Alfonso Fernandez, a Barcelona veterinarian, explains three types of mange in dogs: otodectic, demodectic, and sarcoptic. He covers their symptoms, how to diagnose them, treatment options, and which ones spread to other animals.
Hi everyone, I'm Alfonso Fernandez. I'm a veterinarian. I work in Barcelona at the San Jose Veterinaris Veterinary Clinic. And today I'm here to talk to you about mange and dogs. Mange is a type of disease caused by parasites. Parasites that are mites similar to those we can find in house dust, although there are different types. In the case of dogs, we basically refer to three sarcoptic mange, demodectic mange and otectic mange. We're going to explain the differences between them now. We'll start with otodectic mange, which is perhaps the easiest or simplest to see. We're going to find a dog that has very itchy ears and therefore shakes its ears a lot, scratches them. It can cause wounds outside the ear and inside the ear. What we're going to see is that the skin of the ear will be red, very irritated, and we'll see black brownish wax that looks like sand. If we take our animal to the vet, the vet will take a sample, look at it under a microscope, or even sometimes just observe. With a lotus scope, they'll be able to see the bugs moving. They're microscopic. And this to give you an idea of how annoying it can be. If you're sleeping and a mosquito flies near your ear and wakes you up, imagine having not one, but hundreds inside your ear, moving, feeding, reproducing and doing all sorts of things. It's incredibly annoying. These bugs feed on skin debris, on liquids, that the skin releases the cells and the wax itself. And this is where the problems arise, because when there is an attack on the ear canal, the body produces wax to try to protect itself. You want to protect yourself and you are feeding them. The treatment is very easy, it is very simple. There are different options on the market, from pipettes to tablets. Your vet will tell you which is the best treatment. There are even people who say that simply cleaning the ears is enough, basically because the cleaning liquid will drown them. It is always better to resort to other things. Cleaning is fine, the cleaner the ear is the better, but you can always resort to other things. It is a type of mange that is highly contagious through contact between animals. It is not contagious to people and it is important that you understand this. It is something that you always ask us when you come, can this be transmitted? I have children. Don't worry, nothing will happen. It is contagious between animals, but it is not contagious to people. The next type of mange we are going to talk about is Modific mange. American scabies is a form of scabies caused by a bug called Demodex canis. Demodex is a mite that normally lives on a dog's skin. And under certain circumstances it starts to grow more than the body can control. The immune system can't control it. And that's when we start to see problems. It usually happens in puppies. What we usually see are patches, areas without skin. They may be a little redder and they may or may not itch. And we usually find it mainly on the hands, face and ears. It's a benign process that is often self limiting. In other words, it can be controlled over time without doing anything. But it's always better if we help it to diagnose it. Your vet will do a skin scraping. It is a test in which we will scrape the skin with a scalpel blade. And what we are lifting, we will look at it under a microscope. And there you can easily see it. The treatment, in the past it was based on baths with insecticides, injections of specific insecticides. Now things have been modernized and simply with tablets or pills. It can be, that is, with pipettes, sorry, it can be solved without problems. Your veterinarian will tell you what the appropriate treatment is for the specific case of your animal. If demodicitis or demodectic mange occurs in adult animals or in young animals that have not been treated, a generalized form can occur that is more widespread on the body, extremities and face, which has very similar symptoms. Sometimes it can be a little more itchy because the skin becomes super infected. Generally, these generalized forms are usually associated with an underlying disease. There is something here, some internal disease that is causing the animal's immune system to malfunction. And when this immune system does not function properly, this mite takes advantage of it and grows more than it should. So when we have an animal that has generalized demodectic mange, it is important to go to the vet, not only to treat the mange, but to try to find out what is favoring the growth of this mite. And finally, we will talk about sarcoptic mange. I have left it for the end, because unlike the other two, this one is contagious to people. It is caused by a mite called sarcoptic mange. This mite feeds on the skin. It feeds by digging galleries inside the skin. And this causes very intense itching. An itching that also, interestingly enough, increases when it is warmer. It increases with the temperature because the temperature activates the movement of the mite, as I mentioned before, especially areas with little hair, such as elbows, ears, ventral areas of the abdomen and chest. It causes very, very intense itching. The animal scratches itself all day long and in a desperate manner. This scratching, as I mentioned before, can also cause a bacterial super infection of the skin, which ends up causing more itching. Your veterinarian will also diagnose this type of mange based on scratching. But it is a deeper scratching. It is a scratching in which we have to make the skin bleed a lot. And just because we do not see this mite in a scraping, does not mean that it is not there. We can do a deep scraping and not find it. That is why it is important that your veterinarian, as they will tell you, does scrapings from different areas of the body. As I was saying, this scabies is indeed an azinosis. That is, it is a disease that can be transmitted to people. In people, it also causes intense itching. You will see pimples on the skin and we will also notice that the itching increases with the temperature. In other words, in winter, when we are in bed at night, covered up to our ears with blankets or a duvet, that is when we will notice more itching. As a general rule, when we treat dogs, it is not necessary to treat people because this parasite does not complete its life cycle in people. In other words, it does lay eggs, but these eggs do not develop. No new individuals emerge from them and therefore the cycle ends. Treatment, as I mentioned with other types of scabies, used to be much more complicated. It was based on a medication that is widely used in farm animals, which required two injections separated by a certain amount of time. Now things have been much easier and it can be controlled with topical treatments such as pipettes or antiparasitic tablets. It is always likely that we will also need to do something else. If we have an infection, we can also treat it with antibiotics or baths to promote the regeneration of the skin and combat any problems we may have here. In any case, as I have told you on previous occasions, your veterinarian will be the one to tell you what the best treatment is in each case. And that's all the information I wanted to give you about scabies. I hope you found the content interesting and if you want to contact us, you can find us in Barcelona on Sagrera Street. Hey, you can find us on our website, san josevetrinaris.com or you can search for us on Facebook. Clinica San Jose Veterinaris thank you very much for your attention. See you soon.
