided to delay giving her the tablet just as a final test to see if emptying the anal glands had done the trick. By evening though she was rubbing her bum again so she got the tablet. Today she has been fine so I have to conclude it is indeed the skin problem and not the anal gland. Unfortunately I can't really test if her problem is seasonal without stopping the tablets again so it looks like £0.70p a day for the rest of her life - lol.
I suppose that's not too bad if it saves me the cost of having her anal glands done every month as was happening. I was tempted to ask for a refund for all the times she has had her anal glands done needlessly. I have been getting free consultations and free telephone advice since I complained though so I suppose that is some compensation.
One issue I had with my vet was that if I took the dog in for her glands and saw the practice nurse it would cost £12 but if I saw the vet it would cost £22. When I queried this I was told vets are more highly trained than the nurses!! Of course if I needed the steroid injection I had to see the vet because the nurse wasn't qualified to administer it. Total rip off.
No direct experience of Apoquel, but thought you might want to read the following article, written by a UK holistic vet, before going down this route with your dog. (Sorry, can't do a link):
http://www.dogsnaturallymagazine.com/wouldnt-give-dog-new-allergy-drug/
Please read the article to the end and draw your own conclusions.
I add the following comments from my own experience and am not trying to preach, but you may find them of interest:
One of our dogs is medium sized, not a Cairn or a Westie, but had terrible problems in the first 12 months of her life when we were feeding her so-called quality kibbles (several supposedly 'premium' makes) recommended by our vet. During this time, she had to have her glands squeezed regularly, she was itchy, very smelly and had to have her teeth cleaned because of the large build up of tartar. In addition she was unable to put on weight, despite eating as much as she could physically manage.
On the recommendation of a very knowledgeable and experienced dog owner of our acquaintance, both our dogs were switched to a raw (barf) diet and have been incredibly healthy for 11 years now. The difference in the previously poorly dog's health started to become evident within a week and our other dog, a medium sized terrier, clearly preferred the new diet. Yes, they do sometimes get seasonal itching, but I think it better to treat this as it arises (although symptoms can be deferred by giving them Quercetin at the appropriate time of year), rather than put a dog on drugs for the rest of it's life.
I find the biggest issue with feeding raw is that many vets don't believe in it, or have so little knowledge of it that they are afraid to recommend it, but this is due to their veterinary training where little time is spent on pet nutrition and the amount of time that is, is delivered by 'experts' from the large petfood manufacturers!
Whatever you decide is best for your pets, I do hope you are a to solve their health problems quickly.
Yes, thank you for that link. I had already read that or something similar which is why I opened this thread asking if anyone else was using the drug and noticed any side effects.
I am always a little suspicious though, of sites that give warnings for various issues and asks you to download 'our book'. It smacks of one big advertisement.
That said, all side effects of drugs have to be taken into consideration but if you read some of the side effects of drugs supplied to humans by GP's you would never touch them.
All drugs are poisons and all are likely to cause side effects of one sort or another. I guess it is the best of two evils. Do you give your dog fairly instant relief and the chance of a pain free life for as long as possible but with the risk of causing the dog some illness in later life, or do you strive to control the pain in some other way which may not actually work and may prolong the agony. Having suffered with shingles recently I know which one I would go for if it was long term - lol.
Another consideration has to be the age of the dog. The linked article seems to mention stunting the growth of an animal etc. My dog is 8 years old now and unlikely to still be growing. She may live another 8 years but I feel that if I can make any remaining years pain free and happy, perhaps it is worth the risk. The pain will be in my wallet unfortunately
Bob, I agree totally with what you say about drugs and enjoying a pain-free life, as far as it is possible.
What I was alluding to, perhaps not very well, was that in my experience, albeit with a totally different breed of dog, was that a change in diet to raw-fed had an almost immediate health benefit for my dog. I was thinking that a similar change for your dog might obviate, or at least significantly reduce, any necessity for drugs.
Although I prepare our dogs' food from various raw ingredients, I fully appreciate that this is not appropriate for everyone, but nowadays there are many suppliers of raw food for dogs, who can provide ready-made, but importantly still raw, meals. Two names that immediately spring to mind are Nutriment and Honeys. I suspect that the cost of buying pre-prepared food from such sources may be a bit more than other well known proprietary brands of kibble ( which personally I would never even consider feeding to my pets again), but if this change in diet has health benefits for your dog surely it must be worth considering, particularly as it may also enable you to cut out the cost of buying Apoquel, or any other such drugs which are presently necessary.
I know that as a dog owner you'll only want to do what you consider best for your pet, and I know from personal experience that lack of support for such a change in diet from a vet can make taking the first step a bit daunting, but hope you'll at least give serious thought to making the change to raw-fed. I'm sure you wouldn't regret it.
I understand what you are saying, Pterodactyl and a mate of mine suggested the same thing. I am a little hesitant to change the dog's diet because she had a bad start in life on that score. The person I bought her from was feeding her cheap adult tinned dog food at 6 weeks old. I decided to change that to puppy kebble which perhaps wasn't a good idea because she seemed to be constantly constipated. It literally took about 3 years to get her eating properly and going to the toilet properly plus keeping her weight constant and I managed that by dispensing with all dry food apart from the occasional dog treat and, on the advice of the vet, changing to Chappie which seemed to suit her well.
More recently (a couple of years ago) I started adding a meat based tinned food to her Chappie...just a small portion to give her a change in taste, and even more recently started using a soft packet food in jelly, again to vary her diet a little while still keeping the main proportion of her meals as Chappie.
I have actually been wondering if adding the meat derived food to her diet might have been the start of her problems and I am considering going back to just Chappie again.
I am not too inclined to give her raw food although I have read that lots of dogs do well on it. Of course you would have to get the balance of nutrients right which might not be easy.
I restarted the Apoquel tablets 5 days ago and so far she seems to be doing well with no side effects and no itchiness.
I have always suspected she had something wrong with her gut since a puppy, which may be Dysbiosis, but I think we have generally solved her digestive problems now.
If the itch stays away, and if that was the cause of her rubbing her bum on the ground rather than anal gland problems, she will be a much happier dog and I will be keeping an eye out for any possible side effects...hopefully there won't be any.
I've had border follies as pets, the first one nearly 40 years ago and he didn't have problem, had even heard of them, he lived on pedigree chum and winalot, was fit until 15, next one dry foods, cost a fortune, terrible anal glands, anyway changed his diet to mixer foods and raw tripe,problem stopped,he was 15 when he died. No more complete foods. Tins and mixer, fit as fleas.
A day of all things motorhome and campervan. The show is held both in the main indoor arena and across the grounds. Catering, hot drinks and food options are available. Easy access to the site and free parking included. Win one of five pairs of day tickets
Topic: Apoquel for itchy dogs
