Treatment options for pruritic diseases
Joya Griffin, DVM, DACVD, discusses available treatment options for patients with pruritus, plus factors to consider when choosing the treatment option
In a dvm360 interview, discusses one of her sessions delivered at the 2025 Fetch Charlotte conference taking place March 14-16 in Charlotte, North Carolina, Joya Griffin, DVM, DACVD, talks about treatment options for pruritic diseases in cats and dogs. In this video, Griffin also discusses how veterinarians can determine which treatment option is best for each patient.
Below is the interview transcript, which has been lightly edited for brevity and clarity:
Joya Griffin, DVM, DACVD: For treating atopic dermatitis, it's a diagnosis of exclusion. So I always make sure that I've ruled out food hypersensitivity and have them on a good, consistent flea control program because that will help to prevent flea reactivity. Even if they are not flea-allergic, that will help to prevent that kind of as a flare factor for those allergic dogs.
And then for treating the itch, when we're going through these diagnostic trials, we have lots of options available with Janus kinase inhibitors like Apoquel and Zenrelia. You can also use Cytopoint, which is a monoclonal antibody; and then steroids; those do have their place in our diagnostic trials because you can use them for a short period of time. For Cyclosporine or Atopica, I typically use for more chronic cases, so when I'm trying to approach the pruritic pet, I usually don't start with those because they Atopica takes a little bit longer to start to work, so it's best used for more chronic cases once you have a true diagnosis.
The treatment option is really based off of the severity of the pet, the duration of their itching, and really their response to other therapies. So I really look at each patient, kind of holistically, and figure out what's going to be the best for them. Some patients have other comorbidities or other medications that they may be on that would prevent them or maybe make a certain treatment less doable. And then I always talk to the pet parent about what their thoughts and feelings are surrounding different chronic medications, and we find what's going to be the best fit for them.
