Ask the vet: Advice on how to treat abscesses in dogs

My vet prescribes antibiotics, and these are usually effective in resolving infections. However, over the past few months she has had an abscess at the back of her right front paw that seems to keep coming back.

My vet has searched for grass seeds and has found nothing. What should we be doing?

Shane Morrison, lead orthopaedic veterinary surgeon at Christchurch Vets (Image: Simply C Photography)Answer: I am sorry to hear that Molly has suffered from repeated abscesses. This is not an uncommon situation, particularly in spaniels where thick fur on the paws traps grass seeds and other foreign material, which can penetrate and subsequently infect the skin.

Occasionally grass seeds pass completely beneath the skin and can migrate some way up the leg. An abscess usually forms where the grass seed (or other foreign material) comes to rest.

The history of recurrent abscess formation at the same site suggests that there is a persistent source of infection, such as a grass seed, that will remain and continue to cause infections and abscesses despite repeated antibiotic courses.

Finding something like a grass seed in the soft tissues of the paw or elsewhere in the leg can be frustratingly difficult. It is no surprise that your vet has had such trouble treating Molly.

In cases such as these, MRI scanning is usually necessary to identify fluid tracts and sites of infection that connect the superficial abscess to deeper tissues.

It is often the case that grass seeds become lodged between the small bones and/or tendons of the paw. The MRI scan will therefore help to identify the exact source of the infection causing the abscess and therefore allow for precise surgical planning to locate and extract the grass seed.

I would recommend that you ask your vet for a referral to a centre such as ours which has on-site MRI facilities. Please let me know how Molly gets on.

For more information, please visit christchurch.vet or call 01473 230999.