Repeat ear infection

[louiseb]

My daughter has a 15 month old Bichon Cavalier cross. He is adorable but had an ear infection lasting several weeks around Christmas. This involved several visits to the vet, a general anaesthetic as he would not let the vet look in his ears, several lots of pills (easy to get down hidden in food) and several lots of ear drops (biggest nightmare ever!)
Thank goodness for pet insurance as the total came to well over £500, for which my daughter had to pay £130-odd towards the cost. We were disappointed with the vet as the dog only had one ear infected at first, but after the first visit, it spread to the other ear. Was this because the vet didn't wear gloves or sterilise his equipment between ears? He looked in the poorly ear first. A couple of days later the other ear became poorly. We are pathetic and didn't say anything about this.

Anyway, eventually all seemed ok and healed after what seemed forever. And now we notice he has another one! He's scratching like crazy and the flaps are red and the canals are dirty. Poor little mite. We've kept his ears clean since the last one and are now at the end of our tether. We are booking him in at the vet's tomorrow, but our biggest nightmare is trying to get the drops in his ears. He changes from the most adorable bundle into a snarling devil and it's quite scary. He HATES having drops in and a lot of the time it's impossible. We could only usually manage it when he was asleep.

We are going to a different vet this time - the one who did his vaccination once the ear infection had passed.

Any thoughts on repeat ear infections, how to treat and how to get drops into a lovely pup?

many thanks

louise