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Environmental pet allergies and petfood allergies are often confused, and changing your pet's diet to a specialty food may not make a difference, according to veterinary dermatologists at VRCC Veterinary Specialty & Emergency Hospital in Englewood, Colo.
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"Food allergies occur in only 10%-30% of dogs and between 20%-30% of cats," said Dr. Christina Gentry, with VRCC's dermatology/allergy department. "Environmental allergies are much more common." As such, switching to a specialized diet (such as grain-free or raw) may not actually be addressing the issue at hand. VRCC has listed three myths regarding petfood diets they they say are prevalent among consumers:
Veterinarians at VRCC's dermatology/allergy department recommend that your pet's diet should be assessed based on its overall nutrient profile of the ingredients, rather than the ingredients themselves. If you are concerned your pet may have environmental or food allergies, contact your veterinarian to have them properly assessed and treated.
Royal Canin is making a new type of petfood formula designed for dogs with intense allergic reactions to certain proteins, using chicken feathers as the main source of protein instead.
The new Anallergenic dog food formula was developed over 10 years for dogs that do not respond to limited-ingredient diets because it uses a new source of protein: feather meal. Royal Canin USA President Keith Levy says the feather meal is nutritious and can be made very palatable.
"Feathers are broken down to an amino acid level and don't have much of a taste. Then we add palatizers for taste. In this case, we have to be very careful not to provoke an allergic reaction. That's why it took so long to develop this particular food. We're looking for lots of different sources of protein for our foods: hydrolyzed soy; we are currently researching worm meal as a potential protein source for some of our foods in China. I tried some kibble made with worm meal once - it tasted very good. So our approach goes way beyond feathers," he says.
Levy says one of the benefits to using feather meal is that it supports the company's efforts in sustainability.
"Ultimately we'll have an issue with finding protein for the human food chain. By using alternative sources of protein, we're using something that would otherwise end up in a landfill," says Levy. "It's the best of both worlds: You're not competing with the human food chain, reducing waste and providing an incredibly nutritious protein."
Research and Markets has added Global Markets Direct's new report, "Cat Allergy - Pipeline Review, H2 2012," to its offerings.
The report provides an overview of the indication's therapeutic pipeline, with information on therapeutic developments for cat allergies, updates on late-stage and discontinued projects, and a review of key market players. The full report may be purchased online.
A new type of test has recently hit the market allowing pet owners to test for their dogs' pet food allergies with just a saliva sample, according to a report.
Although testing for other potential non-food-related allergens must still be done by a veterinarian, Nutriscan has developed a saliva test that can identify 20 of the most common food allergies in dogs.
Dog allergy testing has usually been conducted by a veterinarian taking skin samples of the dog and prescribing a pet food diet free of those ingredients that could be potentially causing the allergies. But with Nutriscan's test, pet owners collect the saliva sample from their dog and return it back to the company to receive results about two weeks later. The test means pet owners no longer have to put their pet on a special prescription diet as a trial and can test for all potential food allergies at one time.
In this second part of an email conversation with a friend, Dr. Michael Watts, companion
animal general practitioner and owner of Clevengers Corner Veterinary Care,
shares his advice on pet nutrition and why prescription petfood diets do work
for managing a pet's health problem.
Dr. Watts says that many niche diets, as opposed to prescription diets, are
made to balance according to textbook nutritional values, but many niche diets
do not do animal feeding trials to measure the actual nutrition performance,
with the exception of a few organic brands. Dr. Watts says that when choosing a
food, pet owners should look at the food’s Association of American Feed Control
Officials' statement for the words "animal feeding tests substantiate this food
is complete and balanced." If the words "animal feeding tests" are missing, the
tests haven’t been done, he says.
Finding a food to manage a pet's allergy may take time, Dr. Watts says. He
says a true novel protein diet may take up to eight weeks to see a
response.
"It is difficult to find a truly novel protein for cats because ordinary cat
foods contain so many similar flavors and ingredients," Dr. Watts says. "Duck,
for instance, often cross reacts with turkey and chicken. Beef often cross
reacts with venison, bison, etc. Add to that the difficulty that many OTC
formulas that say 'soy free' or 'grain free' have been shown to have significant
enough levels of these ingredients to aggravate a truly allergic cat. It’s not
so much they’re 'sneaking it in' as there is inadvertent contamination. Feed
mills are dusty places and it’s easy to have cross contamination of production
lots."
While the dog food market has a few truly novel protein diets, using
ingredients like kangaroo or rabbit, very few over-the-counter diets for cats
have these novel proteins; most are limited to salmon, chicken, duck and
venison. Dr. Watts says that these cat diets are not totally novel for all cats,
so it may be easier for a vet to find a prescription hydrolyzed protein diet,
which breaks down the protein into small enough units that the cat's immune
system, theoretically, does not detect it.
Dr. Watts recommends the website, balanceit.com, for pet owners looking for a novel protein diet
but who do not want to feed a prescription diet. The site sells supplements that
make a homemade diet complete and balanced on paper and were formulated by
board-certified veterinary nutritionists. This allows cat owners, especially, to
select their own novel protein source and use the supplement to make the food
balanced for the cat's nutritional needs.
