The secret list

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Sunday, February 13, 2011

Jan 1, Dog Eye Problems, Symptoms and Care Tips - Pictures of Cloudy, Cherry eyes, Third Eyelid and Glaucoma

Dog eye problems can be relatively common occurrences, and there are a variety of them that occur most frequently.

Dog health

Dog eye care is essential for pet owners because unlike you they cannot simply remove any foreign objects from their eyes themselves, and they can't directly alert you to pain they are in. Therefore you have to be attentive to symptoms and you should work on keeping your dog as healthy as possible with preventative and maintenance dog eye care to prevent worsening conditions.

Dog Eye Problem
Pictures shows a dog with an irritating eye.


Many dog eye problems can be easily prevented with some very easy and light maintenance and care. For example, taking just a moment once per day to use a clean, damp cloth to wipe away the buildup of gunk around your dog's eyes can help prevent irritations and infections. Gently use a wet cloth to wipe the area clean and be careful to not rub, poke or scratch the actual eye.


You should also be sure to keep the hair under and around the corner of the eyes short and well kept as well. The hair itself could begin to poke, bother or scratch the eyes, or the presence of the hair can prevent the proper disposal of some of that eye buildup and gunk. Of course, if you trim the hair yourself always do it in a downward direction, in other words never have the tip of the scissors pointed toward your pooch's eye. Even a calm dog could suddenly jerk, move or twitch leading to serious potential eye injury.

Dog Eye Care


First of all it's simply bound to happen that your dog at some point will get irritated eyes as a result of contact with some other kind of object or material, or even as the result of some kind of foreign object being embedded into their eyes. If your dog irritated, reddened, slightly swollen or inflamed eyes and so forth, you can try to flush out the eyes yourself.


You can use a contact lens solution, a pre-made saline solution or a quick salt solution you can make on your own. Just mix in a teaspoon of salt into a pint of water. Then dampen a clean cloth, cleaning the eye area gently. You can also use an eye dropper to get some of that solution directly into the eyes.


If you see that there is actually something stuck in the eyes, you will want to go see the vet as soon as possible. There could already be small and damaging scratches or there could even be corneal ulcers. The dog may need to receive some anesthesia and undergo a brief surgical procedure to remove something that's really stuck up there.


Don't try to do this yourself because you need to be careful and precise and your dog could be in significant. It's a situation where the proper dog eye care is really administered by the vet, although you can check for the problem existing, looking for any foreign objects you can directly see, or noticing symptoms such as swelling of the eyes, tearing and even blood.


There are certain dog breeds such as beagles, cocker spaniels, Pekingese, and bulldogs are more proned in getting an eye conditon calls Cherry Eyes. Cherry eye is a prolapse of the gland of the third eyelid. Dermatitis, bacteria, parasite or fungal infections may cause inflammation of the eyelids. This makes gland protrudes and becomes irritated. The normal treatment for cherry eye is surgical replacement of the gland.


Another one of the common dog eye problems that you may run across is a cataract. Cataracts in dogs are essentially the same as they are in people, the lens becomes cloudy and opaque, which can significantly hamper vision and even lead to blindness in severe cases.


It's important to catch this problem as early as possible, and this can be done by regular veterinarian check ups. Additionally, keep notice if your dog seems to be struggling to maneuver around. The lens can actually be removed through surgery, although the condition cannot be completely cured. In the majority of circumstances, cataracts are genetic conditions, although trauma and injury could also create these kinds of dog eye problems.


Another serious dog eye problem is Glaucoma. It is a condition where increased pressure within the eye. The pressure causes the eye to stretch and enlarge which will cause eye blindness later on. Glaucoma is an inheritable disease and is common for a couple of dog breeds like cocker spaniels, chow chows and labrador retrievers.


These are some of the more common and basic dog eye problems that you'll encounter and it's important to be familiar with them. You can prevent a lot of hassle and aggravation for you and your pooch by practicing preventative dog eye care and by being attentive to early warning signs and other symptoms. Most problems can be easily fixed, although some like severe cataracts have serious long term consequences.

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