# Constant paw licking and ear scratching



## gale leslie (Aug 12, 2011)

Reaching out to find out if anyone has some proven natural or homeopathic remedy for this issue. Chance is constantly licking his paws and tends to scratch ears mainly at night and first thing in morning.


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## krandall (Jun 11, 2009)

A lot paw licking and ear scratching is cause by food allergies. You might want to look into that, and consider putting him on a limited ingredient diet with a different protein source than what you are using now and see if there is any improvement.

When you ask for something "proven", that's tough, because very allergic dog will react to something slightly different, and may respond differently to treatments. If you are looking specifically for natural or homeopathic answers, you might want to consult a holistic vet. But I'm SURE that they will first want you to try to figure out and eliminate the cause, if at all possible.


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## TShot (Jan 16, 2009)

Petunia started with the constant paw licking a few months back. I figured it was allergies. At the time she was eating high quality raw frozen food Stella and Chewy's Chicken and Fromm's kibble. I knew it wasn't the quality of the foods. I brought her to a holistic vet and she suggested that she might be allergic to chicken so I stopped feeding chicken and switched to salmon and surf and turf. That didn't help. Petunia licked her paws constantly until they were stained. The holistic vet gave me some "Silica grains" to put under petunia gums , weird but she said only do it once and to phone her back in three days and give a update. Three days later no change maybe even worse. She said to give her 10 grains of Silica between gums and lip.
That night Petunia started scratching at her ears. I brought her back to the holistic vet and she cleaned her ears and said for me to wipe them with Witch Hazel every day and call her back in three days. Three days later no better.
So the holistic Vet suggested a blood test to do allergy testing. Cost $250.

The next day before we got the results of the allergy testing. Petunia got much worse, her ears were hurting her in the middle of the night shaking her head and scratching constantly.
So first thing in the morning I took her to her Regular Vet ( not the holistic vet). He said that her ears were very infected and that her paw licking was called Atopy. He asked why I waited so long to bring in Petunia. I fessed up and told him that I wanted to try the Holistic approach. He said he understood but I could tell he thought it was a mistake.

He cleaned Petunias ears much better digging out all kinds of goop and adminstered a Otibiotic oinment in her ears. He told me to put 4 drops twice a day for a week deep in her ear canal and to give Petunia 1/2 benadryl twice a day as long as she was licking her paws.
The results were terrific. Petunia's ears cleared up in three days and she has now stopped licking her paws.

I went back to the holistic vet and picked up the allergy results. This is what she is allergic to :
Foods > Alafa, Corn, Eggs, Pork and Sweet Potato.
Outdoor> Rye Grass, Bermuda grass, All sorts of weeds like Ragweed and tree pollens > particularly Oak, Pecan and Hickory.

So now Petunia is on a diet of Stella and Chewy's Dandy Lamb and ZiwiPeak Lamb. For treats Ziwi Peak Lamb.
When she comes in from outside I wipe her down and wash her paws.

Petunia is now doing great.
I know that Holistic vets can be good. But I must say I wish that I would have taken Petunia to her regular vet sooner.
Petunia is now doing great.


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## krandall (Jun 11, 2009)

TShot said:


> So first thing in the morning I took her to her Regular Vet ( not the holistic vet). He said that her ears were very infected and that her paw licking was called Atopy. He asked why I waited so long to bring in Petunia. I fessed up and told him that I wanted to try the Holistic approach. He said he understood but I could tell he thought it was a mistake.
> 
> <snip>
> 
> ...


I think the take-away message here is do your home work as far as the vet is concerned, and if things aren't going well, AT LEAST get a second opinion. I changed from the first (regular) vet I used for Kodi when what he as saying to me made no sense based on Kodi's symptoms. I checked with a vet friend of mine who told me that I needed to take him to a board certified internist to get to the bottom of things. That vet, I really liked, and he ruled out the dangerous things that the other vet had overlooked, and did narrow it down to "something" in his hind end, and put him on muscle relaxants and pain meds. (take two of these and call me in the morning)

Fortunately at that point, some sports friends pointed me in the direction of the wonderful integrative practice I now use. The great thing about an integrative medicine approach (whether it's for animals or humans) is that they use any modality at their disposal to help the animal. It turned out that Kodi had badly pulled muscles in his upper thigh during an agility demo (I had TOLD the other vets that I suspected something from the demo, because he was fine until then, and the next day could hardly move!!!)

My new vet does veterinary chiropractic. He could hardly walk going into the exam room, and trotted out with his tail up over his back again. He now goes for "tune-ups" every 6-8 weeks, but I also started using her as his regular vet. She uses traditional medicine where it is appropriate (antibiotics RIGHT away when he got Clostridium last winter) but will also help me try more natural approaches where that is appropriate, like last summer, when Kodi developed an allergy. (which we now are pretty sure is a mildew in the grass)


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