Canine Seborrhea is common skin disorder in dogs and is a primary source for a dogs unpleasant smell. There are three types of seborrhea oeosa, sicca, and dermititis, these conditions upset the natural skin process known as keratinization. These 3 types of seborrhea are further categorized as primary and secondary. Primary is hereditary and secondary is caused by other diseases such as hypothyroidism, pancreatic disease, parasites and allergies. Each type of Seborrhea has unique symptoms, sicca causes a scaliness to the dogs skin, oeosa causes oily skin in addition to the scaliness, dermatitis causes scaliness that tend to flake including oily skin, the multiple impairments that dermatitis causes a dogs skin results in inflammation that compounds the damage. Dogs will continually lick and chew at themselves as the inflammation cause itchy and irritable skin. All three conditions gradually thicken the skin over time causing the skin to become scaly, oily, and crusty, causing the dog constant discomfort and pain. The oil is main cause of a dog’s smell and while common should be treated in all cases.
Causes
The thyroid hormone, thyroxine, is extremely important for our dog’s entire body. It acts as a catalyst in the body and plays significant roles in a variety of effects and reactions, such as oxygen consumption; growth and development; food metabolism; vitamin requirements; reproduction; and resistance to infection. Since hypothyroidism is an underproduction of this important hormone, it is easy to imagine the adverse effects that will have on our dog if she suffers from this hormonal disease.
Treatment
A dogs thyroid health is extremely important, since the thyroid is part of the Endocrine System wich include a dogs glands.