High Fat Diet and Cysts

Question:

My dog is 8 yrs. old, and had kidney failure when she was 4 yrs. old, and through a holistic doctor, she had rejuvenated her kidney function in 5 months time. She is now 8 years old, and she is having cysts appear on her skin. She has a lipoma, and I had that checked, it is not cancerous. Shortly after I changed her food from Innova senior food to Innova Evo-without grains, she had these cysts develop. She also needs to lose 5 lbs. She is pretty active, and I only feed her 1/2 cup of dog food 2 times a day. But the Innova Evo has alot of fat content in it.

I need help making better food choices for her, and when she was having kidney problems, I did a raw meat, white rice, and vegetable diet, and continued it for 2 years. I am trying to help my dog, but I need to know what I can do to keep these cysts at bay. Besides the dog food, she has a Canine Food Supplement from Wysong, she takes dandelion tincture, Moducare for her immune system, and shark cartilage to amnage the lipoma. She used to take horsetail.

What can I do to better help her manage her body? Any help you can possibly provide I will be gratetful. Thank you, karen Z.

Response:

Hello Karen,
Thank you for your inquiry to Holistic Pet Info. It really seems you are on the right track based on your information. If your holistic vet practices traditional Chinese medicine, there are herbs that have been used for skin masses. These masses are considered phlegm stagnation, which may have been influenced by her previous kidney disease. Without getting into too much detail about Chinese medicine, phlegm can also be caused by high fat diets. In Lucky’s case it may be helpful to have a diet analysis done to determine what exact foods are recommended for her condition. There are specific proteins and carbohydrates that may best fit her Chinese medical diagnosis.

I recommend continuing her immune support and food supplement; I feel the best results for Lucky may come from specializing her diet. Best of luck.

Sincerely,
Colleen Smith DVM, CVA

Follow up Question:

Thank you for the information you gave me to help with my dog, however, I need to ask you is there a website that I can get specific ideas on my dog's exact foods she needs? Thank you for being so helpful, this is very complicated, but my dog continues to teach me lots of things.

Hello Karen,
There is a human acupuncture site that has a very large and helpful selection of diet and nutrition information based on Chinese Medicine. It is www.acupuncture.com and click on diet and nutrition in the left hand column. It gives details and recommendations based on energetics and medicinal actions of foods.

There are also some books that may give you some resources to develop a new diet for your dog.
"The Tao of Nutriton" by Dr. Maoshing Ni
"Healing with Whole Foods" by Paul Pitchford
"Chinese Nutrition Therapy" by Joerg Kastner

I hope this give you more concrete information to make a well-balanced and exceptional diet for her. Happy cooking.
Sincerely,
Colleen Smith DVM, CVA