Let Food Be Thy Medicine

One of my favorite quotes about food comes from Hippocrates, the father of modern medicine: “Let food be thy medicine, and medicine be thy food”. His knowledge and foresight that this demonstrates, shows that despite living from 460-370BC, he had a better understanding of health than many doctors and vets do today. It seems extraordinary that, even now, if you go to the doctors with high cholesterol, early heart disease, liver disease, or any number of other health issues, the best advice you might get is a single sentence, or “try to eat more healthily”. I find this both sad and frustrating. Hippocrates also believed all disease starts in the gut - there is certainly a lot of truth in this as we now know that around 70% of the immune system is found in the gut, and that the microbiome plays a key role in health.

Diet is so critical to health that I believe we should be teaching it in schools - what could be more important, given that we eat 3 times a day? Teach children to grow vegetables and make healthy complete meals for themselves & their families, rather than teaching them to make cakes and regurgitate information. Also teach them about animals - how to feed, interact with & care for them. Anyway, I digress.

     An unexpected breed to find in India, this young one looked quite healthy.

I fully believe that the most important thing I have learnt since leaving university is about Species Appropriate Feeding, in dogs and cats often referred to as Biologically Appropriate Raw Feeding (BARF). I was lucky enough, as a student, to see practice with my good friend, and a great inspiration, Dr. Nick Thompson of Holistic Vet Ltd. The knowledge he shared with me cultivated a great fascination and thirst to learn more about how we can best feed our domesticated animals of all kinds. I’d had previous experience of working on a game reserve in South Africa, that also housed some big cats for the Born Free Foundation. These were cats, born or raised and kept in captivity that would be unable to feed themselves or survive in the wild, so could not be released. Feeding time involved sawing up huge wildebeest or antelope carcasses and feeding whole limbs or similar, so to mimic how these cats would eat in the wild. In zoos too, the keepers do their best to feed their charges a diet as close as possible to their natural one, to promote optimum health and welfare. Why then do we feed our dogs and cats dry biscuits (kibble) every day?

Almost more importantly, why did we only have 2 lectures on small animal nutrition in our clinical years at university? One from Hills, the pet food giants, and the other from a clinician detailing how different commercial diets were altered for different health conditions, e.g. Hills k/d for kidney disease. We were taught farm animal nutrition relatively well comparatively as, for these ‘working’ animals, optimum performance, growth and health are crucial to herd management and farm profits. But again, why only one lecture on equine nutrition from Dodson & Horrell? How are young vets supposed to advice on species appropriate feeding with little to no knowledge? 

    Nani, an ‘old’ (12yrs is considered old in India cat at one of our guest houses.  

Luckily for me, with my interest sparked, I started researching and learning about animal nutrition for myself. I read many books, researched online, chatted with holistic vets feeding natural diets, and then I looked to my amazing collie companion Fudge to be my next teacher. At university I didn’t have the time or money to feed a natural diet, but I did start to introduce a regular raw meaty bone. After these I noticed his poo would be firmer, easier to pick up and invariably lighter in colour (a common occurrence due to the calcium in bones, excess of which is passed out in the stools). I also noticed that his teeth became shiny and white again, remaining that way throughout the rest of his life. I actually like to play a little guessing game when I see dogs teeth - I can nearly always guess if they are bone eaters or not, the changes can be so obvious. Once I’d left university I started feeding a completely raw diet, and that is when I knew I was on the right track. 

