Hot spot -- the dog kind, not the T Mobile kind.

March 24, 2008 8:50 PM

Does my dog have a hot spot? What should I do about it?

Poppy, my miniature Australian shepherd, has a spot she's been chewing at for the last couple of days. It's on her back, just to the right of her spine and about 4 inches above her tail. I clipped the hair around it, some of which has gotten kind of matted and nasty. The skin underneath feels kind of stiff and scabby/cardboardy -- not much wet exudate, and the only color difference I can see is that it's darker (but not red) than the surrounding skin. The spot seems stinky, but I can't tell if it's that or her stinky butt I'm noticing.
I plan to take her to the vet as soon as possible, but in the meantime I'd like to know if there's anything I can or should do for her, given normal household items. (I've seen recommendations for specific pet-related products, or witch hazel, etc, but I don't have any of those things on hand). Does this sound like a hot spot? Does the location suggest any possible causes? (Could this be an anal gland issue?) She doesn't have fleas, but she spends a fair amount of time outside, and her favorite hobby is herding the cat, which means she sometimes comes out on the losing end of the cat's claws.
To repeat -- I'm calling the vet first thing in the morning, so unless you think I need to rush her to the 24 hour animal hospital, be assured I'm not relying on you for her only medical care. But my vet is very popular and thus very busy, so I'm afraid we might not be able to get in for a day or so, and I don't want to let this get any worse; I've read horror stories of how fast a hot spot can go bad. What should a first-time dog owner do?

posted by katemonster to pets & animals (4 comments total)

Bath with epsom salts can help itchy paws and skin, or a bath with colloidal oatmeal seems to work as well for our aussie. I'd suggest rinsing the area an putting an e-collar on her until you can get her to the very for a look.
posted by iamabot at 9:01 PM on March 24

We have good luck using spray Bactine to keep itchy dogs comfortable. Our vet didn't seem too worried about them bothering with it, not that they cared for the smell and taste anyhow.

(Incidentally, hot spots in that area turned out to be flea allergies in our case. The dog was flea-treated, but got the odd bite anyway.)
posted by bunji at 9:03 PM on March 24

Of course you should figure out why your dog is getting hotspots, and you are. This is not a replacement for figuring out why your dog has a hotspot, but it's a quick, dirty, lo-tech trick to keep her from chewing herself into a bloody pulp until it's resolved. And Aussies, among other breeds, are famous for worrying hotspots and making them worse.

Any big pet store will carry self-adhesive, non-sticky bandages. Vet-wrap, it's called, and it costs $2 or so for a roll of it. Wrap a great, big, bulky wad around her front leg. She will be too focussed on tearing it off to worry her hotspot. Keep reapplying it until the hotspot goes away.
posted by freshwater_pr0n at 10:02 PM on March 24 [2 favorites]

Hot spots are usually red, raw skin that can be oozy or wet looking. If you have what you think is a hot spot but it has a crust or scab over it, get it checked for a staph infection.

My Berner had several localized staph infections which sound very much like what you describe. We took him to the vet because the usual treatment for hot spots didn't work. The vet found it wasn't hot spots but staph and put him on massive antibiotics for 3 weeks. He started to clear up pretty quickly and the antibiotics did the trick.
posted by onhazier at 5:50 AM on March 25