Help! Giving ear drops to my dog.

lorweld

I have a 1 year old pomeranian who has an ear infection. I brought him to the vets today & she prescribed Surolan ear drops to be administered twice daily in each ear.

Has anyone any tips on giving these ear drops? Poor Rua hates me at his ears and goes crazy when I try I've tried rubbing him down to calm him before but the minute I try putting the drops in he begins whimpering, snapping at me & clawing me. I eventually got some in but there's loads on his coat. I tried again this evening when he was sleepy & the same thing only worse. I've marks on my arms from him clawing me. I feel so bad for him as obviously he's in pain & getting extremely distressed by me at his ears but he needs his medication to get better

He is now hiding under the table looking at me like I'm the biggest meanie in the world even the lure of a treat isn't working.

Has anyone any tips?

Rips

Wrap him in a thick towel to keep those claws out of your way. Sit on the floor and put him in between your legs, use one arm to wrap around him and steady his head, and use the other apply the ear drops. If you hold the bottle in your palm, palm up, with your thumb and index finger on the base of the bottle, you can also use the heel of that same hand, to steady the head as you apply them. Surolan is thick, so give the bottle a good shake before you even start and make sure its squeezed down ready to apply.

You may need to switch hands to do the opposite side even if you are trying to apply them with your stronger hand.

DBB

I'd also add to what Rips advises, and suggest that you give him a nice treat or two before you begin just after you've the towel wrapped around him, followed by an amazingly fab treat when you're finished

lorweld

Thanks so much for the advice! Will try that in the morning & see how it goes. He has just forgiven me & is cuddling into me

kylith

It helps if you have a friend to help hold them, I find. Two tips are to 1) keep the bottle in your pocket for about half and hour before administering it so it's warm, and 2) to periodically throughout the day quickly check their ears without putting any drops in. That will get them used to you being at their ears, if you keep doing it occasionally they soon won't be as bothered. I do a fake examination of mine's ears, eyes, and teeth every now and then, they're not mad about it but they accept it as something humans do and it means they're not so bothered when the vet checks them.

DBB

To fancy it all up a bit, you could train him to enjoy his ears being touched... if you've ever clicker trained him, this would be ideal.
If not, here goes!
Get yourself a clicker, and a box of treats. Put the box of treats where you can reach them easily but where he can't see them.
Without making the clicker too obvious, when your dog is beside you, click.
Immediately reach for a treat in the box and give one to him.
Repeat this, 20 times.
Now, touch him anywhere on his body (not his ears).
Click and treat.
Repeat this 10 times.
Move your touch very slightly further towards the ears, each time clicking and treating just after you've touched him.
Once he's comfortable with this, start to concentrate near the ears for while: touch near his ears 10 times at each training session, clicking and treating each time. You can do several training sessions a day.
Don't push things any further until he's quite happy for you to touch around his ears.

To illustrate the process, not quite the same thing but here's a video of Dr. Sophia Yin (Veterinary behaviourist) clicker training a dog who hates having his nails trimmed.
However, I do feel that the time it took her to get the result with this dog was terribly fast! Now, maybe your little Pom will proceed as fast as this too, but it's unlikely! The trick is to not proceed to the next step until he's happy enough at the previous step, and if you can enlist the help of an assistant, all the better.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WWZUcLfHXLE