Monday, November 29, 2010

Riggs is allergic to...

We finally got Riggs skin bacteria infection cleared up and today was allergy test day.  Part of Riggs's chest/stomach area was shaved and his skin was pricked with various different trees, grasses, weeds, molds & smuts, house dust mite, insects, and others.  Anything that registered a 2 or higher is considered to be allergic too.  As has been the pattern with Riggs since we first got him, he was allergic to almost everything.  He did best with trees and horrible with everything else.
  • Out of 20 different tree species he scored 2 or higher on 9 of them
  • Out of 5 different grass species he scored 2 or higher on all 5 of them
  • Out of 9 different weed species he scored 2 or higher on 8 of them
  • Out of 12 different molds & smuts he scored 2 or higher on all 12 of them
  • Out of 5 different house dust mite he scored 2 or higher on all 5 of them
  • Out of 4 different insects species he scored 2 or higher on all 4 of them
  • Out of 3 others (cat, feathers, & wool) he scored 2 or higher on all 3 of them
What is the next step you ask?  Allergy shots for the rest of Riggs' life.  Apparently dogs can not build up as strong a resistance to stuff like humans can so the shots will have to be forever.  So today we got to learn how to give Riggs a shot.

To give a dog a shot you pull up the loose skin located right behind his head and stick the shot into the pocket of space made from pulling the skin up.  We will have to give him a shot once every 3 days which will spread out to once every 10 days and eventually to once every 20 days.  Total bill today: $824.78.

Riggs shaved chest/belly area.  The little line of dots is all the various needle pricks they did testing on the various allergens.

Saturday, November 20, 2010

Clean the folds

Pugs have many folds in their face which is a perfect spot for eye gunk to run down into and get all gross.  This cleaning process would go so much faster if you would just hold your head still.  Do you want me to accidentally poke you in the eye buddy?  If you do not hold still that is what is going to happen.

Tuesday, November 16, 2010

Sunday, November 14, 2010

Wash rinse repeat

So as much as Riggs hated baths before he really hates them now.  To get him over this skin issue we have to lather him up with shampoo and it has to stay on him for 10 mins.  After we rinse him off, we lather him up with conditioner and that has to sit on him for another 10 mins before being washed off.  You should see the strange looks we get when we take Riggs for a walk around the neighborhood to keep him distracted.  All they see is a dog that looks like he ran through a car wash and is covered in suds but did not bother to rinse off.

Tuesday, November 9, 2010

One by one upstairs they come

Riggs use to sleep downstairs until Mama nagged and nagged Dada to let him sleep upstairs in bed with us.  All of Riggs toys (I mean stuffed animals) were downstairs in a big pile.  Well over the past several weeks Riggs has been strategically bringing one stuffed animal upstairs at a time and before I know it the bedroom is covered in stuffed animals and nylabones.

Wednesday, November 3, 2010

Allergy Specialist

We have tried every test our primary vet and we could think of.  Four different food trials have been tried.  Two emergency vet visits.  The itching and scratching continues.  The vet has recommend we go see an allergy specialist.  We had our initial consultation today and the specialist feels pretty confident that she knows what is going on.  She says the allergies he has are most likely environmental and not due to food.  Currently Riggs skin is fighting off a bacteria infection due to the allergies and that needs to be cleaned up before they can do any type of allergy tests to find out what he is allergic to specifically.  So more medications, sprays, shampoo & conditioner to get his skin infection under control.  Total bill today : $452.33.

Monday, November 1, 2010

Riggs the pig?

Halloween has arrived.  If any of you remember from last year, Riggs was dressed as a devil.  This year Mama dressed the poor guy as a pig.  You can tell from the photos that Riggs does not enjoy dress up like Mama does.