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Golden Retriever skin allergies: Why is he still itching, miserable?

Updated On September 23rd, 2025

Pet's info: Dog | Golden Retriever | Male | neutered | 2 years and 11 months old | 94 lbs

We have a golden with some type of skin allergy. He has dry a Sally patches/ bumps and he itches all the time. Our vet has had him on cephalexen and ceterizine but he is still miserable. Help?

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1 Answer

Most Helpful Answer

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Answered By Ann Dion, DVM

Veterinarian

Published on May 13th, 2017

Hi! Its great you have a picture in there! So, the wound appearance is similar to a fungus infection, which is quite common in dogs with this type of fur as in golden retrievers. It's not easy to dry it completely, so some fungus can take advantage on that and cause an infection. As it is pruritic (a nice word for itching), and fungal infection in the majority is NOT itchy, a secondary bacterial contamination can be occurring. You will need some extra diagnostics work up with your vet to figure this out, or do an diagnostic by exclusion (treating the most common causes to see if helps). Other very important fact to be looked at, is if this "crusty - like" wound was caused by the itching problem and there is another underlying skin allergic reaction happening such as, flea allergy (remember you don't have to see the fleas on your dog for this), food related allergy, atopic allergy, etc. As I don't know for how long you have been treating Cody, so the antibiotic might no had kicked in yet. Cold baths with Chlorhexidine shampoos (you can even buy "Dettol" on supermarket) can give some quick relief.

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