We took our Bichon to the vets last night to have his anal glands emptied and I asked the vet about Cyclosporin which is a drug that can be used in skin problems and has had some good results.  Our vet has put him on some tablets called Atopica (cyclosporin) and I have just been on the animal medicines website (which is a really good website and the prices seem good too) and it says that Atopica is a new drug.  We haven't got them yet because they had to order them so we will have them today or tomorrow.  They are quite expensive and are £28 for 10 tablets (although animal medicines Ltd are selling them for £13.81 with free delivery but you have to have a vets prescription) and we are going to see how he is for the ten days he is on them and then go back and if he is okay and they work the vet will put him on another 10 day course and he says we will eventually be able to give him one every other day and then maybe get him down to one a week on them so I am really hoping that they work and he has a scratch-free life in future because he is a lovely friendly little dog and he doesn't deserve to suffer the misery of scratching :-(  The vet did mention that the tablets may make him sick and if he is very sick he might have to come off them again :-(

Has anybody ever used atopica and had any success with them?

I'd read the document on this page if I were you: http://www.us.atopica.com/product_label/en/index.shtml - then ask yourself whether you want to take the risk. Atopica can cause gastrointestinal problems which may be the cause of the problem in the first place. You don't need drugs to deal with the majority of skin conditions, just good nutrition. (See www.nzymes.com and http://www.greatdanelady.com/articles/allergies.htm)

I suppose every drug has some sort of risk and we have tried lots of different things that people swear by and they haven't made any difference at all :-(  He is usually put on steroids and the vet has given me his assurance that these drugs aren't harmful like steroids are, so I am going to give them a try because if there are problems and he becomes ill on them then we will take him off them straight away and at least we will have tried.  Drugs that we take can make some of us ill but some people can take them with no side affects at all so I suppose it must be the same for dogs.  For example I take Ibuprofen as a painkiller for my knees and back but I know of two different people who can't take them at all because it gives them diarrhoea and sickness. 

My retriever is on Atopica at the moment, she had terrible skin, it was so awful to watch her scratch til her skin was bleeding, nothing was working, I heard about this new drug and decided to give it a go and we have never looked back, it is very expensive , but it worked for her, the sores have gone she no longer is scratching. Her coat has returned and she is back to her normal happy self.

Barbara

Oh thats great to hear Barbara, thank you :-)  I have phoned the vets and they haven't got the tablets until tomorrow.  How long will it be before we notice a difference do you think?

Whatever you are using is only suppressing the symptoms not eliminating the cause.

If you identify the trigger and remove it you will not be left with any problem to treat.

I totally agree with you, tohme...and you're lucky if you don't get another problem as a consequence.

Yes I know that it would be great if we could find the exact cause of the allergy but I have heard of so many people who have put their dogs through all the tests (one woman on another forum spent £1500 trying to identify what her westie was allergic to and was still no nearer at the end of it and said she definitely wouldn't recommend the tests)  His allergies get worse at the end of April so I think it is definitely pollen related but I can't really keep him away from grass for the rest of his life and pollen is in the air anyway.  I have tried different foods without success and just want him to have a scratch free happy life.

It took about 2/3 weeks for the Atopica to start to work, you start with a high dose gradually easing off.    

It's very easy to say treat the cause but we have spent a year trying to find the cause of her skin condition, spent hundreds of pounds on shampoos, sprays, tablets, she has had all the allergy tests known, weeks on steroids, I know giving pills isn't the answer but it has given her back her quality of life and now she is on a single dose a week and if she is on that for the rest of her life with no side effects she will be.

Sorry Anna forgot to say good luck I hope it works for you.

Barbara

Thanks very much Barbara for all your information.  Our dog has been suffering for a year as well and I have tried all sorts of things although I haven't had him allergy tested because I have heard of so many people that say they are a waste of money and its money I don't have because I have 3 children.  If they could definitely tell me at the end of all the tests and treat it I would borrow the money from a relative and have every test I could afford but these tests don't seem to make things any better so I would rather spend my money on something that will give him relief now, not struggle on for another 12 months trying different things.  My vet is confident that it will work and it won't do long-term damage.  I suppose its like people with hayfever, it can't really be cured so we just take drugs to alleviate it so whats wrong with doing this with a dog.  People take cyclosporin as well to stop their body rejecting transplants.

If your dog is insured this will cover allergy testing.

You may find that homoeopathic treatment with mixed pollen is helpful if it is environmental not food.