The changes I saw in my own dog I found fascinating. After a month or 2, people would approach me on dog walks to compliment me on how shiny Fudge’s coat was, or how healthy he looked, and ask what I fed him. More importantly his stools normalized from variable colitis (starting firm and ending soft), to consistently firm, easy to pick up, mucus free, almost odourless nuggets (oh the joys!). He was also less itchy and only had one more hot spot the whole of the rest of his life (after an insect bite), having had 5 or 6 in his previous year or 2 with me. As a 1.5 year old he’d developed a sudden onset lameness, later diagnosed as a mild OCD (cartilaginous) lesion of the shoulder joint, with various other inflammatory changes. I only rehomed him as a 1 year old, and was told he had previously eaten “whichever food was on offer”, so suspect his nutrition was sub-par during those crucial growing years when good nutrition is so essential to normal development of bones and joints. After a shoulder arthroscopy, Fudge still suffered on/off bouts of lameness, which I’d been advised to treat with exercise restriction and anti-inflammatories. If they continued, my teachers agreed that intra-articles steroid injections would be next on the cards, but that these would need repeating throughout the rest of his life. Even with my limited knowledge at the time, this seemed a bleak outlook to me. You’ll be thrilled to know that his raw diet, with added omega 3s and joint supplements, kept him free of lameness, bar the very occasional requirement for a resting day or 2, until he was about 9. At that point herbal medicine kept him happy and comfortable, with no further anti-inflammatories ever being needed. I have clients who can report similar successes. What better way to treat disease could there be than feeding the right food?

“If we eat wrongly, no doctor can cure us; If we eat rightly, no doctor is needed.” - Victor G. Rocine

This is another favorite quote of mine, and I have seen it over and over again in practice. There are always those memorable cases, for me usually of chronic inflammatory gut problems that don’t resolve, and then you discover that, alongside their strict diet plan that you’ve drawn up, they have tea and custard creams every afternoon (how very English!). On the other side, skin disease, gut problems, lameness and even behavior problems have all improved or even resolved by changing animals onto a species appropriate diet. Not every case, of course, and not always straight away - some tweaking and perfecting is often needed, or some herbal or homeopathic support. However, enough cases happen this way, that diet is one of the first things I want to know about in any new patient, especially those suffering from chronic disease. 

So what do I consider as a species appropriate diet for dogs and cats? 

Cats are obligate carnivores, meaning they are designed to eat a diet of prey only - meat, bones, organs, viscera, etc. So this is what I recommend is fed, alongside a little fish, and occasionally some supplements, such as herbs, if needed. (When I talk about herbs as part of diet, I always refer to them as supplements, differing from using them as medicines by dosage and frequency of administration, as well as safety of the herb in question). Cats have no dietary requirement for anything else, most especially not carbohydrates. Originally descended from desert cats, they are designed to get most of their daily fluid intake from their prey. This is one reason that kibble can be such an issue for them - cats eating kibble, even if they drink to thirst, have been found to take in about 50% less water than cats eating wet foods. This can lead to a state of harmonic low level dehydration which, along with synthetic phosphorous in processed foods, increases the risk of kidney disease. Carbs in cat food are not only unnecessary, but they play a huge role in the pet obesity crisis that we see the world over. The satiety center in a cats brain (the bit that tells them when they’re full) responds to protein and fat. This means that if you feed a food containing 50% carbs, they must eat twice as much to feel full! The other indisputable cause of the obesity crisis in dogs and cats (and realistically humans) is overconsumption. I’ve found raw feeding to be a great way of helping dogs and cats to lose weight. Any low carb food will be helpful, but owners can struggle with the decreased portion size. Carbs often act as a filler in many processed foods, so a lot goes in one end, but a lot comes out the other too! With low carb diets, more of the food is utilized, with less wastage, so less food needs feeding overall. If your pet struggles with hunger whilst trying to lose weight, then feeding dogs just once a day, or cats just twice, I’ve found can be helpful, as can the addition of insoluble fiber, such as psyllium husk.

Dogs are a little different. They are facultative carnivores, meaning they are designed to eat prey too, but they are scavengers so can get by eating other things. A highly acidic stomach acid, short gut length, vertical jaw motion, carnivorous teeth, and low amylase levels are similar between dogs, cats, wolves and wild cats, as well as many other carnivores. So my ideal diet for dogs is the same as for cats, although for dogs I do like to add some fruits, veggies and herbs. There is much debate about the addition of these in raw diets amongst the raw feeding community. I include them not because they are essential, but for the additional phytonutrients and health benefits they provide. My favorites are leafy greens, antioxidant-rich berries, and small amounts of yellow-orange veggies - all have been shown to improve canine health in various ways, such as minimizing cancer risk.

                   An overweight Labrador family we met at a German Bakery!

