“My new vet put my little Westie on Atopica after he's struggled with severe food allergies for the past year. He's always had mild allergies but this year it has been terrible to the point he got secondary yeast and bacterial skin infections. My previous vet had him on Apoquel which helped for the first couple of weeks and then nothing. My dog was gnawing his fur off, his skin was turning black and getting leathery. It was flaking terribly. His ears and skin were bright red. He was scooting all over the place and dragging his belly across the carpet to the point he was bleeding. Nothing has helped. He's been on prescription dog food for almost a year and he doesn't get anything else. We even use his own kibble as 'treats'. Poor guy. When the vet first put him on Atopica, I hid it in his canned food. The capsule is big and it smells pretty bad. He ate it but vomited the next morning. I didn't put two and two together so that night I gave it to him again, and the next morning he vomited again. I stopped giving it to him at that point and my vet recommended I see a dermatologist for further treatment. I looked up the few she recommended. They were all frightfully expensive and the reviews online made me uncomfortable. I decided to give Atopica a second chance. I did some review reading online and saw that other people's vets were recommending to freeze the Atopica and give it on an empty stomach. Check and check mate. I feed my dog around 5:30pm every night, when I get home from work. Instead of putting the Atopica in his food at dinner, I freeze it and wrap it in a half a slice of cheese, or a slice of ham (technically not supposed to because of his allergies, but its the only way I can get him to swallow that big capsule on his own) and give it to him right before I go to bed, around 11pm, about 5 1/2 hours after he's been fed. I read you should only freeze it up to 10 minutes before you give it to your dog but I keep the whole box in the freezer and store it there permanently. SUCH a difference. He's only thrown up once in the past two weeks, but I'm not entirely sure if it was the medication or a fluke (he has a history of GI problems). The first few days of being on Atopica consistently, he did have loose stools. No diarrhea by any means but it was definitely loose. After about three days that cleared up and went away. Some days he has terrible, terrible gas that smells just like the Atopica capsule. On days like that, or if I hear his stomach making weird noises, I just hide a pepto bismol capsule in his food and it goes away. He's been on Atopica for almost two weeks straight now and I noticed immediate improvement. Within the first 72 hours, his skin was returning to its normal color (the black is most likely permanent but the bright red inflammation has subsided), his skin was flaking but in a healing way. Instead of dandruff, he had large flakes of skin that I would pick out of his coat and underneath the flakes would be bright, smooth, healthy skin. His ears are back to normal and he's no longer scooting, shaking his head, dragging his belly or chewing at his legs. Every now and then he stops and scratches at his sides but a dog is going to scratch, they are dogs after all. He's sleeping at night, in fact he's been doing a lot of sleeping. I tell myself he's catching up because he's been so miserable that he'd never lay down...but I'm also starting to wonder if drowsiness is a side effect? Knock on wood, he's only vomited the one time since I started freezing the Atopica and giving it to him on an empty stomach. This medication has been a life saver. The only reason I didn't give it 5 stars is because of the gas and potential upset stomach.”
“Allivet has the best price around for this medication. My vet uses this to treat my dogs severe inflammatory bowel disease. She has no side effects from this medication and seems to control her symptoms better than anything else we've tried.”
“I've tried everything for my cat's allergy issues! This Atopica works great. She went from gnawing, licking, and chewing on a scale of 1-10...she was a 10. She has been on Atopica for a month now and she is ZERO. I put it in a Pill Pocket and she is good to go! Allivet has been great. They are very helpful with any questions I have and their prices are good! Thanks!”
“Best price I could find online. My GSD has been on a maintenance level of Atopica for several years and will be on it for the rest of his life. I was originally able to get it through my vet at about $55/box (discounted) but they recently lost their discount from manufacturer and now charge full price of $101/box. We use 2 boxes a month, so wanted to find the best price out there!”
“While searching details on Atopica I found the Allivet site and discovered that I was able to purchase the allergy medicine for my Shih Tzu on line versus my vet. I was able to reduce my out of pocket costs by eliminating the middle man, our Vet. Allivet was great and made my purchase very easy by calling the Vet for verification and within a few days the products arrived.”
