The dog health is a well studied area in veterinary medicine. Infectious diseases that affect dogs are important not only from a veterinary standpoint, but also because of the risk to public health; an example of this is rabies. Genetic disorders also affect dogs, often due to selective breeding to produce individual dog breeds. Due to the popularity of both commercial and homemade dog foods, nutrition is also a heavily-studied subject.
If you were asked if your dog is healthy and happy, how would you respond? Do you really know how to “read” your pet?
“Fido” can’t speak for himself and relies on you to be his eyes and ears for everything in his or her world. That means everything, from what is the best diet to reading the signs of illness.
Sounds like “easier said than done,” doesn’t it?
Well, we can’t teach you how to speak “canine,” but we can give you the tools to reach a better understanding of what life is like for your pet.
Starting today, learn the facts about what your dog really needs to survive longer and healthier.
Did you know?
Dogs shouldn’t be given chocolate? Do you know why?
Dogs get allergies just like people. Can you identify them?
How to give your dog CPR?
Are you giving your dog nutritional food? Walk down the aisle in the grocery stores and you will see every kind of dog food that you can imagine.
Are you randomly selecting your pets diet based on what’s the cheapest? Go ahead, admit it. . .most of us do, but we are really short changing our pet when we buy based on cost.
Like humans, dogs need the right combination of the basic food groups in order to have a healthy life span. Dogs also need to be regulated on the kinds of food that they eat or else they would end up being obese as well.
Do you think that you have taken every precaution to see to it that your dog does not become ill? Well, let’s see. Are you under the impression that “distemper” and “rabies” are the same illness?
You’d be surprised how many people believe they are the same. They aren’t and each needs to be treated properly. We’ve all been there and believe we know everything there is to know about dog health. Unfortunately, that isn’t the case.
Rabies in dogs is a fatal disease transmitted by the bite of an infected mammal, such as a cat, raccoon, bat, or another dog. Animals with rabies suffer deterioration of the brain and tend to behave bizarrely and often aggressively, increasing the chances that they will bite another animal or a person and transmit the disease. Three stages of rabies are recognized in dogs and other animals. The first stage is a one to three day period characterized by behavioral changes and is known as the prodromal stage. The second stage is the excitative stage, which lasts three to four days. It is this stage that is often known as furious rabies due to the tendency of the affected dog to be hyperreactive to external stimuli and bite at anything near. The third stage is the paralytic stage and is caused by damage to motor neurons. Incoordination is seen due to rear limb paralysis and drooling and difficulty swallowing is caused by paralysis of facial and throat muscles. Death is usually caused by respiratory arrest.
More Burning Questions. . .
Is it true that dogs can cough?
What are intestinal parasites?
Should we feed our dog meat, carbohydrates or fat?
How can we control flea infestation?
What is heartworm?
What is Leptosporosis?
We are all familiar with the “standard” diseases that we hear about in dogs. But, rabies, distemper and parvo are not the only diseases our dogs are vulnerable to. There are others that, while they are familiar in the veterinary world, we know nothing about. See if you can identify these:
Canine kennel cough
Infectious Canine Hepatitus
Canine Coronavirus
Lyme disease
Dog health care benefits by interested owners conscientiously bringing their dogs for yearly checkups: New and better blood, lab, and x-ray procedures aid the veterinarian in gaining valuable knowledge of what is happening to your dog. New and improved equipment like MRI machines speed up diagnosis as well. Not only do these factors enable more effective care, but they also save you money in the long run because your pet won’t need repeated vet visits to find his problem.