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IMPA Greyhound

by erb152 - June 25, 2009

Hi Dr. Marsden,
My name is Elizabeth Bryson and I'm from Associate Pet Hospital in Swift Current, SK. Just saw your talk at the SVMA in Regina last weekend, and wondering about starting my own greyhound on some herbals. She is five years old and has been on low dose pred alternating with azathioprine every other day for immune-med polyarthritis since she was one. Her DJD is quite bad. She is very lame, all four legs are affected with her elbows and carpi being the worst. Her joint taps are no longer inflammatory and her blood work has been normal annually. She gets occasional stress colitis and has multiple tiny sebaceous cysts all over, as well as often has a mucoid vulvar discharge (no uti, not an inflammatory discharge). She has typical greyhound teeth and needs a dentistry soon. Had one bout of pancreatitis last fall and has marked splenomegaly. Christy Griffin has done accupuncture on her a few times. Any input or recomendations would be greatly appreciated.
Also, I have been reading the catalogue a bit and was wondering what you would recommend keeping on the shelf for those young dogs with steroid responsive allergic dermatitis too....
Thanks for your time!
Beth

by naturevet

June 25, 2009

Hi Beth,

It's nice to see you using the site. I hope our advice proves useful, as herbal medicine can be extremely rewarding in practice.

Inflammation from a Chinese medical perspective is often diagnosed as Damp Heat. Features of your dog consistent with this diagnosis include the growths, vaginal discharge, and colitis. Basically, exudates, mucous and growths were labeled 'Damp', and the association of these with signs of inflammation and redness gives us the 'Heat'.

Si Miao San (Four Marvels Powder) is our quintessential anti-Damp Heat anti-inflammatory formula. In fact, the formula was developed to treat joint inflammation and vaginal discharge, both of which your dog possesses.

So it seems the place to start. I'd give about 1/3 tsp BID per 20 lbs or so. You can bump up the dose if it is working, but not quite complete in its effect. We've also found that diet (as predicted by Chinese medical theories on the origin of Damp) plays a big role in inflammation and IMPA. In particular, a low carb higher protein diet. An ideal diet would be, at the least, a home-cooked grain free diet. At best it would be raw, although I don't know how you feel about raw diets. If SMS aids, then these diets should be given serious consideration, in order to maximize benefits.

Hopefully you'll see some of that pain decreasing after the diet and herbs have been in place for a couple of weeks.

As for allergic dermatitis, there are about a half dozen formulas we choose from that are all quite different. They include Si Miao San, San Ren Tang (Three Seeds Decoction), Si Wu Xiao Feng Yin (Four Materials Eliminate Wind Powder), and Qing Ying Tang (Clear the Nutritive Decoction). In addition, there are two not yet on the site that you can get from us: Chu Shi Wei Ling Tang, a spin on Wei Ling Tang (Harmonize the Stomach with Five Herbs and Poria), and modified Long Dan Xie Gan Tang (modified Gentian Combination). You can start looking these up on the site to get an idea of what the patients might look like, even buy a couple of bottles of the first four. But we're happy to also guide you on a case-by-case basis for a while as you get going. There are several cases on dermatitis in this forum that will serve as a place to start in terms of learning their essential features.

In conclusion, it's great to be hearing from you, Beth. I hope you find the above advice and the tools on this site useful, so that your experiences in herbal medicine are rewarding.

All the best,

Steve

by erb152

June 25, 2009

Thanks so much Steve! I'll definitely start the SMS with Joon. Don't think I can bring myself to do the raw diet, I am a total germaphobe and we have an eight month old baby at home, but she has been eating orijen fish and doing well on it.
So the allergy case I had in mind is a 4yr old male neutered pug who responds very well to steroids (is on Vanectyl P 1-2 tabs a day) but as soon as they are discontinued he gets immediately dry, red, very flakey and very itchy all over his body (dorsally as well as ventrally). Also on optimmune ophth bid for marked pigmentary keratitis. Eats orijen fish. We ran RAST testing on him last month which came back with insignificant numbers on everything. Also did a thyroid panel and was low normal so the internist said to try him on supplementation, started last week. Very dedicated owner.
Thanks again!
Beth

by erb152

June 25, 2009

Just out of curiosity...what is the benefit of feeding raw homemade over cooked homemade?

by marneemadsen

July 1, 2009

HI Beth,
Your pug case is a bit opposite of your greyhound in that there are a lot of dryness signs rather than damp heat. A good response to steroids with minimal side effects usually means they are asking for moistening and cooling. Steroids do that, then if given too long create dampness. So you may want to look at Si Wu Xiao Feng Yin. Dry eye is a sign of Liver Blood Deficiency...not enough moisture to eyes, just like the rest of the skin. I might try not to get too far into thyroid supps as it doesn't seem to be the real issue.

As far as food goes, processing and cooking add heat to food energetically, so raw foods are cooler by nature for hot animals.

Hope that helps....

Marnee Madsen

by naturevet

July 2, 2009

Hi Beth,

I agree that your dog is rather 'dry' from a Chinese medical perspective. Generally in these dogs, especially if they are very itchy, we try a formula called Qing Ying Tang (Clear the Nutritive Decoction), which is anti-inflammatory and even anti-microbial, but also helps improve circulation (hydration) to the skin. It's quite a complex formula pharmacologically, but symptom-wise, it fits. It also fits the keratitis and dry eye. If it's wrong for the dog, you'll see some seborrhea oleosa. That won't be a bad thing. It'll just tell us where to go next.

Regarding your question, as Marnee said, processing is considered to add heat to the food from a Chinese perspective, making it more 'heating' and itch-aggravating in animals, and people! I'm not a big advocate of raw home made diets, however, for food safety reasons. The commercial companies that make raw diets have an astounding safety record, and this is partly due to when the grinding is done - i.e. after the food is frozen, and making sure it is frozen in the first place. This is probably the most important method of limiting exposure to pathogenic bacteria, and it works. As long as owners do that, it should be okay, but many don't. Home-cooked is fine, however, for many animals, and eliminates much of the 'heating' concern of processed diets, which is really coming from their very rapid bowel transit times; and their effect of creating hyperinsulinemia and secondary inflammatory changes and oxidative stress.

Okay, hope that you get somewhere. Again, I wish you luck and hope these two cases start to intrigue you about pursuing this branch of medicine.

All the best,
Steve

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