[vterrell]

My 13 year.old beagle was attacked by a dog on the beach while we were out of the country last June 2012. Long story short, the wound (on her neck) wasn't.properly cleaned and being that we were in a third world country, vets weren't incredibly helpful. An abscess formed about a week after,was drained by the vet only to reform a couple weeks later. This continued periodically, the abscess moving around her neck and showing up in different places, at one point on the complete opposite side. Now we are finally back home a month.ago and I've been taking her to her vet here. At this point of return, the abscess was pretty close to the original wound and was the size of a pretty good hand full. The vet drained it. It came back. Drained again. Finally they performed surgery and cleaned it up and resealed it. A.week later, I removed her bandage to change it and it was dripping pus. Took her back in and they inserted a drain. She had the drain removed 2 days ago and things seeemed to finally be looking up until.I changed the bandage today and it seems like the pus is back. Not nearly as bad as before, but enough to drip from.the incision. I changed the bandage and sterilized the area with betadine. I hope we are in the clear.soon but after almost a year.of this, I need some clarity. What in the world is going on that no vet can fix? Any insight would be very helpful.

[joypulv]

For one thing, the poor dog is old. Age really does make it more difficult for all animals including humans to heal. For another, being 'out of the country' (you don't say which one) could mean any kind of infections or parasites unknown to vets where you are. Even a regular old bacterial infection could have gone deep enough to be difficult to wipe out.

I'm a little puzzled by the bandages being on for so long - the vet doesn't have you change them daily and clean the wound with antiseptic? Was the vet clear on instructions?

[Lucky098]

You should probably send off a culture of the pus to see what type of bacteria is growing and use the antibiotic that will kill it... bacteria can become resistant to antibiotics And re-occurance such as this will happen

[tickle]

You should probably send off a culture of the pus to see what type of bacteria is growing and use the antibiotic that will kill it... bacteria can become resistant to antibiotics And re-occurance such as this will happen

Also, at 13, dog has a pretty compromised immune system which makes this difficult to cope with.