My preference is always to feed dogs and cats a fresh raw diet, ensuring it is varied and balanced over time. I believe this is the diet they evolved to eat and so it can provide them with optimum health. I do understand, and have seen, that this diet does not suit every dog or cat that walks into my consulting room. Some seem to do much better on cooked food, either all the time or during periods of disease, or old age. Key points to remember when feeding a raw diet include:

1. Ensure it is varied, and balanced over time. 
2. Bones must only ever be fed raw, NEVER cooked (cooking makes them brittle and hard, making them more likely to damage teeth or cause an obstruction as they cannot be digested).
3. Bones should be carefully selected according to the size of your pet and their mouth shape, as well as being ideally non-weight-bearing (this will minimize the risk of tooth damage).
4. Hygiene and common sense around storage, serving and handling raw meat is paramount. (The same could be said for kibble, as recalls are not uncommon for bacteria such as Salmonella or Listeria).
5. It is best not to feed a mixture of raw and cooked foods, as they digest at different speeds and require slightly different acidity and enzyme levels.

Here in India I can tell you that the dogs are definitely not eating this diet! The cats fare better as their diet consists mostly of rats, mice and birds that they catch for themselves. From what I can tell, most dogs are surviving on a mixture of rice, chapati (flat breads), Parle G (very sweet) biscuits and leftovers from human meals. These leftovers will mostly be vegetarian, as most Hindus are vegetarian. Those that do get dog food have the usual culprits of Pedigree Chum and the like. I have seen one dog eating a raw meaty bone, tied up outside his home. Others I have seen feeding on animal carcasses by roadsides or in the countryside. There are hundreds of dogs everywhere we go in India, and many pups in various stages of growth. I expected to see more issues linked to such a poor diet, but the pups externally seem to grow relatively well for the most part. They can clearly survive on this diet, but they most certainly do not thrive! I have seen maybe 5 or 6 dogs over the last 3 months that I would consider as looking in premium health. 3 or 4 of those must have been under 1 or 2 years old, where youth can give the appearance of health. Obviously other factors are involved in their appearance - mange, fleas, and all the secondary skin complaints that follow are seen in most dogs. I have seen more bizarre gaits and postures than I could possibly describe - whether from injuries, developmental joint or bone abnormalities from poor diet of pup or mum, or a combination I couldn’t say. I have not seen many old dogs. When I thought of coming to India I expected the majority of dogs to be underweight, but I’ve seen as many here that are overweight, ranging from a little chunky to full on obesity. The surprising number of labradors and their crosses over here definitely win the obesity stakes, as they often do in the rest of the world! In truth, seeing how carb and sugar-filled their diets are, I am unsurprised. What does surprise me is how they can grow and survive so well on such poor food. They’re not thriving, but it has still got me thinking...

We live in times of environmental crisis and destruction, where the encouragement for humans to eat less meat for environmental reasons abounds. Can we justify feeding this much meat to our pets if they can survive without it? I don’t eat meat myself, yet I feed it to my pets to ensure they have the optimum nutrition, and so health. Should we be making a compromise? Should we maybe sacrifice the very peak of health in our pets, to help save our planet?

Raw feeding is becoming increasingly popular, for all the reasons I have outlined here, so the pet food industry is requiring more and more meat to meet demand. At the same time, there are various vets around the world, including renowned holistic vet Richard Pitcairn, who have started advocating vegetarian diets for dogs and cats, for environmental or health reasons (such as severe food intolerances). However, I have seen for myself disease and ill health caused by imbalanced vegan and vegetarian diets. Recently a few diets have come out using insects as a protein source. Insects reproduce quickly and in huge numbers, making them potentially a more environmentally friendly option. Could they be used to make a diet as healthy as one made from meat or fish? 

I am starting to think that we ought to be researching these options more thoroughly, to see if a truly healthy and balanced diet for dogs at least, can be made with insects or vegetarian food. In the meantime should we consider a compromise? Maybe feed a vegetarian food 1 or 2 days a week, and meat the rest of the time? 