Sadly Tohme we didn't get to insure him before he started with his allergy :-(  He was only about 16 weeks when he started scratching and our GSD was ill with Anal furunclosis (although we didn't know just how ill at the time:-()  We took him to the vets at 17 weeks and the young lady vet who saw him said that it might be a skin condition (at this point it could have been fleas or something else) and that we couldn't insure him now because she had diagnosed it :-(  We were going to insure him but were still looking into who to go with and with our other dog being ill we were at the vets every week with him (we sadly lost him on July 10th last year) so I know its my fault for not getting my finger out quicker and insuring him, a mistake I would definitely not make again if I had another dog.  I think he was insured by the kennels for 6 weeks after we bought him and he was 10 weeks when we got him.  The annoying thing is that the other vet who is a man and who owns the practice saw my dog groomers dog and suggested these cyclosporin tablets to her but she wasn't insured (and her dog wasn't a puppy) so he told her to go home and insure her dog and come back in a month and she could claim on the insurance for the tablets which cost about £160 a month :-(  Needless to say I changed vets when I heard about this.

Thanks for the info on the homoeopathic treatment.  Someone recently suggested me getting some honey but it had to be from local bees but I can't find any beekeepers around here unfortunately.

[link]https://www.helios.co.uk/cgi-bin/store.cgi?action=link&sku=Mix-pg&uid=46052[/link]

Thanks for the link tohme, but for some reason it won't come up on my computer :-( It just says this page cannot be displayed.

http://www.helios.co.uk

Our German Shephard was diagnosed with Anal Furunculosis last year. Until recently, the only cure was to operate, which apparently was a very messy process and not very successful - until Atopica came on the scene.
He has now been prescribed with Atopica for over 12 months, and after various trials to see if he could gradually be eased off it once the problem was reduced, our vet has come to the conclusion that it is now a life-long need. The doseage of 2x 100mg capsules per day (and that's a strong dose) keeps the Furunculosis at bay. It will never go away, but doesn't appear to get any worse.
Thankfully he is insured - cost just for the Atopica is nearly £400 per month.... However, the maximum claim is £6500, so it won't take us long to get through that. Having recently checked the www.animalmedicines.co.uk website, we can now get them for approx . £47 per 10 capsules, a saving of about 30%. Worth knowing, particularly if your dog isn't insured.
One thing to be wary of - we moved house before Xmas, and just forgot to give him the capsules with everything else going on (inexcusable, I know). The Furunculosis got a lot worse in a short space of time, and caused bleeding which we couldn't stop. Thankfully the vets emergency service was highly effective and very professional (even on 27th December) and he was on the operating table 30 minutes after calling the vet. We very nearly lost him, and this was solely our fault for not giving hime the capsules for a week. Please be aware and don't make our mistake.
In conclusion, a very expensive drug (don't know how they can justify it), but does the job.
Hope this helps.
Alan in Wiltshire.

Hi Alan, sorry for confusing you.  We haven't got our German Shepherd anymore, we lost him in July last year after only having this dreadful disease for a few months, but he had a very bad case of it and the vet recommended it was the best thing we could do for him :-(  I had never heard of Atopica then but it was my dog groomer who has a GSD and she has it for her dog so I asked our vet to see if we could try it for our Bichon.  He is on his 23rd day now of the course but I can't really see that it is helping a lot with his scratching problem :-( 

Yes it is very expensive from the vets isn't it.  We have to pay £28.04 for 10 tablets.  I have seen the website which you mention and it would be only £13.81 on there but you have to have a vets prescription and no doubt they will charge the earth for that so it wouldn't be worth it really would it.  If the atopica does work then he can probably go on a reduced dose when he has finished these last ten tablets, I will have to see what the vet thinks.

Thankyou very much for your reply and hope your lovely German Shepherd is okay, its a terrible disease isn't it.  Our German shepherd was so bad that he couldn't even pass any motions at the end :-(

My dog was put on Atopica about 5 months ago when he was diagnosed with anal furunculosis, even now after surgery and 5 months of Atopica he still hasn't healed. Is there anyone else having this problem, these drugs cost me pretty much £100 a week + £40 a week for his prescription diet which I can only buy at the vets. It is an extremely expensive treatment that I am struggling to afford, I feel I can't give up on my dog but can't as yet see a light at the end of the tunnel.

