DOG HEALTH - WHO’S IN CHARGE?

I’ve almost always liked my dog Django’s vets. I just didn’t like how limited their education was about toxins and nutrition, especially once I got educated and saw the gap. Don’t get me wrong – in some ways, I am even more impressed by the veterinary profession than human health practitioners in that vets have to study the anatomy, biology, and diseases of multiple different species while doctors just focus on us humans. Doctors are impressive, too, for getting through medical school, saving lives in emergency medicine, delivering babies, doing critical research and identifying diseases no doubt. Kudos to everyone in the health space for all species. Kudos to emergency responders. And kudos to all hard-working animal welfare and rescue workers.

But I want to share why I don’t leave my dog’s life in the hands of his vet exclusively.

His vets recommended over-vaccination. Vaccination is often part of disease prevention, but over-vaccination may actually cause diseases and ailments like tremors.

His vets recommended prescription Frankenfood by the big 3 conglomerates that own half the dog foods including the fluorescent radioactive-looking food. Plus one of those companies makes lots of their money selling candy. I don’t think health is their priority. Do you? The others also sell processed food for people – not great, either.

Django’s early vet even started surveying us clients on what we fed our dogs. I assumed they reviewed the info and knew what recommendations to make if anything was out of whack. Nope. No questions were asked. Not even “Is that food labeled balanced and complete per AAFCO standards?” As long as you didn’t write you were feeding chocolate and grapes, I’m not sure they were intervening and rectifying any dietary imbalances or diets of low quality. So why ask?! It gives people the false impression that they’re minding the store so-to-speak.

Food is either medicine or poison. When the vet surveys what you’re feeding, you assume they’re reviewing the survey response to comment where necessary. When they take blood, we assume they run tests on it rather than storing it on a shelf or pouring it straight down the drain. When we report things to authorities whether about domestic violence, animal abuse, a street crime, or hazardous waste, we assume they leap into action …. Or at least crawl. Maybe it’s naïve to expect professionals to do the job they claim to do. I don’t know.

Django’s vets also recommended monthly flea and tick preventives full of chemicals, including neurotoxins. And even in winter in areas not prone to extensive heartworm even in the summer, they suggested we give the chemicals just to keep the habit up and since there would be no downside. No downside to neurotoxins and other pesticides? How about the tremors my dog may have gotten as a result of this bad decision? Some of these products now have neurological warning labels required by the same FDA that approved these chemicals years prior. Mosquitoes and heartworm aren’t a threat for many months of the year in the places I’ve lived. Add to that, many of these preventives have been found to last MORE than a month. Add to that, the topical pesticides are also exposing us to pesticides …. While we proudly buy local, seasonal, organic produce to avoid pesticides.

Then there were times I was advised by my vets to double up on the pesticides – the ingestible AND a flea/tick collar – like when we were going hiking or to the country back and forth over a few months. My poor dog. And all these products were, of course, for sale at the vet’s office. One was the Seresto collar – now under investigation by the EPA for the high number of reported deaths and other adverse reactions seemingly linked to the collar’s ingredients.

Then there was the traumatic vet visit that ruined vet visits for my dog forever. I was worried he might have a UTI, so they needed to test his urine, but since his bladder wasn’t full, they decided to stick a painful catheter up his penis to get a sample. Couldn’t we have just given him some bone broth to drink and come back with a urine sample in a cup?

Early on, his vets didn’t seem too concerned about the extra 7 pounds he was carrying compared to his ideal weight later on. They definitely wanted 2 pounds shed, but the rest of the pudge was cute, I guess they thought. I thought so, but now I know how dangerous any excess weight is for dogs – for longevity, for pain and chronic diseases from arthritis to diabetes and cancer. Why didn’t they know this? Sure, more data comes out all the time, but I’m pretty sure there’s been a lot of consensus about dogs’ ideal body condition for generations. I know I’m a Jewish mother – dog mom – and food is a sign of love, but I certainly didn’t want to “treat” my dog to an early death.

And then when we were briefly living in a small town, the vet there insisted his hearing loss was just old age since she couldn’t see an obstruction, but wasn’t there a way to test for an infection that maybe could’ve been causing it and then cleared up?

Even with the most competent integrative vets, I’ve had to keep my eye on the ball. There were situations where a supplement was recommended that conflicted with another one Django was temporarily on. For example, too many probiotics. And then a vitamin complex that was actually wrong for his needs and increased his blood pressure and seemed to reduce his magnesium per tests. Then another specialist surprised me with a proprietary concoction that included a bad form of copper. And vet offices can make mistakes as can doctors and hospital staff with the dosage of meds. So be on top of it.

So, the way I see it, arthritis, tremors and anxiety about vet visits could all likely have been avoided even if the hearing loss and surgery for a benign mass couldn’t have been.

We need vets, especially for emergencies. We just need to take some more control over our dogs’ healthcare decisions by doing our own research or working with a collaborative care team including health coaches or finding holistic vets.

Any vet with good intentions should be happy to have you ask questions, get second opinions, or debate the efficacy of a protocol involving drugs. If they roll their eyes or insist, it might be arrogance and attempts at intimidation.

But I am against bullying our vets or blaming them every time our animal gets sick and can’t be healed. Vets work hard and deal with a lot of stress and sadness. Many may be frustrated they don’t have time to do as much continuing education as they’d like. I don’t think they’re thrilled to have to diagnose our dogs with terminal illnesses. I think it’s a tough job because I think most of them really love animals. And all of this plus the relatively low income has something to do with the high suicide rate in their profession. Something to think about.

So, be kind to your animals’ vets and listen to their perspectives. But expect them to be kind to your animals and respect your perspectives, too. You need to be your dog’s best health advocate. You’re the one who is there to take care of them everyday, to observe behavior and appetite changes, to create a safe space for them, to exercise them, to socialize them, to give them choices, to choose whether to let them consume food, water, air that has toxins or not, to choose organic materials for their bedding and toys or not. Take responsibility for your dog’s well-being. It’s YOUR dog, your family member. You need to be more invested than anyone. Your vet isn’t around everyday and your vet doesn’t always know best.