As humans we are constantly compromising our own health, by consuming things unsuited to optimum health, yet most of us are unaffected on a day to day basis by these poor choices. As a vet, I find the idea of feeding a sub-optimum diet extremely difficult, but as a green-minded lover of the environment I find the idea of the amount of meat needed to feed even just the dogs and cats of the UK slightly disturbing. What should we do? Feed for the health of our pets? Or for the good of the planet? Can we find a diet, or way of feeding that does both?

“In all affairs it’s a healthy thing now and then to hang a question mark on the things you have long taken for granted.”- Bertrand Russell

                          

Progress & the Gold Standard

We live in times of rapid change, with recent years and decades bringing huge amounts of progress in every field. However, all progress comes with its good and bad parts.

India and England are vastly different countries, but looking at how they’ve progressed, many similarities can be seen. We can all see how the smart phone has allowed everyone to have the world at their fingertips, but we also know its negative side. I was astonished to find that the general population of India appear even more preoccupied with their phones than Westerners. Dinner dates are had with both parties staring at their phones in both countries, and train rides involve the majority of passengers staring at their phones whilst music or videos blare out. Many question how good phones are for our brain function, as we have no need to remember things that would have been essential before, as we can just look it up. With fewer computers amongst the general population in India I feel the phone has made more of an impact, both for the good and the bad. Suddenly masses of the population, who could only access books before, have found the world at their fingertips with all the knowledge and possibilities the internet offers. Also a huge leap in ease of communication. The negative side is that a lot of what is seen on the internet, as we know is social media, where how you look and what you’re doing seem the most important things to share. Indians have truly taken selfies to heart, I would say even more so than other Eastern countries. Not a day goes by where you don’t see hundreds of Indians taking hundreds of selfies, or get asked for a selfie by what seems like every other visitor at an attraction. So they have seen the great benefits and downfalls of mobile phones. 

In other areas, such as the environment, they have progressed quicker than many western countries, though over a shorter time. Over the last 4 years (when my partner Joe last visited) their littering problem has vastly improved, with signs all over discouraging littering and single-use plastics (although I won’t pretend it isn’t still a huge issue, with litter being posted out of train & bus windows, or piling up around corners). The smell of burning plastic is only occasionally smelt, rather than around every street corner. In terms of energy supply, I believe they will become 100% renewable quicker than many western countries. They have both the advantage of progressing this way later than the west, and so more advanced technology is available, plus they have more readily available resources - huge hydro-electric plants have taken over some Himalayan valleys, solar fields have cropped up on arid land, wind farms on hilltops, and solar water heaters and panels dot many rooftops in the cities. Yet, as a country, they still have huge issues with poverty, and a gigantic poverty gap between their richest and poorest. So progress brings many benefits, but has its pitfalls and difficulties too, for it is easier to change the energy supply of a nation, than the habits of its people, as countries the world over are finding.

In the veterinary industry, like many medical fields, things have progressed rapidly over the last decades too. We have a huge plethora of diagnostic and treatment options available, that wouldn’t have been dreamt of before. Not only are they now available, but often quite readily, with CT & MRI scanners being commonplace, even if only one day a week as they travel around, and even prosthetic limbs being offered for animals. Veterinary medicine, as we know from James Herriot, used to depend a lot on the ingenuity, knowledge and resourcefulness of the vet, as the number of treatment and diagnostic options was low. Although these are obviously fantastic progressions for animal health and welfare, there are drawbacks. All new treatment and diagnostic options tend to be expensive, at least initially. In fact the price of pet insurance has been rising rapidly, to the point where the number of insured pets is dropping. Many people simply can no longer afford to insure their pets, and many insurance companies have so many restrictions and exclusions, including making owners pay an additional fee to visit a referral centre that isn’t on their ‘list’, that many deem it not worthwhile. These owners are tending towards simply saving what would have been their monthly payment in a pet bank account for their own insurance. Could we be moving towards an era where the cost of pet ownership means that pet welfare could drop due to an inability to afford treatment? 

