Are most veterinarians ignorant about what food is good for your pet? (allergy, bite)

[Dashdog]

As the others have said nutrition is not a big part in the education of any doctors human or animal. Hopefully with the big push on nutrition and eating whole foods verses processed foods and just consumers turning away from Hills etc and switching to better quality foods that will soon change.For vets the big dog food companies like Hills are more or less the sponsors of nutrition classes for them.

My vet and I had a discussion about diet once and he was against raw food as he claims he has had more patients with hepititis that were on raw diets but he thinks a lightly cooked home meal is the best. That was years ago so I am not sure where he stands now on the subject. He has always commented on how beautiful and healthy my dogs skin and coats were and I have always said it is the food they eat and told him what they get fed so hopefully vets may start learing from owners about nutrition. I would say a good 75% of the dogs in this town get itchey skin issues and hot spots during the summer it is referred to as the Santa Barbara itch it is that common. Well Jazz and Dash never had any of those issues so yea I think my vet paid attention to what I said I feed them.

I am a big believer in nutrition and eating whole foods but then again my brother's Shar Pei got Kibbles and Bits and tons of table scraps, including all the skin from a turkey and lots of fat from other meats as his wife saw no problems with that ( If I saw her doing that I would cringe and tell her he can get pancreatitis from all that fat) and that dog lived to be 13 ( Which I think is considred to be quite old for the breed)and he never had a health issue until that last year when he developed seizures so go figure!!!! My guess is there was enough good stuff in the table scraps ( along with the bad fats) to make up for the poor nutrition of the kibble.

[DawnMTL]

Originally Posted by goodgal

I have been going to a vet that is highly recommended. The last time i was in there we had just gotten our new puppy and I was telling him I had her on Innova for puppies. I got a blank stare. I then said I had thought about Wellness too (which I did eventually try). Another blank stare. I then asked if he recommended any foods that were top notch. He said Purina puppy chow or the science diet or if i wanted to spend more then eukanuba. I had already frequented Dogfoodanalysis.com so I knew these were rubbish and he caught the look I had and said "are you ok?" I said "I am alittle shocked you would recommend those foods because they are rated so low"another blank stare and he said he had fed his dogs on it for years. OK am I being too picky? Why am I more knowledgeable about a good diet then my vet? Granted he is loving and highly recommended yet this gives me pause for concern! I am now on the search for a vet in my area that knows that diet is important too!

I'm not sure that it's going to be easy to find a new vet that knows that diet is important. That's not to say that he/she is a bad vet; it's just that nutrition is not their "thing."

I learned this through my own medical situation. I was diagnosed with MS almost 20 years ago and, after diagnosis, became a patient of the top MS doctor in Montreal (Canada) where I was then living. I was not in good shape, and he wanted to put me on meds. I was terrified of the meds and started doing my own research. I found a diet (low in saturated fat but very high in unsaturated fat) that sounded promising. When I told the doctor about it, he said "It's a fine diet, but it's not going to help your MS." I told him I was going to try it anyway.

I never had another attack.

Do I blame the doctor? Nope. He's a scientist, not a nutritionist. And, really, that diet wouldn't necessarily have worked for everybody anyway.

So I take Artie to the vet for medical issues. But you know who I turn to for nutritional advice? www.dogfoodanalysis.com and this forum. It was on this forum that people started questioning whether Artie was grain-intolerant and if that was the cause of his problems. Neither of the vets that I had gone to ever suggested that his food may be the source of his poop problems.

[leorah]

Traditionally educated vets and even some nutritionists will tell you that the nutrients themselves are what is important and it doesn't matter whether those nutrients come from genetically engineered corn or from organic carrots. The body takes what it needs and discards the rest. Holistic vets are often much more aware of/educated in the impact that chemical preservatives, grain fractions, by-products and fillers have on the overall health of an animal.

Keep in mind that many veterinarians receive their nutritional training in classes funded in part by the large dog food manufacturers such as Hills and Iams. And selling SD and prescription food is a profit center for veterinarians. That being said, such diets serve an important need for people who have chronically ill animals that require a specific nutrient profile. In some cases these prescription diets, filled with corn and other junk though they be, provide life-giving support to animals that would not do well on other diets.

[Travel'r]

Letter submitted by Dr. Michael Fox on the subject:

Conflicts Of Interest In The Veterinary Profession And The Origin Of ‘MAN- MADE’ Dog And Cat Diseases (http://www.twobitdog.com/DrFox/Manmade-Dog-Cat-Diseases - broken link)

When an animal is "prescribed" food for, say, Kidney issues, we are told that it's because the animal needs to have less "protein", right?

What we are NOT told however is that there is a BIG difference between good proteins (MEAT) and bad (cheap junk used for substitutions of species-appropriate) proteins.

Corn & Wheat Glutens, for example, are high-protein extracts used to boost protein percentages without expensive (read: meat) ingredients.

Although Beef is listed first, we are aware, at least on this forum, that the abundance of garbage far outweighs it as there are no other specified meat sources listed in the main ingredients, and their weight combined far outweighs that of the beef in what is popularly *considered* one of the best of the *mainstream* foods :

Beef, brewers rice, corn gluten meal, whole grain wheat, whole grain corn, animal fat preserved with mixed-tocopherols (form of Vitamin E), poultry by-product meal (natural source of glucosamine), fish meal (natural source of glucosamine), dried beet pulp, animal digest, calcium phosphate, dried egg product, potassium chloride ...Dog Food Reviews - Pro Plan Beef and Rice Formula - Powered by ReviewPost

The thing is: you will be told that the BEEF (protein) "has to go" first and foremost.

