[LucyGoosey]

Hi, guys; I'm at a loss here. I'll preface this by saying yes, I have been working with my vet, but I'm wondering if it may be time for more extreme measures/treatment or a second/third professional opinion.


SITUATION:
Lucy turned 7 in August. For the last year or so, she's been having a wet sound in her nose. Sometimes her she'll have clear snot bubbles, sometimes not. In the morning she'll sneeze repeatedly for a few minutes (usually around 10 times). When she's grooming herself, she'll sound like she's tryiing to breathe at the bottom of a big pot of mac & cheese; it sounds thick, wet, gurgly, and disgusting; the Skesis form the Dark Crystal tucking into some dinner.

When she's sleeping or napping or otherwise not excited, her breathing is relatively quiet, though at times there's some audible wheezing or other respiratory sounds.

Here's the kicker: other than this nasal issue, she is perfectly healthy and happy; she's energetic, eats & drinks fine, pees and poops fine, plays with her doggie brothers and sisters, sleeps well, and continues to have a friendly disposition with the curious intelligence that Yorkies are known for. All I can think is that if I were the one having the issues she's having, I'd be miserable. It's basically like congestion and a runny nose nonstop, only she can't use kleenexes.


TREATMENTS SO FAR
When it first started happening, I started giving her Claritin. This seemed to work for a bit, but then stopped having any effect. Then I took her to the vet once I started to get more concerned and noticed it just wasn't going away.

The vet initially took some labs and prescribed a steroid and antibiotic. I don't think this helped much, if at all. This was prescribed because the labs showed some bacteria, which might've been secondary to chronic allergies. When this treatment didn't help, we tried switching foods a couple times. Still no help. Then the vet prescribed Apoquel. This worked like a miracle for about a month. But as of about two weeks ago, the wet sounds, nasal inflammation, sneezing, snorting, and gurgling are back as bad as they ever were.


MOVING FORWARD
I am still working on switching pill pockets for the pill, but she was doing fine for most of the time using pill pockets. The vet has said we can do a rhinoscopy to see if there's any tumor or debris caught in her nose causing the problem. This is likely my next step, but I'm wondering if I should maybe get a different vet's opinion. I have any number of very good vets in my area to choose from.


So...

What say you, YorkieTalk peeps? Has anyone dealt with anything like this before? I'm still hoping it's something stupid simple and easy to eliminate if it's environmental or food related or something I'm just overlooking.