Another potentially detrimental progression in the industry is that towards corporate practice. Almost 70% of veterinary practices are now owned by corporate companies, meaning that profit-driven businessmen and women hold the practice reins, instead of practicing vets, who understand all aspects of the business. I can see some possible advantages to corporate practice - more money in the industry could mean more investments for research and scientific advancement, as well as more widespread availability of resources, such as diagnostic equipment. However, with profit driving decision-making, will the research be done for the good of the pet population, or for the good of the practice pocket? Some corporate practice groups are also making partnerships with different companies, such as the Linnaeus group with PetPlan, the insurance company. Until this point, as vets, we’ve never been allowed to specifically recommend insurance companies, so times really are changing. Others are making their own brands of supplements, or restricting what they sell to specific drugs or foods. Are pet owners to be penalized by their vet practice for wanting to make their own choices about what food or insurance to choose? And are vets to face these same restrictions when trying to offer pet owners the full array of options? 

This brings me to the Gold Standard. In medical terms, this is the treatment or diagnostic protocol that has been found, through scientific study and/or experience, to be the best available option for a given disease or condition. The advancements in medical fields are constant so the gold standard does change, and over recent decades will have changed innumerable times. Medical advancements have no doubt saved many lives, human and animal. For humans, these advancements can give the patient more choice, accuracy and efficacy in their diagnosis and treatment of disease. For animal owners, who have to make decisions on behalf of their pets, I think it can leave some feeling confused and uncertain. Most human and animal patients depend on the knowledge and advice of their doctor or vet to help with these difficult choices. For some this is a huge help, but for others, as I have seen, it can leave them feeling even more lost. Many vets are fantastic at explaining all the treatment and diagnostic options available, with pros and cons for each, ensuring owners can make a fully informed decision. Others, due to time or energy pressures, practice protocols, or personal preferences, can fall short of this ideal. In this regard, I fear the gold standard can sometimes do more harm than good. 

There is no doubt about it, gold standards save lives. All over the world right now gold standard protocols are being rolled out to try to minimize the spread of the novel coronavirus, originating in Wuhan, China. These may save many lives, with their successes and failures helping new gold standards to be drawn up. In every disease condition, if there is a gold standard option, it should always be offered and/or discussed - I do not question that. The thing that distresses me, and many pet owners I have met, about the gold standard is that it isn’t always ‘holistic’, and some vets seem only happy offering this option, as it is considered the ‘best one’. 

As I wrote in my previous blog post, holistic means to take into account all parts of the patient, and to find the option that suits them as an individual, in themselves and in how they are expressing their disease. For animals, the owners’ lifestyles, working hours, ability to administer medication and finances must also be taken into account when choosing a protocol. We’re very lucky in the UK to have the NHS, removing cost from most human medical decisions. In veterinary medicine it must always be considered, even in insured cases as insurance policies vary hugely. In my personal experience, cost, pet personality, and owners’ ability to mediate (either issues of timing/repetition of medicating, or physical ability) most frequently influence options chosen. For example, an older owner, who lives alone and off their pension, is unlikely to be able to afford or administer an expensive tablet 3 times a day to a fractious fussy cat! It may well be the gold standard treatment, but for this cat and owner it is not suitable. Similarly an anxious and aggressive dog, that needs sedation for anything more than a cursory check, may not suit a weekly day admission to a vet hospital for intravenous chemotherapy. Many owners are also influenced by previous experience - if a pet of theirs died under, or recovered poorly from, an anaesthetic when unwell, the option of a long surgical procedure may be the last thing they want, if it isn’t already at the life or death stage (e.g. a twisted spleen, or intestinal foreign body). 

Unfortunately, I have seen many cases where owners have been offered the gold standard treatment, or the option of taking their pet home, with pain relief if needed, and waiting for them to decline or die, whilst being made to feel guilty for not choosing the gold standard option that doesn’t suit them. This is by no means the norm, and I suspect other holistic vets see more of these cases than regular vets, as it is often to the alternatively-minded that these owners turn for help. I have seen similar happen with diagnostic options, where the owners are offered hundreds or thousands of pounds worth of tests, often with neither an offered option of a treatment trial, nor the 1 or 2 most useful tests within their budget. They are then made to feel terrible if they can’t afford it, or don’t want to put their pets through invasive procedures, which may or may not give them answers. Again this isn’t commonplace, but with the growth of corporate practices and profit-driven decision making could it become so? 

