Swollen Paw Pad

I noticed a little swelling yesterday on my dogs paw and thought nothing of it. However it's much larger today, should I be concerned? Should I wait to see a vet or get in ASAP?   Anything I can do at home to help it?

Hello - it looks as though there is a spot of severe inflammation between your dogs' toes.  Sometimes these can be caused by a foreign body such as a grass seed; the body mounts a reaction and 'ejects' them from under the skin.  How to deal with these is quite contraversial.  We used to give antibiotics and anti-inflammatories to return things to superficially near-normal again in the short term, but the FB would remain underneath the skin and the problem flare up again later.  I've known vets go searching for a grass-seed under anaesthetic, but finding them can be more difficult than anticipated.  Sometimes then, it can be a good idea to let the inflammatory system wall the foreign body off as an abscess and do its stuff, but this can cause a lot of pain, licking and local mutilation in the meantime.   So, every case is slightly different and your vet should examine the lesion and work with you to find a preferred plan of action.  Furthermore, they will help to rule out differentials (other possible causes), for example allergy / cysts / lumps on the underlying bone and so on.