Hadley's Regime

Deciding we could no longer stand it anymore after Hadley's latest outbreak in August, we took Hadley to a pet allergy and dermatology clinic (oh yes, that is a real thing).  In all honesty, Hadley was just generally miserable and we needed to do something about it.


So after one false start (we got our days mixed up), Hadley and I trekked out to Richmond in Honcho with Tokyo Rose leading the way (see previous post).  We met with the pet dermatologist who I liked very much for several reasons.  Most of all, I felt that she really knew what to do about Hadley's condition.  Our other general practictioner vets (I feel this is necessary to differentiate between our vets -- we have several, you see) would suggest a potential remedy and then say "let's see if that works and then we'll go from there."  Not really the most reassuring words right before you pay a substantial vet bill.  The other reasons were that she asked a lot questions about Hadley and talked about how pretty she was (the quickest way to get into my heart).  


Well, the vet started talking about ringworm, ruptured ear drums, yeast infections, and hives all at the same time, so she ran pretty much every test under the sun, except for an allergy scratch test, which is really the main test we wanted her to run.  The reason she didn't run that test was because of this night (when Hadley swelled up like a balloon and we spent about two hours at the emergency vet).  She was afraid that Hadley would go into systematic shutdown, which is as bad as it sounds.  Basically anaphylactic shock and/or death.  So we decided on the less risky serum test.


They ran the serum test, but in the meantime, she provided us with a whole host of antibiotics, ear cleaning solutions, shampoo/conditioner, and antihistamines.  All of this came with a full page of instructions.  We have to do this for EIGHT WEEKS (two weeks down).  Here's the rundown: 

• Immediately before/after breakfast, I have to shove 4 pills down Hadley's throat.  We can't hide it in her food or coat it in peanut butter because she knows how to lick all the peanut butter off of the pill and still spit it out.  However, she has figured out she doesn't like the pills, so she holds her mouth shut and starts wiggling her tongue like crazy.  She has to take one pill at night.
• She gets ear drops twice a day, which she is very twitchy about.
• Twice a week, we have to squirt ear cleaning solution in her ear and then use a bulb syringe to wash her ear out.  We then have to take a piece of gauze and stick it all the way down her ear canal to get the remaining stuff out.  Then there's more ear drops and solution to rub on her ear flaps.
• Once a week she gets a bath where we she has to let the shampoo sit on her for 15 minutes.  Seriously?!  Have the people who created this stuff NEVER had pets.  She did manage to sit still in the tub for that long, but Charlie and I had to sit there with her.

Today, we got the results from her serum test.  The serum test basically tells us what she is allergic to.  Well, ladies and gentlemen, Hadley returned a 49 out of 50 on her test.  The vet told Charlie she hadn't seen a test like that all year.   She's allergic to EVERYTHING almost -- Charlie said the list was long.  We didn't tell Hadley that, of course.  I just told her she is off the charts (and she just wagged her tail).


Apparently, the next step is for the pet dermatologist to mix up some magic serum that we'll inject into Hadley twice a week (the technical term is "topical" treatment).  You gotta admit, it's never a dull day here at the Brown household.