Luckily, the majority of vets love to explain to owners all the options available, and so allow them to make their own informed choice, whilst still maintaining high levels of animal welfare. This way the ‘gold standard’ for that particular patient and owner can be chosen with all sides feeling happy with the choice made. I find the holistic consult style, used for herbal medicine, homeopathy and acupuncture, to be particularly good for this. The length and requirement for the collection of detailed information into all areas of the patients life, and their owners desires for treatment, tends to allow the vet to know their client and patients better, allowing comfortable discussions, often about uncomfortable subjects. 

In a lot of chronic disease, from a conventional perspective, there are often few treatment options available, so if an owner refuses one it can leave the vet feeling at a loss as to what to offer. For example: Cancer cases that don’t want chemo, surgery or steroids; heart disease cases without symptoms, whose owners are reluctant to just wait for them to appear; early renal failure cases that have yet to reach a severity requiring medication; or joint problems in young animals whose owners are reluctant to start a lifetime of drugs. As a pet owner myself, I couldn’t bear to just watch and wait for my pet to decline. I would feel helpless. It is these owners that regularly end up at the door of a holistic vets, and find there the help and understanding they need to make their decisions. Herbs, homeopathy, acupuncture and diet can all be used, alone or in combination with each other, or with conventional drugs, to help relieve symptoms, support organ and body system function, and so improve the health and happiness of diseased pets, and so their owners too. Many conventional vets are becoming more and more interested in nutraceuticals (nutritional supplements, often containing one or more herbs), physical therapies, and acupuncture, making them more readily available around the country. However, I have heard from colleagues that some practice owners discourage this usage, and the RCVS statement on complementary therapies was hardly encouraging. So again I worry that we could be entering an era of restricted choices for pet owners, when in reality we have never been blessed with more options.

With this in mind, my advice to pet owners the world over is this: 

Find a vet you trust, and can have open honest discussions with; look outside the box and research things for yourself as well as listening to your vet - we can’t know everything! And remember, your vet is always trying to do their best by your pet, based on the knowledge they have, however it may seem. We do this job because we love animals and want them to be as happy and healthy as possible. Also, remember that your pet is under your guardianship, so unless their welfare is compromised, the decisions are always yours. Never feel pressured into making a decision that feels wrong for you and your pet. Gold standard or no, the decision is yours.

For me, India is a constant inspiration in working with what you have available. Give them a problem and they’ll find a solution, or way of sorting it, using whatever resources they have. Their solutions may be so far from the gold standard that it can be almost laughable, but you know what? They work! Maybe not perfectly, and maybe not for long, but they demonstrate the ingenuity and resourcefulness of human nature. We should all remember that progress can be great, and the gold standard important, but there are many colours duller than gold, yet just as beautiful to some, if not others. Choose your own colours, in life & health.

“If he is indeed wise he does not bid you enter the house of his wisdom, but rather leads you to the threshold of your own mind.” - from The Prophet, by Khalil Gibran 

India & Holistic medicine

For someone that’s never been to India before, and loves animals, the most notable thing here is the vast number of animals roaming around freely. You turn a Delhi street corner to find a cow munching rubbish, or a dog trying to find the softest spot to lie down. On the beach a cow may join you sunbathing, or a dog enjoy the cool under your table in a cafe whilst a cat looks for scraps nearby. Cats, chickens, pigs, ducks, cows, dogs and many others make their own lives in the areas around where people live. The occasional drama is inevitable, with animals blocking the road, dogs bickering on the edge of their territories, and a memorable bull fight on the beach that had everyone nearby scattering at top speed!

To Westerners it seems a bizarre arrangement, but in India necessity drives much of how they keep their animals, and many other things. When there is little to graze, the grazers most roam freely to find whatever forage they can. Seeing them eating rubbish makes me cringe, I much admit, but parts of the system make perfect sense. In a hot country, with variable electricity, all foods attracts flies and ants, and won't store well without a fridge once cooked. Problem solved with an extremely efficient composting system - the cows! (With some help from the dogs, pigs and chicken of course). All fruit and veg peelings, plus any leftover cooked food or plate scrapings, go to the cows. They love it, and within a day or 2 you have fresh dung in its place, which has a multitude of uses - fuel, flooring, plaster, etc. To keep cows or pigs in close and enclosed quarters here would breed disease, with the intense heat, the numerous flies and the minimal water (or excessive water during the monsoon). It would also hugely increase the workload for the animals caretakers, many of whom already have to work hard, under adverse conditions and intense heat, just to get by.

