When your pet suffers joint pain

Winnipeg

As we and our pets age, mobility becomes one of the most concerning issues we have. Aging joints gives us both pain and can restrict motion.

For us, there is a cornucopia of medications and supplements that we are offered by our doctors, TV ads, and our social media reels. “Eat this miracle food for better joint health,” hits my feeds all the time. And while some might have merit, a lot miss the mark, especially products offered for sale by questionable sources.

For our pets, there are not as many options, and some of the most effective can also be the most dangerous. The most common prescription is for Meloxicam (Metacam). This is an amazingly effective drug, and I highly recommend its use for short-term injury rehab for pain control. Unfortunately, because it is so effective, it also gets prescribed for long-term treatment of joint pain due to arthritis. It isn’t cheap, but it is easy and effective. But the long-term use increases the chance of side effects, which can include damage to the kidney and liver. Unfortunately, these side effects are usually overshadowed by how well it works and how easy it is to administer.

The biggest problem I have had using this product is that it masks the pain, and we all know that pain is the body’s way of telling you “Don’t do that.” So, pets on Metacam become much higher risks to re-injure or worsen a condition, because the pain warning isn’t there. As long as you make sure that the pet can’t get into trouble making the injury worse, it’s a great drug.

Rather than using drugs, though, joint pain can be addressed by removing the cause of the pain. Which is usually inflammation.

Inflammation can be caused by many factors, the most common and most easily addressed is diet. We know many foods cause inflammation. In pets, these foods are things like carbs, excess Omega 6, and the chemicals that can be used for supplementation and preservation of hyper-processed dry foods.

Countering these inflammatory items can be partly done through balancing the Omegas with added Omega 3 (DHA, EPA, DPA) and through the use of natural anti-inflammation foods, like turmeric golden paste. But a better way to address them is to remove them from the diet altogether.

We eat clean, fresh foods whenever we can, and we know our bodies appreciate it. Same for our pets. Getting away from the carbs that are needed to make those little brown pebbles, and the processing and chemicals give our pets a new outlook. And they love getting fed real food, too.

Instead of covering up inflammation with drugs, clean foods don’t cause any to start with. When we add in the joint support supplements, like green-lipped mussel (or other source of glucosamine), Omega 3 oils, turmeric, etc, we give our aging pets relief from inflammation and joint support. An added plus to clean foods is that replacing the calories from carbs means the pet actually builds muscle better by getting more usable protein. Another added bonus is that many pets drop extra weight that the carbs can cause, extra weight that can put a strain on joints too.

Cleaning up the diet and using natural supplements can end up being cheaper than prescription diets and drugs. Bonus, they have only positive side effects. It is easy to give our pets longer, happier, pain free golden years.