Well the day finally came that Hestia got allergy testing. We’ve been fighting staph infections for the past two years. She gets them about once every two months. We’ve tried everything the vet can think of to stop them coming back. But the vet thinks Hestia has allergies that cause her tummy to get irritated, and then the staph bacteria that normally occurs on the skin is getting in and causing an infection.
On the way there, I used Felix’s new SleepyPod carrier. It is safer than his seatbelt, as it has passed more crash testing. It was a birthday present from Sabrina and Karin! Here are two pictures of Felix, one with his head poking out, and the other with his head zipped in.
I decided to take all three dogs to the vet, and I used their new stroller! It was great being able to take all three dogs somewhere and not having to juggle them in my arms (they got really dizzy when I did that!)! I got a short video and a picture of them in the stroller. It’s a navy blue stroller and big enough to hold all three dogs!
The vet and all the techs that saw us also loved the stroller and loved seeing all three pups! Felix was especially excited to be at the vet and kept wanting his turn! Hestia would have been happy to give up her turn LOL!
The tech and the vet both looked at Hestia’s stomach. They also found a few lesions on her feet in between her toe pads. So the vet said it was time to do allergy testing. It is $712 to get testing for environmental and food allergens, and to get 9 months of shots to treat the allergies. That’s actually pretty cheap for allergy testing and treatment!
In the meantime, I’m supposed to get a special shampoo and bathe her with it once a month. Every other week she needs to get a conditioner-only bath as well. Hestia’s going to love that… NOT! All the special shampoos with those ingredients at the vet’s office were scented, but we were able to find one I can order that is unscented, so yay!
We also got 4 weeks of antibiotics to treat her current staph infection.
Hestia was so good getting her blood drawn for the allergy testing! They said she is a dream to work with. And she really enjoyed the peanut butter she got in exchange!
While it was an expensive vet visit, I definitely felt listened to and that the vet cared about the situation. She had done research into the new staph medicine I had found and brought up to her last time, and told me why she was uncomfortable using it (small sample size and about the same cost as allergy testing which is the gold standard for these cases). She remembered about the no-fragrance stuff before I even told her, and said if we couldn’t find something commercially, she’d reach out on the vet dermatology boards to see if anyone knew of any way to make it yourself or buy from a smaller company.
I just really hope the allergy testing and treatment works for Hestia! It’s expensive to have to go to the vet every other month!