Not only is the way they’re kept very different, but also the human-cow relationship. According to statistics, there are almost 45 million cows in India. Having cows around all the time means the familiarity between cows and humans is strong, so more interactions, both friendly and less so, occur. Personally I love greeting and chatting with the local cows, and feeding them my fruit peelings daily. The cow is considered sacred by most Indians, and cattle slaughter is hugely controversial. Cows are associated with the god Krishna in Hinduism, and are highly regarded in the Ayurvedic system of medicine for the ‘ambrosia’ they produce (milk and dairy products). It is not only their holiness that makes them so special, but their fundamental importance as an integral part of the rural family - mother, father, cow, children, grandparents. Many poor families can be happy and healthy only if their cow is happy and healthy. So again we come back to necessity.

In the current world climate, necessity is driving a lot of big changes - global warming, pollution, littering, to name a few major ones. I also personally feel that health, the world over, is declining, necessitating changes in medicine, and how we look after our own, and our pets health. Yes, we have fewer severe acute contagious diseases, in both humans and animals, but we have much much more chronic disease, both physical and mental, of varying severity. The levels of these diseases - cancer, mental health/behavioral problems, autoimmune disease, chronic inflammation, to name a few - are increasing all the time, particularly in dogs and humans, and especially in the western world. I sometimes wonder if living a longer life of poorer health, is really better than living a shorter life of vibrant health?

So what is the answer?
I believe that the answer lies in truly holistic medicine - or ‘Whole’-istic, if you like. For those unfamiliar with the term holistic, it means to deal with or treat the whole of something or someone, and not just a part. Holistic medicine, therefore, looks at every system of the body, diet, lifestyle, mind and emotions, etc. and treats the individual patient based on the findings. This means that 10 people or animals with the same named diagnosis, say Inflammatory Bowel Disease, might require 10 different management regimes. This is because each of these patients is an individual, expressing their disease in their own unique way. Conventional western medicine would likely treat all 10 with steroids, and the same prescription diet (in dogs and cats!). We all know we are individuals and differ hugely to others, whilst sharing some similarities. Does it not then seem bizarre that we should all be treated with the same diet and medicines?

In a similar way to how the cows roam freely here, living off what they find, a lot of natural medicine has come from what is available - food, herbs, pressure/acupuncture points on the body, etc. It also works along the same level of efficiency - the cows roam freely to ensure their health is as good as possible, given the circumstances; holistic medicine encourages the body and all its systems to function as efficiently as possible, allowing as optimal a health as possible, given the circumstances.
This is what I love about holistic medicine.

Conventional western medicine tends to treat whatever symptoms of disease appear with antipathic drugs, like antibiotics, anti-inflammatories, etc. that aim to stop symptoms. Unfortunately, symptoms are the natural expression of the body when suffering dis-ease, so stopping them does not leave the body at ease again. Removing the symptoms does not even stop the disease, as it does not treat the cause of the problem.

I find that using holistic medicine is much more satisfying, especially in a fully integrated fashion - creating a management plan using different medicinal systems, depending on the needs of the patient. You might use herbs, homeopathy and antibiotics to treat a chronic skin disease with a secondary infection, for example. Herbs, homeopathy and diet can help to support organ function in pets on strong conventional medicines, like anti-epileptic drugs, and even help to keep the drug doses as low as possible. Diet alone, or with herbal or homeopathic support, can resolve a lot of digestive disease. The possibilities are endless, and the necessity of holistic medicine in the modern world is endless.

Like the Indians keep their animals using their available resources, so can we, as pet guardians and practitioners, use all of our available resources to keep our pets and patients as happy and healthy as possible, in 2020 and all the years to come. I personally believe that we can only achieve this through truly holistic management, and I look forward to sharing my knowledge with you all in the future. Together we can do our bit towards improving pet health and happiness in the years to come.

Happy New Year!