r/AskAVeterinarian

I took my dog to the vet yesterday for a tooth abscess. I noticed her cheek under her eye was swelling so I took her in and one of her back teeth has abscessed after she bonked her head at the dog park.

They prescribed her antibiotics (clindamycin) and gabapentin to take every 12 hours. She’s now had 2 doses of each (one last night one this morning). It may be too early, but I have noticed it’s gotten bigger since yesterday and I thought the antibiotics would reduce the swelling. Her appointment for extraction isn’t until the 20th of this month. I wish it were sooner. It was the next available surgery date they had.

Question: Should I wait one more day to call/bring her back in, to see if it finally goes down? Or should I address it immediately?

Additionally, is there anything I can do to aid in reducing the swelling alongside the antibiotics while we wait for extraction day?

my cat had been throwing up because of some hairball food, so we switched to sensitive stomach food, but now she won’t eat at all and she’s losing weight at an alarming rate.

i tried feeding her wet food but she only nibbled at it and licked up some of the gravy. i’m pretty worried and would appreciate any advice.

My 8-year-old cat keeps squinting his right eye. He'll stop for a bit, then go back to squinting. Sometimes I think it looks a little watery, and sometimes I think I can see a slight bit of fogginess to it. But he won't let me take a look at it. I can't tell if it is swollen or not, but it isn't warm to the touch. Is there anything I can do before taking him to the vet? Or is vet the best first stop here? I don't want to take him if it is not necessary. But if he is in pain, and it requires medical attention, then I will take him in asap. I just wanted to ask for an opinion first, before I spend a couple hundred dollars at the vet.

Hi all,

My friend’s cat is a sweet 9 year old boy who started exhibiting urinary issues just last night.

Bloody urine, frequency in trying to urinate but inability to do so, consistently licking himself, some vomiting.

She did take him to the vet today. They ran a few tests and sent her home with the advice to “take him in” if he doesn’t urinate for several hours. He’s been prescribed gabapentin and special urinary food for the time being.

Our question is, what warrants an emergency visit? The vet was unclear about what “take him in” entails, and what even constitutes an emergency. He hasn’t been able to urinate much at all for roughly 5-6 hours. He’s purring and acting normal at this point aside from very frequent litter box visits with minimal to no urine produced.

Do we take him to an emergency vet? Do we wait to hear back from the vet she already visited until morning?

Thanks in advance for any input. We love our boy and just want to help him however we can.

Hi and thank you for taking the time to read my post. So my 9 year old 90lb Pitbull ate a couple plastic plants on Sunday evening. He threw up that night and has thrown up about once a day ever since - always with plastic leafs coming out. Aside from getting sick, he’s acting completely normal. Plenty of energy, wants to play and walk, hes pooping and his appetite hasn’t changed. He’s a very anxious dog and is absolutely terrified of the vet, he’s been through a lot recently with ultra sounds etc due to unrelated matters so I’m trying to not take him in. As long as his behavior stays normal is it safe to just keep monitoring him? No stomach dissension or reaction from pushing on it either.

My Cat is a tabbie and hes panting like he cant breath and he was attacked bye dogs and we need help he feel outa a tree on to a Concrete walk path outside my house i need help into trying to help here at my house and we cant afford to take him to the vet and i live in Mississippi Hinds County Jackson MS

We believe our puppy may be picking up worms from rabbit droppings in our yard. The problem is, it’s really hard to even see anything—when I look around, I can’t spot any. Most of the time it just looks like she’s sniffing, not actually eating anything. We always keep her on a leash outside and don’t let her roam freely.

She’s on a monthly flea/tick and deworming preventative, and we’ve already been to the vet three times for worms (most recently yesterday). Each time they give her an oral medication that seems to work temporarily, but then the worms show up again in her stool.

She just got a dose yesterday, and now today we’re seeing worms again—and they’re still moving. I thought they’d be dying off by now.

The vet also mentioned that rabbits can carry a parasite (Eimeria), and if a dog ingests infected droppings, they can become infected too. Although, it is harmless to them.

At this point, I’m feeling really stuck and unsure what else to do. Is there anything we can treat the yard with, or any way to prevent this from continuing?

I wanna start off by saying I am taking her to the vet tomorrow or the day after, both my brother and I have midterms this week so I haven’t been able to take her in again.

We found her last Thursday right under our apartment building, matted with a flea infestation. We took her in the first day we brought her in and they said she’s fine but they didn’t actually do any tests. We brought her in literally 30 mins before closing so it was understandable. By the third day, she started having occasional soft poops and STINKY farts. I called the vet since I couldn’t bring her in and he said that it’s fine, it’s likely because her tummy is all messed up from whatever she was eating on the streets.

I was trying to sleep when I noticed my dog kept scratching which is weird bc he does sometimes scratch himself, but he keeps getting up all of a sudden to scratch the same 2 spots. I finally got him to stop and I looked at the spot he’s scratching at, and it happens to be where he has a small skin tag. It has never been red and inflamed like this before, so I’m not sure what happened. The small area around it also looks kinda of patchy red, and the second spot where he’s scratching looks similar. He’s otherwise not scratching himself anywhere else. I don’t think he’s been scratching at it for that long, I’d say it‘s been a couple days that he’s been scratching but I hadn’t noticed how frequently he started doing it.

Could it be that something but him in those spots and he’s irritated it? Or maybe he’s having allergies? I’m not sure but it freaked me out bc his skin tag has never looked like that before. Any help would be appreciate!