Tip/Tricks for Giving Daily Meds?

ccbaggirl89

ccbaggirl89

Member
Mar 26, 2015
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#1
Hi all! One of my dogs went to the vet recently and needs to take daily meds now. Three small pills AM and the same three small pills PM, every day. 6 pills a day now, basically. I have only been doing this two days and hiding the pills in a snack. I know there are pill pockets, but any other ways to get the pills down? He's a tiny dog and one of the pills is quite large (even cut in half). What tricks do you use to hide the pills other than pill pockets? Would love to hear some suggestions.
 
#2
My dog takes heart meds 4 times a day. Some of it is timed so I can put them in her food and the other times of day I use cream cheese. I cover a pill in it, and she licks it off my finger.

I have tried pill pockets, they are pretty large, and you can cut them in half to use them. I know some people have success with things like roast beef or cheese slices, but I find my dog eats the meat and the pill falls on the floor. Find something he loves - though sometimes they catch on and you have to switch up the treats. Cut up meatballs, liverwurst, soft/wet dog food...
 
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#3
Hey CCbaggirl89,
A soft cheese that can hold a pill, or a piece of hotdog should work. Cheese prob better as it's a small dog and you can smush that pill in it. You can always cut the pill into 4's given its size. If it powders up when it's cut, you can smush the cheese in the powder as well. GL!
 
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#5
I schmoosh a little piece of wheat bread around the pill, squeeze it tight, and slather it with peanut butter. If the pill is large I cut it into multiple pieces with a knife or pill cutter available at any drugstore.
 
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#6
If the pill can be given crushed, crush it and mix with honey. The honey disguises the bitterness of the pill. I used to give my dog his meds this way. He used to lick the honey/ med off my finger and the spoon. When he was too ill to lick the honey, I would crush the pill and mix in water( or caro syrup) and give it via syringe. The space behind the canine teeth are perfect place to squirt the med in their mouth.
When I tried to hide it in cheese or food, he would eat the food and spit out the pill. He was too smart!
Crushed pills are easy to hide in a baby spoonful of vanilla ice cream too. My dog was skinny and needed to gain weight so our vet was fine with giving him a small spoon of vanilla( no chocolate) ice cream twice a day with his meds. The ice cream helped the pills slide down so he couldn't spit the pills out.
 
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#7
Only thing that works for one of mine is vanilla ice cream pockets. I take a tiny bit of vanilla ice cream and mold it around the pill. It's so cold, he doesn't have time to eat around it, so he just swallows whole.
It could probably work with anything really cold.
 
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#9
All of my previous dogs would eventually eat their pills when cheese, peanut butter, bread, a pill pocket or something else malleable was smooshed around the pill... some were more crafty than others and would eat the surrounding treat and then spit out the pill, but eventually they all would get it down (and I think sometimes just did that to get more of the chees, peanut butter or bread!).

One of my current dogs, however, is iffy about food at the best of times (especially weird given he is a beagle) and so none of these options worked. Eventually out of desperation I learned how to open his mount and put it so far back in his throat that he just swallows it down reflexively - it isn't hard to do once you get the hang of it and is truly the only thing that works for him.
 
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