I have a medical question for you guys. Sometime ago, Alfred was put on some antibiotics and a cortisone spray because he had something called hyperpigmentation. As I understand it, he must have had some kind of low grade infection that caused him to be itchy and cause some skin issues. There was some hair loss on the insides of his legs and on his groin. The skin also had darkened. The antibiotics and cortisone did seem to reduce that and, while the skin is still a little bit darker, it is generally a nice pink tone and some hair is growing back. But he also seemed itchy and was rolling around and rubbing his face on the ground etc more than normal. I had put him on Benadryl but they switched him to apoquel. He has now been off that for a few days and I think the itchiness is returning.

We never really explored what the underlying issue was. Initially, I thought it was a seasonal allergy because he has had itchiness problems in the fall before. So we assumed that's what it was. But we have now had cold enough weather that I would have thought any outdoor allergies such as ragweed would have ended. Nothing inside has really changed except, of course, the furnace is now on. But I am pretty good at replacing filters etc. Anyway, the point is, I'm not sure why he is itchy. He also seems to be shedding a fair bit although he is a very thick coated dog and I'm not sure whether he is in fact shedding more or it's just my imagination.

Any thoughts on where I should go with this? I am thinking of asking to put him on apoquel longer term although it seems to be horribly expensive. I may inquire about getting the prescription from the vet but buying the pills from Costco as I know this dramatically reduced the cost on some drugs we've used before with previous dogs. Anyway, any thoughts are welcome. I hate to see my poor baby itching and rubbing his face etc but hate to think that this might be a long-term problem