Hi Sarah,

The problem with Anal furunculosis is that it is an incurable disease :-(   I know how you feel because I went through all this last year with our dog and he had a very bad case of it according to the vet.  Is you dog a German Shepherd and how old is he?  Somebody who walks their dogs in the same field as me also lost a German Shepherd to this horrible disease they struggled for 12 months and paid out over £2000 but in the end there was nothing they could do but have him put to sleep :-(  As for the prescription diet - well one of the vets at the practice put ours on it.  There was a bag of dried food that our dog wouldn't even touch and the tins of chicken which were about £1.50 per tin.  When we went back the week after one of the other vets said it would make no difference what we fed him, he said Chappie would have been just as good for him.  I was told that if Atopica doesn't work within 4 weeks of taking it then it probably wasn't going to work.  It didn't do anything for our dog (the one we have now) at all unfortunately.:-(

Thankyou Anna, yes he is a German Shepherd he is 6 years old. I gathered from the information I have found on the web about the disease itself that I was fighting a losing battle. So it is just the matter of time I guess my bigger fear is that his daughter too will develope the same disease. She is 3 years old, some web sites claim its gentic and is passed on generation to generation others make no such claims. So far the vet bills are about £2500 and still building, when you look at him you wouldn't know there is anything wrong, I think thats the hardest thing to accept. All the while his quality of life is good I guess I will have to keep fighting the fight. I am back at the vets each week so next weeks visit I will ask more about the Atopica because at £100 a week for the drug you need it to be doing something.
Sarah

Hi Sarah,

Yes my dog was nearly 6 years when he got the disease too :-(  and I know what you mean about not knowing their was anything wrong with him when you look at him because ours was just the same.  Ours only had it a short time - he was put to sleep within 5 months of getting it on the advice of the vet.  The vet didn't seem to think an operation would work.  He said they could stretch the back passage but within two weeks it would start healing again and we would be back to square one :-(  Ours had a very bad case of it though, yours might not be as bad - I hope not :-(  I had never even heard of the disease when the vet diagnosed it.   We have been using Atopica for our Bichon who has skin problems.  It cost £28 a packet and we went through 3 packets but it didn't stop him scratching unfortunately.:-(

I used to post on the BBC board and a lovely lady vet from the USA told me all I needed to know about the disease (I am still in touch with her now) and helped me before and after his death.

hi i have a 3 year old white staffie she has not had life easily. she also has bad skin problems we have had all test done on her even food ones.Ice has had medicene sent from abroad of the vet and still nothing made her better.then the vet mentioned atopica we thought may as well try it. she has been on it for about 6 months she doent have the red flare ups as bad but she is on 100mg 2 a day which is the most.she still has very sore feet and needs to be bathed twice a week in special shampoo and steroid cream to is not allowed on grass which is not really fair to a dog i dont really know what to make of these pills.tomorrow she goes to see a skin specalist so we will have to see what he has to say but i dont like the idea of her staying on these pills forever as they do have bad side effects if constantly on them.its not nice seeing her sore and carnt do anything to help her.

Hi Sarah. My gsd had furunculosis diagnosed age 8. He had cryosurgery and didn't have any further problems.  Unfortunately he died 4 days before his 11th birthday.  My vet had recommended atopica but I wanted to try the surgery route first as Atopica is a relatively new drug and therefore long term side effects are not yet known.  For my boy, the surgery worked and though it may not work for every dog it may be worth a try when other routes have not worked.  I went to a specialist vet in Staffordshire.

Well it turned out my Bichon had sarcoptic mange in the end, no wonder the Atopica wasn't working.  A few treatments with Stronghold and he was fine and has been for the last three years or so.

Atopica has been a godsend for my dog, she has no side effects at all, but has the complete reasolution of her horrible atopic dermatitis that was a living hell for 2 years.

It took 6 weeks to work fully.

You can source it online cheaper than your vet but you will need to get a prescription and vets charge for this (rightly so)

Atopica is usually the drug used when all else fails, due to cost and possible side effects. Most good vets will try and solve the problem by identifying what your dog is allergic to, this can be costly but necessary just in case there is a quick fix - like change of diet, even if you find out what it is your dog is allergic to, reducing your dogs exposure to the allergen can be impossible (house dust mites, storage mites, pollens, grass etc)

In an ideal world we would have a magic cure for atopic dogs but sadly there is no simple answer, if you have tried a food trial, antibiotics and baths & lotions, immunotherapy, steroids and still have problems Atopica is the only thing left, but a very good option compared to living with a dog that is in a terrrible state or euthanasia!

Remember side effects dont always happen, my dog has had absolutely none, and anyone living with a dog that's tearing itself to pieces knows just how distressing that is.

Ask your vet to refer you to a dermatologist, you may save money in the long run by seeing a specialist early and finding the best treatment for your dog.