Keeping Your Dogs Teeth Healthy

The one thing about dogs they are your very best friend. Every time you walk through the door your dog is so happy to see you that he wags his tail and virtually smiles at you. How can you show you’re pet how much they mean to you? Well, one way is to think about that smile for your pet. Did you know that your dog’s diet can influence their oral health and teeth?

Humans need to brush and floss their teeth regularly to keep their teeth, tongue, and gums in good condition. Research has recently shown a link between good oral health in humans and a lower risk of heart disease. If good oral health can have such a profound affect on people, then it only makes sense to consider the impact it can have on man’s best friend.

It is important to brush your dog’s teeth frequently to keep plaque and tartar from becoming an issue. Even wiping his gums with a clean, damp cloth can be beneficial.

Your dog’s diet also plays a role in your pet’s oral health. Do you typically feed your dog canned or dry dog food? What kind of treats and toys do you provide for your pet? All of these things can affect the likelihood of trouble with your pet’s teeth.
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Dog Vitamins(Canine Supplements)

Signs and Symptoms

In order to be healthy, all dogs require exercise and proper nutrition. A healthy, balanced diet can go a long way toward ensuring health and happiness for your pet. However, just as with humans, a proper diet may not always be enough to ensure optimal nutrition. Generally, vitamins and supplements are required in order to meet all of one’s nutritional needs and to boost physiological function. This is why dog vitamins are important; they augment a balanced diet and healthy lifestyle to provide your pet with the best level of health attainable.

While almost all dogs will benefit from some form of vitamin or nutritional supplement, there are situations where dog vitamins are actually required in order to prevent or treat ill health. If your pet is suffering from malnutrition, or at least isn’t quite receiving the optimal amounts of vitamins and minerals, its health could be in jeopardy. Malnutrition weakens your dog’s system and makes it more susceptible to illness and disease. For this reason, it’s important for pet owners to be aware of potential signs of improper nutrition so the situation can be dealt with quickly, before your dog suffers from too many consequences.

While deficiencies of different vitamins may manifest themselves through various sets of symptoms, there are some general warning signs that pet owners can watch out for. For example, a common effect of poor nutrition in canines is lethargy and listlessness. If your dog seems more tired than usual and does not display its usual interest in exercise and daily activities, this could be a sign that he or she is not receiving sufficient vitamins. Dogs suffering from poor nutrition also often develop skin problems and experience changes in their coats. Fur may lose its usual shine, appearing dull and lifeless. It may also take on a dry, coarse texture.

If your pet is displaying any of the above symptoms, it may be suffering from a lack of vitamins and proper nutrition. If you observe any of these warning signs, contact your veterinarian immediately. This is vital because these symptoms are also characteristic of several canine illnesses and, even if vitamin deficiency is the problem, there may be an underlying illness that is causing the deficiency. Therefore, it’s important that your pet be examined by a veterinarian as soon as possible.

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Allergy Testing & Immunotherapy (dog)

Allergy testing is a way to get a positive diagnosis for atopy (inhalant dermatitis) and to a lesser extent for contact allergies. Scratching, licking the feet, chewing, and red irritated skin are all symptoms of atopy in the dog. Atopy is the name given to allergies that result from breathing in pollen, dust, or mold. Other than flea bite allergies , atopy is by far the most common cause of allergies in dogs. When an allergy to a specific substance can be identified, the dog can receive immunotherapy (hyposensitization injections).

Types of allergy testing

There are two basic types of allergy testing. The most common is a blood test that checks for antigen-induced antibodies in the dog’s blood. There are two standard tests that are used to test the blood. The first is called a RAST test (radioallergosorbent). The other is an ELISA test (enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay). Both of these tests are very similar but many practitioners feel that the ELISA test gives more accurate results than the RAST test.

The other type of testing is intradermal skin testing. In this test a small amount of antigen is injected into the skin of the animal and after a short period of time the area around the injection is observed to determine if the animal is allergic to the agent. The pros and cons of both tests will be discussed in greater detail later in this article.

Blood testing by RAST and ELISA

To perform either of these two tests to determine what substances an animal may be allergic to, a blood sample is drawn from a suspected atopic dog and sent into the lab. The blood is screened for a reaction to a broad range of allergens including pollens, dust and molds that are common to the geographical area in which the dog lives. Tests for reactions against different foods and contact allergies such as cotton or nylon can also be done, although the tests perform less accurately for these allergens. The testing generally takes several weeks.

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What should I feed my dog or my cat?.

The bottom line on pet foods is simple. We have a rough idea of the essential nutrients necessary for pets. We know some of the toxic levels for nutrients. Other than that, it is hard to be sure about any nutritional claims.

Studying nutrient needs is extremely complex. There are a great number of theories about what constitutes “proper” nutrition. For every good thing you hear about a food, there are likely to be as many bad things. Making sense of this is very difficult. There is no single food that is “best” for all makes and models of dogs.

Some things seem to be clear, though. Pets do require certain nutrients. A good way to ensure that the pet foods you feed your pets contain adequate nutrients is to look for a statement that the food meets AAFCO Food Trial testing standards. This is an organization which sets standards for pet foods. Most good quality foods will have this statement on their label. It is at least a good start in ensuring that your pet’s diet is adequate.

Some people are currently advocating diets containing raw meat for pets. Before feeding raw meat, please stop to consider the health warnings for humans concerning raw meat. Dogs get the same illnesses from E. coli, Salmonella, Toxoplasmosis and other health hazards associated with raw or undercooked meat. Is the perceived benefit worth the risk of one of these diseases?

