please read, need advice for my balding chow chow

helpshadow · Post by **helpshadow** » Thu Nov 24, 2005 7:09 pm

Hi, my name is Jim and I just signed on as a member to hopefully find some helpful information about my chow chow "shadow" who has lost most of her hair and is mainly bald on her back. She has been scratching at herself for a long time even with baths, etc., It looks awful and I don't know where else to turn. If anyone has any helpful advice I would be so grateful.
She's a wonderful black chow who I found in the streets 3 years ago. I hope someone out there knows what to do. Thanks for reading.

Jim

Post by **kingalls** » Thu Nov 24, 2005 7:36 pm

Ah..you're not alone....several recent posts on this same subject. Most of us suspect the food first. What are you feeding Shadow? Most grocery store brands like IAMS are culprits for skin allergies. You need to stay away from brands that have alot of wheat fillers. You might try going to the home page on this site and selecting the Q & A section as there are older posts regarding itchy and/or balding chows. The top problem seems to be caused by food.
Welcome to this site! There are many that will advise you as much as possible.

Karen

ngraham · Post by **ngraham** » Thu Nov 24, 2005 7:51 pm

That sounds like some kind of allergy to me. Be it food, grass, or something else. What does your vet say? I had a friend who had a chow who had a similar problem, and it ended up being grass allergies. The vet gave Cinnamon shots for it and it seemed to help quite a bit. Chows don't tolerate alot of meat/protein in their diets, which cause allergies. What do you feed Shadow?

tekendall · Post by **tekendall** » Fri Nov 25, 2005 9:42 am

Go to your vet and get a skin scrape to check for mange. My old chow was loosing hair and scatching like crazy for weeks (mostly on her back legs and back). We went to the vet (2 diff ones) about 4 times. They were not sure what it was and tried all sorts of things (cortizone shots, anti-itch creme, steroids). About a month later (when all the humans in the house were itching) we took her back and they did a skin scrape and found sarcoptic mange (mites). She was almost completely bald before we got it diagnosed...and we were all miserable! It was fairly easy to treat after that, 2 shots about 2 weeks apart. Good luck..I hope you find out soon what's causing it.