I have two labs and my one has an ear issue. His ears have an odor and a black coffee grain like substance in them. The vet has given me several different ear washes to try but none of them have seemed to work. I clean his ears regularly and give him Benadryl occasionally for the irritation but nothing has fully cured the issue. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated. Thank you.

Has he ever given you a antibiotic for his ears or an antibiotic drop? How often are you cleaning his ears?

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Originally Posted by bushg

Has he ever given you a antibiotic for his ears or and antibiotic drop? How often are you cleaning his ears?

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No. I clean them daily with an ear wash and Eucalyptus Oil as recommended.

The 2 times I have taken my dog in I have been given an antibiotic ear drop along with the recommendation to clean them with the ear cleaners. I clean daily until infection is gone adding the med. After the ear is cleaned and then weekly. Same with my cat. My friend has a Sharpei that has chronic ear infections and she always get the ear drops. My suggestion is to ask for some.

One can't always generalize from a few cases. It is a common mistake of the inexperienced. Although Labs have frequent ear infections, some dogs just produce excess ear wax. It is poor practice to give antibiotics if it isn't an infection. Unless the smell is pretty bad, it may just be wax. My one Lab and her half sister both produce excessive wax at times without an infection. Mine gets a lot of infections too. I mainly sort out when to drag her into the vet by the smell. When it is bad, I take her in.

Other times I clean her ears using water with a little vinegar in it. It seems to do a good job, and the price is right. In another thread tonight, somebody mentioned a foaming product. It might be something new and worth checking on.

Labman your post made me think, if the gunk isn't a sign of infection, then surely there is a test that the vet can perform. To find out... thinking back my vet swabbed the ear and did a culture, I gues this is how he determined that a antibiotic drop was needed.

All I remember my vet doing is looking at it with the scope. Different problems may require different techniques.

That poor dog. He must be very uncomfortable. Black coffee grain like substance is very much the decription of how ear mites look to the human eye. Did the vet rule that out completely? Your other dog just might be a very lucky dog that hasn't been infected yet. It is so hard to say what could really help him without the benefit of being able to examine him. If the suggestions here don't help, you might want to consider looking into a second opinion by another vet in your area.