Don’t let your pet teach you to feed it a poor diet. It is very easy, especially with small dogs and cats, to fall into the trap of feeding your pet what he or she wants instead of what he or she needs. Dogs are very patient trainers of human beings. If you’re not paying attention, you could find that Spot is on an all meat diet in no time. It can be hard to ignore those pleading eyes, but your pet IS better off if you feed a balanced diet!

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Diabetes Control- Dog

Diet is an integral part of the treatment for diabetes. It is important to feed a maintenance diet which meets your dog’s individual caloric needs and varies as little as possible. For a dog receiving insulin two times a day, the optimum feeding schedule is to feed four meals a day. One at the time of each insulin injection, one in the early afternoon and one in the late evening. It is probably best to feed a high carbohydrate, medium fiber diet. You can just add fiber to your dog’s normal dog food using a fiber source such as psyllium (Metamucil), pumpkin pie filling or other fiber source. There is some difference between fiber sources (soluble vs. insoluble) and how well they work, but it may not be clinically significant. Or you can buy a commercial food containing the proper quantities of fiber. Some of these foods are Prescription Diets w/d, Science Diet Maintenance Light, Theradiet Reducing (dry), Purina Fit and Trim, Purina Dog Chow - Low Calorie Formula and Cycle 3 Light (canned). The canned version of Theradiet Reducing may have more than the optimal amount of fiber and this is also true of Prescription Diet r/d. These food vary in fiber content but no one knows for sure what the optimum amount is.

There are a lot of different recommendations on how to start insulin therapy (dosages to start with) so it is entirely possible that your vet chose a starting value that falls within one of the recommended ranges in the literature. We usually use about 0.25U per pound of body weight as a start but I have used up to 0.5U per pound in situations in which it seemed necessary to gain control of the situation as quickly as possible.

We think that most clients with dogs can learn to draw blood using the devices that come with glucometers and recommend that owners of diabetic animals purchase a glucometer. We usually recommend spot checking the blood glucose the first two to three days after starting insulin and then running a “glucose curve” after that.

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Pet Food Safety - Home Made Can Eliminate Uncertainty

The latest outbreak of dog food and cat food contamination has shaken the confidence of pet owners the world over, but nowhere as much as in the United States where illness and reported deaths took its highest toll of family pets. Now, in the aftermath of large scale pet food recalls, many are asking questions about the ingredients that they’ve always trusted to provide optimum health for their family pets.

It comes as no real surprise now that many pet owners are choosing to make their own homegrown variety of pet nutrition. When made properly, it has to be a better option than all that imported stuff with unknown ingredients of suspicious composition and origin. In fact, many say it’s not too difficult at all and fairly inexpensive to make. But, a number of experts caution that homemade diets won’t work for every pet or its owner. Some dogs and cats have a more difficult time adjusting to a new diet and the new process itself may simply be too labor intensive and inconvenient for many owners. The choice should be made only after careful consideration.

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Putting Your Dog On A Diabetic Dog Food Diet

Like humans, dogs too get diabetes. When a dog has diabetes, the best way to keep it in control is by giving it diabetic dog food, which is low in sugar and carbohydrates. Apart from controlling the amount of sugar in a diabetic dog’s food, the amount of food and the frequency in which they are fed also needs to be monitored. The general recommendation is that your diabetic dog should be fed smaller meals twice or thrice a day instead of a single large meal. This is because blood sugar levels can be stabilized by smaller meals, whereas a single large meal results in a high insulin spike, and then for it to drop down in 12 hours. When blood sugar plummets too low, it results in hypoglycemia, which is a series condition.

So what diabetic dog food should you give your dog? Here are a few recommendations that will assist in controlling the diabetic condition of your dog:

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The Right Food to Feed Ragdoll Cats And Kittens

Cat food can be classified into dry, moist, and semi-moist foods. Each one has its advantages, and Ragdolls need various kinds of food at different stages. Kittens need on the whole breast milk and moist food, while adults require more protein and dry food. Pregnant Ragdolls have special dietary needs that change all through the pregnancy as well.

Ragdoll kittens ought to be only breastfed for the first four to five weeks. Cat milk includes all the nutrients necessary for the kitten’s growth, including antibodies that help prevent disease. Breast milk also passes on other antibodies that the mother produced to fight previous diseases.

More food ought to be supplied after four to five weeks, as the kitten requires more nutrients to support its fast growth. Introductory food ought to be easy to digest. Mix canned food with warm water or kitten replacement milk until it constitutes a loose paste. Do NOT use regular cow’s milk this is too heavy for kittens and could cause in indigestion.

Dry food

After another four to five weeks, your kitten should be ready for dry food. To make the change easier, moisten dry food with a little warm water in the first few feedings. It’s also essential to choose high-quality supplements to dry food and some of the good brands are Iams®, Science Diet®, and Nutro Kitten®. Science Diet Feline Growth® is popular among Ragdoll kittens. Supplements can be provided twice a day with morning and evening feeding. You can switch to adult food after approximately 12 months.

Choosing and preparing kitten food

Ragdoll kittens have fragile stomachs, so take extra care in choosing kitten food. Food should always be warm or slightly above room temperature. Discard all food that has been left out for more than 30 minutes, especially in the summer. Bacteria grows fast in warm, wet foods and may possibly upset your kitten’s stomach, or even lead to food poisoning. To stop wasting food, just observe how much your kitten eats at a time so you know how much to prepare per feeding.

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