Nail Problems; Does This Sound Familiar?

[kudzu]

A while back I noticed Venus had a claw on a rear foot that appeared caked in dried mud near the nail bed. Attempted to scrape off the “mud” only to find it was actually part of her nail. Was a very weird texture but considered it just an oddity. Didn't give it any more thought.

 

Monday Venus started licking one toe on a front foot. That toe has a bad ligament & is prone to subluxating. Worried she'd reinjured it I was surprised to find that it wasn't swollen & she was actually licking near the nail bed. Couldn't find anything wrong, no injury or signs of infection. She continued to lick at it & by Wed. she was limping & occasionally holding the paw up when she was standing still. So I carted her off to the vet Wed expecting this to be something like arthritis. Only problem the vet could find was that the nail felt slightly “loose.” Since it looked otherwise healthy the vet thinks this is likely the result of trauma. So V is on restrictions for the next month in hopes of getting it to heal.

 

This morning I noticed that odd nail on the back foot. Then noticed a similar one on the other back food. Ran my fingernail across the surface of one of the nails & a chunk fell off. It was several layers thick & from the area along the nail bed, not the tip. Now one side of that nail is very thin. Also, the tip is chalky for lack of a better descriptor. If you scrape it lightly you get a white powdery substance. That doesn't happen with her other nails. (The toe involved is on the same leg V has been gimpy on for a while relating to an old muscle injury so hard to gauge if the nail hurts when she puts weight on that foot.) No way did I try scraping the odd nail on the other back foot for fear of breaking some of it off.

 

So I go to take a look at the nails on her front feet again. Shape looks fine on them with one exception. On the same foot with the loose nail is another toe with a hollow nail. Her nails are not long in Greyhound terms & the were clipped at the vet's Wed so isn't what was the tip & closer to the quick.

 

Reported all this to the vet today. Unless Venus acts like she's hurting more or the problem increases we're still taking a 30 day wait & see attitude. However, the vet felt it suspicious, worries about the pain issue & suggested I go ahead & increase EFA's, particularly EPA & add Vitamin E.

 

Anyone seen anything similar? I don't care what her nails look like. I just don't want her hurting.

Edited October 24, 2011 by kudzu

[tbhounds]

Sounds like the beginnings of SLO. It was a great idea to increase the efa's.

[duncan41]

What dose of EPA, EFA and Vitamin E are you giving Venus and how much does she weigh, if you don't mind me asking?

 

Sure hope you get to the bottom of this soon!

[kudzu]

Sounds like the beginnings of SLO. It was a great idea to increase the efa's.

Yeah, clearly the vet is suspicious of this. It would be a very mild case at this point. We figured the extra EFA & vit E couldn't hurt. In fact, I am hoping it will help with the rear leg.

 

What dose of EPA, EFA and Vitamin E are you giving Venus and how much does she weigh, if you don't mind me asking?

Venus is about 60 lbs. We're starting the Vit E at 200 iu/day but may later increase it to 400 iu. She was already getting supplemental EFA. Vet suggested increasing EPA to 1000 mg. Am using Carlson Super Omega 3 & will up V's dose to 4 capsule per day. Here's the breakdown on that:

Supplement Facts

Serving Size: 1 Soft Gel

Amount Per Soft Gel

Calories 9

Calories from Fat 9

Total Fat 1 g

Vitamin E Natural (d-Alpha Tocopherol) 10 IU

Omega-3 Fatty Acids (from fish oil) 600 mg

EPA (Eicosapentaenoic Acid) 300 mg

DHA (Docosahexaenoic Acid) 200 mg

Other Omega-3's 100 mg

 

eta: Well I guess if you add the Vit E from the fish oil Venus will be getting 240 iu/day.

Edited October 22, 2011 by kudzu

[Guest Greytluv]

My IG has it. His nails crumble and grow at odd angles. I tried the Vit E but it didn't help. He just gets Salmon Grizzly Oil now. I keep his nails as short as I can. If they get too long they start to break off and causes a lot of pain.

[Blitzen_n_Simone]

Sounds like SLO.

 

Fish oil and Vit E are the ticket for my grey right now.

[kudzu]

Well, now it looks like two nails are lifting off the quick. Venus is such a stoic dog but this is clearly causing her more pain. She is on meloxicam & a very low dose of gabapentin for her back right leg with tramadol as needed. This morning I gave her one tramadol but tonight I upped it to two. She has now stopped licking it & seems more comfortable. Had thought keeping my girl from being bouncy would be hard but as of last night that ceased to be a problem. This is so disturbing. I hate for anyone to hurt but it's even more upsetting when someone so tough & uncomplaining gets so down. In my examination & photo taking I was working very hard not to touch the nails at all.

 

Do they always bleed when the nails are shed or could we get lucky & skip that part? The blessing so far, for the humans at least, is there is not oozing, bleeding, etc. Had warned BF that if the nail came off we could be in for bloodshed. So far not. I've no idea how long it will take for these nails to come off the rest of the way. My poor girl.

 

For the record, here is Nail One as of 10/21, this is the original problem nail

 

Nail One 10/23 AM, now separating from quick

 

Nail Two 10/23 AM, looked hollow Wed & now starting to lift up

 

Nail Three 10/23 AM, this is a normal looking nail on the same foot

Edited October 24, 2011 by kudzu

[tbhounds]

Oh boy- I would bet money on it that it's SLO. The nails don't often bleed when they lift off and actually as the disease progress' there's less blood and less pain. I think that's because you are no longer dealing with a healthy, vascular nail. The nailbed dries pretty quickly requiring no bandaging.

I would start the traditional protocol tetracyline, niacinimide asap- maybe you can slow the progress down at this point.

I heard that tetracycline is hard to get hold off right now but, not to worry many Drs are using Doxy with the same results.

[tbhounds]

I wanted to add-- there's another medication that's being used for SLO--Pentoxifylline. I used it with my boy years ago and I found it was as effective as the tetra/B-3 combo.

Just thought I would throw that out there.

[kudzu]

Thanks tbhounds. Have call into vet. Was already thinking to at least start niacinimide. Will discuss tetracycline, doxy or pentoxyfiline. Oh goody, more vet med to learn. Just what I needed... NOT!

 

Morning update: Nail 2 almost as bad as 1. Nail 3 appears to be hollowing out. She is now occasionally making yips of pain even though she is on meloxicam & low dose gabapentin. Have added in tramadol. Poor baby is normally so stoic. [sigh]

 

ETA: anyone know of a correlatio between Lyme disease & SLO or immune mediated diseases in general?

Edited October 24, 2011 by kudzu

[Guest Yankeegreyhound]

That looks just like my Sara and she has SLO. She started taking 1000mg fish oil 2x a day, 400iu vitamin E 2x a day, niacinimide 2x a day and something else, I can't remember the name right now but I got the info from the Grassmere website.

 

Within a couple of weeks, she stopped licking her feet. No new nails have become affected.

 

The good thing is, any nails that came off, didn't bleed except for 1 (that darn dew claw!). But that 1 came off when she slipped and got it stuck on something in the car so I don't think it was ready to come off yet.

[kudzu]

Left message for vet this morning saying V has two nails coming off & asked for call back. I missed her call but she left a message saying, "Well, apparently this is already more advanced than we thought. I want to start her on tetracycline & niacinamide." Oh, I so love this vet! Here's hoping we can stop the progress of this disease quickly.