[Giles123]

Does anyone know of a good food for a senior dog with liver issues. We have our 14 year old Rottweiler mix and she already takes denamarin for her liver. She’s been on chicken and rice for a while since she gets some type of colitis intermittently. She literally has water coming out her back end at times. Currently she gets her chicken and rice and a bit of the brothers complete turkey and egg allergy food. Lately she has trouble with that food. Her vet recommended a senior food that is easily digestible. Thinks the other food is possibly too nutrient dense and hard for her to process. Anyone know a good dry food to put her on that hasn’t had recall problems?

Kelly james
Kellyjames@cox.net

[Cheryl Pepper Millie Sophie]

Hi Kelly,
My 11 1/2 y.o. mini schnauzer has similar issues -bad bouts of gastritis IBD/IBS just suffered a bad bout in December.
I came to the conclusion that she can no longer process kibble any kind-she was on the Amicus Grain-free Senior,did very well on it. But as they say things change
But it seemed every so often the problems reappeared.
In December after every single test was given except an endoscopy -i changed her to lightly cooked ground turkey breast with canned organic pumpkin -then switched from the pumpkin to sweet potato, nothing else for 3-4 weeks ,now your kid may have an infection have you had her stool tested to rule out any infection?
Now I was told she should dry a vet diet-hydrolozed protein-she she was also vomiting and reguritating. I choose to try something else and if that didn’t work ,well to go ahead & try what the vet recommended.
She is on The honest Kitchen now a rehydrated food i buy her grain free, they have various types.
my thoughts are stop the rice-rice can cause inflammation, and she has an inflammatory process occurring with the colitis episode.
Dr. karen Becker has some excellent articles just on this subject-its on the Mercola.com website.
If you can buy some organic canned PLAIN PUMPKIN -stop the kibble completely. You might also offer her a cooked sweet potato, with the ground turkey. I know this may sound odd, but pepper does better on Ground turkey ,chicken & beef than she did on lightly boiled chicken breast. Maybe try a ground version of the turkey or chicken. She could have developed an allergy to egg or even the chicken. You might want to try her on a novel protein,a protein that she never ate, I bought a rabbit at Whole foods & boiled it for her. Her tummy needs about 3-4 weeks of rest, that’s why I say the soft low residue foods-no treats nothing that cause cause the inflammation to linger.
I just personally think, that as they get older the kibble is just too hard on them, and I soaked her kibble to make it easier. When they have this inflammatory disease, I think they need a softer diet.
There are some canned foods also that you may want to try, on that I really don’t know, i have never fed canned. I know people have good things to say about WERUVA & other people can guide you on that.
I hope some of this helps you, I will be glad to help further if you have any more questions.
Good Luck
Fondly,
Cheryl
I see you provided your email I will email you the site to Dr. becker and all you have to do is put in the search IBD/IBS

[Dori]

Hi Kelly. My suggestion would be do go completely grain free. Avoid poultry and all the night shade plants some of which are white potatoes, tomatoes. Just google night shade plants. They are all inflammatory and you want to avoid them. You also want to avoid soy. Also, as Cheryl stated, rice is also inflammatory. You need to remove as many inflammatory ingredients from your dogs diet. My 15 year old 7 lb. Maltese, Hannah, tended to have high liver levels and is also on Denamarin daily. Her regular vet had prescribed 1/2 tablet a day but the specialist I took her to (at the recommendation of her regular vet) so that we could rule out any issues going on told me to give her a whole tablet once a day for the rest of her life. I’m sure you are aware that it must be given 1 to 1/2 hours before meals. Not with the meal. I also give her 200 mg. of vitamin E (soy free) once a day (also prescribed by both the specialist and Hannah’s vet). Mercola.com is the only company that has a vitamin E without soy that I have been able to find. When I originally went grain free Brothers Complete was what I was feeding but had to stop feeding their foods because all their foods include turkey or chicken in them and one of my dogs (I have three toy dogs) is intolerant of all poultry (all fowl). For the most part back around 3 years ago I switched to THK Zeal (only one of their formulas I could find that didn’t contain any poultry). I then added commercial raw diets to their diets. I feed rotational within brands and also different brands. The Honest Kitchen Zeal is still in rotation. I also feed some Freeze Dried foods. Hannah’s liver levels have come down considerably and just a shade above normal. They were crazy high awhile back.

[Giles123]

Thanks Cheryl I’ll definately give it a try. I think your right as they get older it gets hard for them to digest the kibble. I’ve heard pumpkin is good for inflammation. Don’t know why I didn’t think of that. Thanks for the info and I’ll check my email for your link.

Kelly

[Giles123]

Thanks Dori. Our girl Sydney is also on the denamarin for life. Being a large breed she had developed some hip trouble and of course by her age some degenerative arthritis. The vet she had before had put her on rymadal but didn’t tell us she needed regular blood tests on that because it could damage the liver. Thankfully we have a new vet who found the problem with her liver right away but she will be on the denamarin for good most likely. Glad you and Cheryl let me know rice is inflammatory. I didn’t know that. I’ll check out the vitamin site you recommended. Think the vitamin will help her. Her hair has thinned a lot. Probably needs that vitamin e.

[Susan]

Hi Giles, try not to feed kibble, its too hard to digest, especially when they get older, your best to cook meals, Rice has little rounded corners which can irritate the bowel & get stuck in pockets of the bowel… my boy can eat grounded rice in kibble but when I feed boiled rice he gets his rumbling, grumbling bowel & diarrhoea, but if ur dog has been doing OK on the rice she my be able to handle rice, Susan Lauten told me to cook rice noodles instead of the rice, you just soak the rice noodles in boiling water until soft & they’re ready…..Pumkin is EXCELLENT, it soothes the GI track, I mix 1 spoon with all meals Patch eats, I boil a heap then mash it all up & put in ice cube tray, cover with cling wrap, I pop out what I need the night before & keep in fridge for next day, we don’t have pumkin in a tin in Australia….. Honest Kitchen has base mixes, you just add the cooked meat, Preference, Kindly are grainfree & potato free, Hale has grains…You have so much to pick from in America your very lucky, I cant get Honest kitchen in Australia…our laws are to strict when it comes to food & animal food…..

[Author]

Posts