Now look at the ingredients in the "Kidney prescription" food:

Brewers Rice, Pork Fat (preserved with mixed tocopherols and citric acid), Dried Egg Product,Flaxseed, Corn Gluten Meal, Chicken Liver Flavor, Soy Fiber, Calcium Carbonate, Potassium Chloride, L-Lysine...Ethoxyquin. ..Dog Food Reviews - Hills Prescription K/D - Powered by ReviewPost.

And how much does a bag of this cost?

Harvard Law Paper: Incestuous Pet Food Regulation Allows Consumers to Feed their Pets Ring Dings and Krispy Kremes

Say what we will about the flaws of our Human Doctors, but if an MD tried "prescribing" us to eat any commercial junk food, he'd get his pants sued off, and his license immediately pulled.

I believe that the fact that a veterinarian will not properly diagnose all-too-common diet-related illness (let alone know how to properly treat it -- such as get the dog off the junk ingredients!) because these companies so generously fund each university and load up on the incentives once in practice is the biggest concern here.

What if Skippy Peanut Butter generously funded our Medical Schools? How would the public-at-large ever know people have peanut allergies if our MDs had the same arrangement with a commercial food maker and blamed everything else, such as the environment.... ? They'd never diagnose it, just as veterinarians never blame the corn, soy and other fillers in the pet foods!

Sure, as with the pet foods, there would be a bunch of recalls, but the doctors would never blame (or even consider) the cause if things were the same as they are with our veterinarians and the pet food industry, and no regulation whatsoever.

Our wonderful veterinarian of over 4 decades never pretended to know about what to feed our dogs. When we asked his opinion in 1986, he said "We study medicine & surgery...I'd probably have to look that up in a book or something."

The genius at Colgate-Palmolive, for one, partnered with the veterinary profession in the '80s. The time has come for them to DIVORCE. Too many unneseccarily sick pets now.

[Fontucky]

Originally Posted by DandJ

So I take Artie to the vet for medical issues. But you know who I turn to for nutritional advice? www.dogfoodanalysis.com and this forum. It was on this forum that people started questioning whether Artie was grain-intolerant and if that was the cause of his problems. Neither of the vets that I had gone to ever suggested that his food may be the source of his poop problems.

Same here. Nanners was losing her coat in huge patches and the skin underneath was scaly and alligator looking. Not only that she was having diarrhea once every two or three weeks for 3 and 4 days at a time. The vet never once suggested a nutritional vector. Then I started to read this forum and a lightbgulb went off above my head.... GRAIN INTOLERANCE!

Within two months after changing her kibble to one without corn/wheat products, the coat was back to normal and her loose bowels are only a once a year thing now.

I love this forum.

[elston]

I asked our vet too......and she was very non specific.....they sell Science Diet but she didnt recommend it.....she said....its up to you what you think is best and what you want to spend....there are a lot of foods. I asked her about corn.....and she shrugged and said....they use it because its inexpensive.....but unless your dog seems allergic to it....it is ok; she acknowledged all the brands you all are mentioning but didnt recommend any specific brand or ingredient to look for or avoid. I asked her what she fed her dog.....she has a golden retriever and she said Purina One. She said...".my dog looks good when I feed him that brand....I notice his coat is more glossy and he looks healthy." She suggested that probably any of them were fine..and I should go by how my dog looks and acts.

At the present time they are eating science diet low cal mixed with some of the nutro senior that I had left in a bag before we got the new dog. I put a tablespoon of Alpo and hot water on it to get them started on it. ( I know that Science Diet is supposed to be terrible but it was what my latest adoptee was used to and I wanted to minimize change in her life.

The only thing I notice is:
1) they seem to like it.
2) they seem healthy
3) they seem to have large bowl movements--but are regular and appear normal.....I suspect there is a lot of undigestible stuff in the food.

[Ringo1]

The sad fact in our house is that Ringo would much prefer Lucy's Purina over his more expensive TOTW.

I'm trying to switch her to Wellness and she is NOT liking it at all!

Don't these dogs know I'm trying to give them a high quality food????

[elston]

That was my experience trying to switch my dog to canidae...because I heard it was the best for her.....she would have nothing to do with it....and shortly after that wouldnt eat anything except steamed ground chicken which I had been giving to a sick geriatric dog in the home.....when I stopped doing the chicken she refused everything including all the high cost organic canned foods....then she accepted that awful cheese and beef plastic food....which has sugar stuff in it.....BUT now she is eating the science diet with a little canned alpo and seems to enjoy it.

I think I am staying with that.....I cant take the reproachful looks and leaving all the othr stuff in her bowl. Meal times were becoming much too difficult.

Oh when all her food refusals started was when I had to give her an anti biotic pill 2x daily and I hid it in her food....because it had to be taken with food. She was on that regimen for a week .....and has been suspicious of food ever since. I later learned that greenies makes a little package to put the pill in and it works like a charm....but my dog still looks at me as if I am trying to poison her at meal times.

[Fontucky]

Those of you who are experiencing finicky dogs... are these small breeds? My experience (through others) is that the finicky ones are usually the little guys. I've yet to experience a picky eater in over 40 years of owning big such as Dobes, GSD, Labs and now my Pitty girl.

[elston]

My finicky eater is a female mixed terrier..about 50 lbs. (I thnk the terrier mix is based on some pitty stock.....she is a brindle who looks a bit like a black nosed cur.)