I have an almost 14 yo boy who is entire. I bathed him today and noticed he only seemed to have one testicle. When I checked further it is possible the other one is there but it has shrunk down to almost nothing.

His health is otherwise OK. He has slowed down recently and is a bit wobbly at the back. Vet said his hips were hurting and gave him Metacam which didnt seem to agree with him to I have stopped that and he seems better. He has put on weight recently. I bathed him because he was losing so much coat. He seems to have lost all his undercoat from along his back and up behind his ears. I am not sure whether he is just having a bad moult but it seems worsr than that . his coat looks quite sparse behind his ears now I have groomed it out.

He is booked into the vet on Wednesday but to stop me worrying myself to death before then it would be great if anyone has any idea what could be the problem.

It has all the classical signs of hypothyroidism -including the testicle. Should be easy to treat in that case! Ripley had it and she was on tablets for it from 8 years of age so for 6 years.
http://www.provet.co.uk/health/diseases/hypothyroidism.htm

Same here.  I lost my Bearded Collie at 15 years old.  She was also on thyroid tablets for 6 years.  Once they got the dose right she improved hugely.  She had started to get very thin in coat, it took a good while, but I saw a big improvement in around 6 months.

Thats it exactly Marianne The symptoms match. His skin is blackening and very dry  too and he has put weight on it does fit perfectly. I cant tell you how relieved I am that it could be something that is easily treated. Thanks you very much

Thanks Jean. As he is nearly 14 I hope he has those 6 months. But he has always been fit and his grandma lived until 16. I have told him he has to live forever. :)

I managed to bring Caseys vet visit forward so he has been this afternoon. The vet is sending of blood to test for thyroid and also checking liver and kidneys etc.

She checked his testcles and said that she thought the normal sized one felt a bit hard and wondered if there was a tumour in it as that could potentially affect the other one. Interestingly she said if there is a tumour, not to worry too much as dogs only very rarely get testicular cancer. I always thought that one of the selling points for castration was that it prevented testicular cancer. Seems a very drastic way to prevent something that is not a big risk. But thats for another thread. Hopefully the blood tests will show up something.

ETA just gone round all 3 entire boys and Caseys testicle doesnt seem any firmer than the other two boys. What a way to spend the afternoon!

Fingers crossed. With Ripley, she had very few symptoms other than weight gain and coat a bit worse than usual and the vet I used then initially did not think there was a thyroid issue but I insisted and when the results came back it proved to be correct. I noticed an improvement within a month on the tablets.

As for testicle tumours her brother S (you will know who) had one so was castrated, think it was last year so at 13. The only one I have ever heard of.

She did say a testicular tumour would not account for the other symptoms so it does seem unlikely. I should get the results back by the end of the week.

A Sertoli cell tumour - the most common type of testicular tumour in dogs- can affect the skin. It's almost always a benign tumour.

I always thought that one of the selling points for castration was that it prevented testicular cancer.

It is, and it's not necessarily going to happen - certainly we've had entire males forever (much as I spay my bitches, usually on retiring, I don't do castration other than for medical reasons!) either.   Obviously if the testicle is retained, it needs to be removed (the risk of cancer for sure).  'Selling points' - you are not wrong.

Certainly there's a far greater risk, and it's still a risk, of mammary, ovarian or uterine cancers in an entire bitch later on.    Although we've never had testicular cancer in our males, we have had one, in all our bitches over the years, who did develop mammary cancer when she was 12.   Not nice.

The blood test results are back. The in-house ones are relatively normal for kidneys, liver etc. The thyroid does show low levels. The vet does not know if the testicle issue is caused by the thyroid as she says if that were the case then both would be affected not just one. She still suspects a tumour in the larger one.

Vet doesnt know if the testicles are causing the other symptoms, If the thyroid is causing the testicles or if he has 2 totally unrelated issues. She could do a needle biopsy to see if that shows up a tumour or I could go straight for castration. She wasnt sure suprelorin would be a good idea because of the hormone increase when the implant is 1st given. Or I could start thyroid treatment and see if that makes a difference. So that is what we have decided to do. He has been given Soloxine 0.5mg twice a day for a month to see if that makes any difference.

FOr people who have had low thyroid dogs how quickly would it make a difference if it is going to? What changes can I expect to see? Thanks

Oh complicated -but I would have done the same as you. For Ripley it took 4 weeks before we noticed a difference -she started to lose weight despite getting more food, and she was less tired. Before she was really fat and got about a third of her normal amount of food. We had to adjust the levels of Soloxine a few times. It's ridiculously cheap, that is one good thing. :)

Casey has been on the soloxine for a few days now but obviously not long enough to make much difference yet. His coat is falling out by the bucket load. When I first noticed the problem he was thin around the neck but now he has lost all his undercoat right down his back and sides. he looks absolutely awful. The top coat is still there but looks thinner. I cant believe the amount of undercoat that is coming out. The skin is very flaky and dandruffy.   Is it normal for thyroid to cause such sudden and severe hairloss?

It's probably happened gradually, it just wasn't very noticeable to start with. Ripley never stopped moulting after it started, not for one single day for years, but she never got thin coat at all once on tablets.

It definitely wasnt gradual.  I washed him and groomed him out last week because he seemed to be shedding rather a lot. I groom him regularly so would have noticed a loss of undercoat to any great extent before that.  That was when the hair round his neck brushed out. The hair everywhere else appeared normal and thick. It didnt come out with blasting or combing. But since then all his undercoat has come loose When he gets up from laying down you can almost see a malinois shape in hair on the floor in hair. A comb run gently through his coat filled up in seconds and there is just nothing left. No undercoat at all :(

It just seems far too sudden to lose all his coat in a week. I will keep him on the  tablets and hope they do the trick.

Gosh that does sound a bit extreme. Hopefully it will all change once the tablets start working.