I never knew Fido was painful!

Almost daily I find dogs on routine physical exam that show signs of chronic pain unbeknownst to their owners.  Arthritis and back pain are two very common causes of chronic pain in middle age to senior dogs, yet their pain is rarely recognized by their human caretakers.  Why is this? The reason is simple.  Pets do not express pain in the same ways that humans do.  Pets do not grimace or have facial expressions we might equate with pain when we observe this in our fellow human beings.  Pets do not complain, gripe or grumble and rarely whine about their pain.  They certainly cannot communicate to us where their pain is at on a scale of 1 to 10.

Decades ago even some veterinarians felt that animals do not feel pain.   That is just not the case.   We know that pets absolutely suffer from pain and it is very real.  They just do not express their feelings of pain in the same manner people do.  I have found that the most common sign of chronic back or rear limb arthritic pain in dogs are lack of desire to be active and decreased interaction with other pets and people.  Some people may construe this as simply “my pets just getting older” when it could be that the pet is experiencing chronic pain. 

Some people feel that their dog is just getting stiff with age because they are slower to rise or get to their feet.  I will submit to you that if your dog is stiff in the morning, or slow to rise from a lying position, or gets up on the front legs then needs an additional effort to get the back legs up and moving, your dog likely is exhibiting symptoms of pain.  I will submit to you that if your older dog no longer greets you at the door when you get home, or just does not seem to interact with your family the way he used to, he may be experiencing chronic pain.  I will submit to you that if your dog seems reluctant to take the stairs or jump into the car like he used to, he may be experiencing pain.

There are so many treatment modalities to help pets with pain issues that significantly improve their quality of life, unfortunately, the biggest barrier to providing this benefit is that most of us humans fail to appreciate that our pats may be experiencing pain, and thus go untreated.

article written by:

Scott Petereit, DVM

Companion Animal Hospitals of Mount Prospect, Kenosha, Vernon Hills, and Oak Park

Switching your Cat to a Healthier Diet

Cats can be addicts!! The dry food that we feed to our cats is high in fat and salt, and even the shapes can trigger the response of turning down other, healthier foods.

Because of the tendency toward addiction on these dry foods, they can be very resistant to change.
It is VERY important that you change your cat very, very slowly to a healthy new diet.  Cats WILL starve themselves rather than switch and this can lead to Fatty Liver Disease, a life-threatening condition.  If your cat fasts, he runs the risk of this disease.
Please take this warning seriously!!

First either ask us how much you should feed ( if your cat is overweight) or measure the total amount you are currently feeding( if your cats’ weight is normal).
Divide your cats’ complete measured daily allowance into 3 meals.  Give one portion in the morning, one in the afternoon, and the final feeding in the evening.
Be tough, that is all he gets for the daily feeding.  It may take several weeks for him to adjust to the feedings, but your cat will learn that this is all he will get to eat.

When kitty learns that that is all they are going to get, replace one of those feedings with canned food.  They will get enough from 2 feedings of dry to keep up the necessary nutrition that they need.

Don’t give in to your cat.  If he gets hungry enough, he will try the canned.  It may take weeks, even months for your cat to eat the canned food, but you are doing this for the health of your kitty.

When your cat is eating the one meal of canned food for several weeks, take one of the meals of dry food and replace with canned.  Be sure to adjust the amount for calorie intake.

After several weeks of  2 canned meals, replace the final dry feeding with the canned.

Another way to introduce your cat to canned food is to measure the total amount of daily dry food, then give 1/3 the amount at each of  2 dry meals, one for breakfast and one at dinner, and leave a bowl of canned food out all day.  This is good for an all day nibbler, and when the dry is gone, they will try the canned.  Then gradually replace the remainder of the dry with canned food.
Take as much time as your cat needs to make the transition from dry to canned.

article written by:
Dr. Joe Whalen
Hyde Park Animal Hospital and Clinic