StoriesMarch 27, 2012

Commentary

Can dogs sneeze? You better believe it
Can dogs sneeze? You better believe it
David T. Roen
David T. Roen

This column originally was published in the Tribune on March 3, 1997.

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I love to sneeze. When I sneeze, it echoes through the house. My wife gets mad and the dog and cats run and hide.

Dogs sneeze, too. Some of them sneeze so hard that they bounce their nose on the floor. I can identify with that.

Sneezing clears the nose of some minor irritation, such as dust or pollen. If the sneezing continues for more than an hour or two, a veterinary examination may be a good idea. It is very common for dogs to get grass awns, especially "cheat grass," or other plant material up their nose. They will usually start sneezing suddenly, and sneeze persistantly. Sometimes they sneeze out a little blood-tinged mucus from one nostril.

We can sometimes look up into a dog's nostrils with an "otoscope," an instrument designed for looking into ears. It has a tube that fits into the ear (or nostril), a light and a lens to enlarge the image. You can sometimes get a nice view of all the little nooks and crannies in the nose.

But if the dog is sneezing to begin with, they really want to sneeze when you stick that tube up their nose. And the veterinarian is right in the line of fire.

This is one of the most delicate of veterinary procedures. If you finally manage to maneuver the scope up the dog's nose, you have about three seconds to look around in there: The dog is going "aahh ... aaahhh ... aaaahhhh ...." - and then he sneezes, and the last thing you see before being blown away is the lens of your scope turning wet and snotty.

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We may need to use a short-acting anesthetic for the exam, and if there is a grass awn in the nose, we almost always have to use an anesthetic to remove it or to flush the nose thoroughly.

Bad teeth can also cause a runny nose and sneezing. A tooth abscess may break open and begin draining pus into the nose. Pulling the tooth usually stops the runny nose, but sometimes a permanent hole, called a "fistula," develops between the tooth socket and the nose. These can be very hard to clear up.

If sneezing is not caused by a foreign body in the nose, or an abscessed tooth, and doesn't clear up by itself in a week or two, we may really have our work cut out for us.

Deep-seated sinus infections, caused by bacteria, or perhaps a fungus or similar organisms, are one possibility. There are also some kinds of cancer that occur in the nose, or the bones around the nose. A type of parasite - nasal mites - can infest the nose.

Diagnosing these things is tough. Samples of the nasal discharge can be put on a slide for examination under a microscope, and possible culture. Anesthesia is required for good X-rays and perhaps collection of samples from deeper in the nose for culture or tissue examination.

Some of them can be successfully treated, and some are extremely difficult, or impossible, to cure. The good news is that many dogs, and cats, even though they sneeze all the time, still live long, happy lives. Or maybe they're happy because they get to sneeze all the time.

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Roen is a retired Clarkston veterinarian whose columns were published weekly in the Lewiston Tribune for more than 30 years. He may be contacted at jazzvet@cableone.net.

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