"Also, you should know that many food allergic cats also have some degree of
gastrointestinal involvement. They are also much less likely than dogs to
manifest food allergies as solely skin symptoms. Since you mention only skin
symptoms, be sure your veterinarian has thoroughly explored all the dermatologic
angles and has run general blood work before placing too many eggs in the food
allergy basket," Dr. Watts advises.
Many pet owners have misconceptions about
veterinarians and may be reluctant to seek or follow their advice, says Dr.
Michael Watts, a veterinarian and owner of Clevengers Corner
Veterinary Care, in an online article.
In the article, Dr. Watts shares an email
conversation he says that he had with a friend, regarding pet food allergy management for his friend's cat and a
veterinarian's advice.
Dr. Watts says his friend wrote: "I think there’s a big 'conspiracy' out
there among vets or maybe the newbies get brainwashed in vet school with all
that corporate money. I think my cat might have food allergies (losing a ton of
hair, itchy) but took him to the vet anyway...We ended up with a newer vet and
he was saying we might have to put him on a big brand prescription diet — the
hypoallergenic one. He was shocked when I told him I’d never feed my cats that
junk food. The first ingredients always seem to be 'chicken byproducts' and
fillers like corn... It makes me sad to think of all these people out there
listening to this vet and using big corporation food when they can just feed
their pets a high-quality, good protein diet."
Yet, according to Dr. Watts, veterinarians that sell veterinary diet pet foods
make very little money doing so, typically US$1 per bag or less.
"Large companies are simply better at being sure veterinarians have the most
up to date information on their diets, so that might be your 'conspiracy,'"
Watts says. "In addition, many veterinary therapeutic diets are actually
superior for treating specific conditions than anything that can be found over
the counter. However, the ingredient lists are formulated by board-certified
veterinary nutritionists and other scientists – not the marketing
department."
Watts also says that studies have shown that beef, chicken, wheat, soy, lamb,
milk and egg have been the cause of more allergies in pets than corn has. Watts
says that cooked ground corn is actually a highly digestible source
of carbohydrates, protein, antioxidants, and essential fatty acids.
"Unfortunately, the niche market petfoods have demonized it to a point that I
don’t even waste my breath with clients anymore. Either a client will take my
educated recommendation or they will ignore me, listening to 'Dr. Google' or
propaganda from specialty pet food manufacturers," Watts says.
In a national survey conducted by Harris Interactive for Wellness Natural Petfood, owners of dogs with food allergies are confused about how to treat them.
Fewer than half of the pet owners surveyed recognized which ingredients can aggravate their pets’ allergies: 40% were aware of wheat causing potential allergic reactions and 26% were aware of soy.
Wellness has introduced additions to its Simple Food Solutions hypoallergenic line of dry food to cater to pets with such allergies.
Fish oil supplementation may be helpful for pets with inflammatory diseases including allergies, arthritis, kidney disease and heart disease and has been shown to slow the growth of cancer, according to a recent article from www.examiner.com.
However, the article claimed eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA) and docosahexaenoic acid (DHA), which are omega 3 fatty acids found in fish oil, are too fragile to survive the shelf life of commercial petfood.
The only reliable source of EPA and DHA is salmon oil in capsules, according to the article.
HBH Pet Products announced the release of its new product, No Grainers dog biscuits and treats, which is a 100% grain-free, protein-infused alternative to treats with corn and wheat fillers.
“Some dogs have trouble processing foods that are grain-based, which can wreak havoc on their systems,” said Colette Dahl, manager of new product development at HBH Pet Products. “Because No Grainers understands the importance of having protein as a staple in a dog’s diet, we developed these … treats.”
Lynn "Nahnee" LaPointe, who worked as an educator in the Van Buren Public Schools for 27 years, has opened Nahnee's Nibbles, a business in Wayne, Mich., that provides homemade meals for pets, according to an article from The Belleville View.
The inspiration for Nahnee's Nibbles came after LaPointe's dog Bear was experiencing digestive issues and his veterinarian recommended a temporary diet of ground beef and rice. Because Bear responded so well to a natural food diet, LaPointe decided to develop other recipes.
"Nahnee's Nibbles has a collection of recipes offering a flavorful variety to suit a pet's individual tastes preferences and are sure to please even the most discriminating tastes," said Karen Reich, business partner and daughter of LaPointe.
About 10% of dogs have allergies, said Sandra Diaz, an assistant professor of dermatology at the Virginia-Maryland Regional College of Veterinary Medicine, in a recent health article by CNN.
"Allergies we cannot cure. We just manage them and keep them under control so the animal can have a good quality of life," she said in the article.
While some allergies are caused by allergens in the air, others can be caused by allergens in petfood. Diaz said it takes many weeks to determine whether an animal has a food allergy.
She suggested starting the pet on new food, and watch for allergic reactions to it for eight to 10 weeks. If there are no reactions, feed the pet with the original food. If the symptoms return, Diaz said in the article, the diagnosis is a food allergy.
