Hi I have a westie and he had the same thing apart from the pus in beard few weeks ago. Vet gave me Atopica tablets. Also have a range of shampoos, malaseb, allermyl, epiderm, epi soothe which he had a bath and has all applied. He also has boracutan which is like viacutan which is fish oils but instead of a capsule its in doggy chocolate format. Henry has not been itching his feet and also his scabs have gone so its worked. Not sure how much all this is as he is insured and pet plan pay!!!!
Hope this helps

My westie has been having the skin problem, AFTER his first annual vaccination. Before that, he was very healthy.
about 1 to 2 weeks after the vaccination, he developed itchy skin. Then the skin urned slowly to red. then to black.
sent to vet many times, all they did - injection, anti-biotics, more pills, a bottle of shampoo.

I noticed the problem always return worse than before after completing the pills.

So, i had no choice but to try alternative and natural methods.

So far, I've tried using pure lavendar and tea tree essential oil. The lavendar oil, i use it for anti-itch and repel ticks anf fleas.
The tea tree can also repel ticks and fleas, and also to heal wounds more quickly by dripping about 3 drops into a tub of water for final rinse after bath.

Anther method i tried was using dead sea mud spa. It helped after first applicatino. But subsequent application didn't really help.

I noticed on one occassion after I brought him to swim at the sea side, the darken skin lightened greatly.
So I got dead sea salt to do soaking for him. It does seem to work.

Now, I've switched to a different vet. I'm going to try out homeopathy alongside with the vet's medication. But will stop the essential oils for now as they'll neutralise the homeopathy.

cross my fingers.

I might give the dead sea salt a try, where do you get it from? can you possibly PM me any homepathy info you have? I would be really grateful, as like you, my vet has only ever given antibiotics for Willow's skin, and it has never made a difference...

Thank you xxxx

I got the dead sea salt within Singapore's online shop.

There's one online shop which local westie owners had recommended. They said it worked like magic - http://www.dead-sea-cosmetics-shop.com/care.asp?cat=91


homeopathy, I'm still reading up. But rather slowly. The information is bits and pieces. You might want to go to my blog to take a look. I think I would have posted quite some info there

hope they're useful

Hi, it's sad but great to hear that another Westie has the same problems. I see you posted your thread in October, have you managed to sort any of the problems yet? would love to hear?

Hi is Henry still on Atopica? If so are there any side effects and where do you get the boracutan from. Is Henry still having problems?

Hi Jo can I point out to you this is quite an old thread so you may not get a response.

You may be better starting a new thread and asking a question about Atopica .

Hi
Henry is not suffering at the moment with his skin (touch wood). You can get boracutan from the vets we have pet plan so it is covered on that. The viacutan and boracutan are same but different forms. Henry will have either as he is really good having stuff like that i throw then to him like treats lol. Hows your dog doing? Have you only just had him? I think its more of a seasonal thing with henry

Sarah x