My dog's head is swollen after a fight. How to ease pain at home?

I am so sorry to hear about your dog. It sounds like you have done all you are going to be able to do for her at home. I would recommend a visit to the emergency vet if there is one in your area, if not see your vet first thing in the morning as she is likely going to need oral antibiotics as well as pain medication, and should have the eye examined to be sure there was no damage to the eye itself. Continue to ice the area to help with pain and swelling until she is seen. You can take a bag of frozen peas or corn and wrap in a thin cloth/towel (don't put the ice pack directly on the skin with no barrier in between) for 5-10 minutes every few hours if she will tolerate this. Do not give any over the counter pain medication because these can be poorly tolerated by dogs and may cause more harm than good.

Thank you for submitting your question. I'm sorry to hear about the dog fight. I'm concerned that her face is still swollen this many days after the fight. There is a chance an abscess has now formed. Bacteria are introduced under the skin with the bite. The skin tends to heal over the wound trapping the bacteria under the skin. If the infection grows, a swelling known as an abscess forms. This will likely require antibiotics, if not surgery to heal. Your dog will need to see a veterinarian. In the meantime, you can try warm compresses at home. Apply a warm washcloth to the swollen area for 5 minutes three times per day. I hope this information!

I'm sorry but there is nothing we can tell you to do about this. My goodness, he got shot in the head! If you were shot in the head you would be at the hospital. I can appreciate you may be in a remote area or may not have the funds for a vet but we cannot tell you what to do via the internet. If you can't take him to a vet, he will either pull through this or not. He needs a neurological exam, x-rays, blood testing and only then would we be able to make a treatment plan. The drugs he would need to reduce any intracranial swelling you cannot get on the street or in the pharmacy; you can only get them from a vet and these drugs are not benign. The animals have to be monitored closely on these medications. It is not just as easy as giving him an injection or a tablet. Hopefully the swelling you are seeing is just swelling under the skin. You can ice any swollen areas for 5 minutes 3-4 times per day for the next couple days. Hopefully that will help to reduce swelling. If you want to post again and tell us what over the counter medications you have available to you for inflammation/pain (human drugs) then we can tell you if you can give him one of those. Please put the name of the drug, the milligram strength and the dog's weight or we won't be able to give you any dosing information.

Poor Bow! If she was bitten in the face and throat, she could have developed an abscess (a local pocket of infection) from the bites. This commonly happens from dog bites. It's quite serious that these areas have swollen up so much they look like a big balloon, and it could negatively affect her breathing. She absolutely has to see a vet today for this issue so she can be treated. Please bring her into a vet now. As for the fighting, if they both are not spayed, it could be related to hormones. I recommend discussing spaying both of them with your vet. I hope this helps!

Oh my. This looks like a pretty serious injury. Your poor fur baby needs to see your local vet to have this wound managed well. The only thing you can do over the counter is to flush the wound with Betadine diluted 50:50 with warm water and then sterile saline daily. The vet will investigate this area to see if any stitches or staples need to be placed and also get your poor baby on oral antibiotics (ie Clindamycin) and anti-inflammatory medicine (ie Rimadyl). Without proper closure and antibiotics, this wound will likely not heal well. Here is a financial resources website link if you need financial help as well. http://m.humanesociety.org/animals/resources/tips/trouble_affording_veterinary_care.html I hope that she/ he heals up soon. Best wishes and take care.

Thanks for using PetCoach. Unfortunately, without an exam (or at least pictures), I'm a bit limited on what advice I can give. Where the wound is would be important to know. I am less concerned about a bite to the leg than I am to the belly or neck. How deep is it? How is Della Reese feeling? Is she eating and running around or lethargic and not eating? My concerns and recommendations -Infection - very common in dog bite wounds - if there is a hole or deep wound anywhere, it needs to be flushed very thoroughly with dilute iodine or hydrogen peroxide. This is possibly the MOST important step. The wounds need to be left OPEN to drain. If you cover them up tightly you will be trapping the bacteria inside and cause an abscess. They will drain some blood-tinged fluid for a few days but it shouldn't be pure blood. If the mess is a problem, put a t-shirt on her (if wounds are on the torso) or keep her on tile/laminate surfaces. Warm compress the wounds twice daily to encourage that fluid to come out the wound holes. Honestly, depending on the severity and location, she really needs antibiotics. Even if you can only get into the vet for the exam and antibiotics, its worth doing. - Blood loss- as noted above, you're more-likely seeing blood-tinged discharge stuff than actual pure blood. Even if there was pure blood at first, she is big enough that she could safely loose a cup of blood or more. - Pain medication - motrin (ibuprofen) is an unsafe drug choice for dogs and is not recommended. If she has only had one dose, stop and switch her to aspirin 24 hours after the first dose. If she has had more than one dose, stop and start aspirin 72 hours from the last dose of motrin. https://www.petcoach.co/canigive/dog/aspirin/ Also don't forget ice!! Ice has incredible anti-inflammatory and pain-relieving effects. Ice up the wounded area(s) for 5-10 minutes as often as you can (up to every 3-4 hours). If it's time to warm compress, do that first and then ice. I hope this has at least given you a place to start. Best of luck to you and Della Reese.

Hi there and thank you for using Petco Pet Education Center, formerly Petcoach to address your concern. You can try and place a cold compress on the area for 2-3 minutes several times a day to see if this helps and lightly massage the area to see if this gets the swelling down. You can also try an anti-inflammatory for dogs, which can be found at your local pet store. I would recommend Well and Good Buffered Aspirin, which can be found at PetCo. If there is no improvement or the swelling increases, I would recommend having Lilly examined by a veterinarian so that the most appropriate diagnostic and treatment recommendations can be made. I hope this helps! Please let me know if you have any other questions or concerns and I would be more than happy to help you further.