DOG HEALTH AND MEDICINE

Gaining excess pounds is all too common in older dogs. So is unintended weight loss. Neither is good for your pet, especially in his advancing years. That's why monitoring your dog's weight is of key importance as he ages. Too many pounds can exacerbate heart disease and arthritis and can cause problems, too- diabetes, back pain, and other orthopedic ills. It can also bring on arthritis where there had never been any. In addition, excess…

Just as some people dont vaccinate their newborn infants for fear the vaccinations can cause more harm than the disease, some owners of new puppies forego vaccinations for their young canine charges in the belief that the shots will do more harm than good. That is not true. Without immunization through vaccinations, a puppy can become gravely ill - and die. Its that simple.

The pain is not mild to moderate; its severe, to the point that the dog may not be able to eat. In fact, she may yelp even when you just touch her back and might possibly be unable to move or stand. The suffering and paralysis can come on either with a past history of back pain or with absolutely no prior warning.Moreover, the pain doesnt wax and wane, as it does with arthritis. Your pet may have real reluctance not only to jump or use the stairs but even to walk.

Eight-year-old English setter Buxley was staying at my moms house, says Neil Whitmore of Fairfield, Virginia. He had been out with her in the morning, and then she left him in the fenced yard. In the early afternoon he lay down with her, like he always does, but then he couldnt get up. It got progressively worse very quickly. He had no muscle control, and then he was paralyzed in both his front and rear legs.

Many pet owners love to consult Dr. Google, says Tufts veterinarian Alicia Karas, DVM, facetiously. Not that she doesnt understand the allure.

Its tempting, she comments, right there at your fingertips. Its free, she adds. And it seems spot on. My dog is limping - how can I get her through this without a visit to the vet? Ah, heres the answer.

The problem, Dr. Karas says, is that not even the best pet-related sites on the Internet can walk you through how to take care of your own particular dog with his own particular circumstances. There are just too many variables. The issue gets particularly serious when it comes to dispensing drugs.

Large studies of human populations have suggested for some time that having adequate vitamin D concentrations in the body protects not just against rickets but also against all kinds of other diseases, notably a number of cancers, including breast cancer. Research has indicated, in fact, that women who live in southern climates in the US. are less prone to developing breast cancer than women who live up north.

One of the most common questions people ask veterinarians as their dog gets older is whether she still needs her vaccinations. In fact, a lot of people with dogs skip the vaccinations in later years, figuring that their pet has already been vaccinated against various illnesses a number of times and has gotten sick to that point, so why put the animal through more shots? It's a grave mistake. Older dogs need their shots even more than when they were young and middle-aged. The immune system, like other body systems, slows down in old age, making a dog more susceptible not only to diseases such as cancer but also to infections. She simply cannot mount a sufficient immune response to illnesses she might have been able to ward off in her younger days.

On paper, human nutrition requirements shift a bit as an adult ages. For instance, while the vitamin D requirement remains same from ages fifty-one through seventy, the need for that nutrient increases afterward. That does not mean, however, that on a person's seventy first birthday, he automatically begins to prepare breakfasts, lunches or dinners any differently from the way he has been for years. Chances are that if someone is healthy and has been eating…

Eleven-year-old Tate, a German shepherd, has started to have anxiety attacks, usually at night, says her owner Sharon Nevins of Berne, New York. When they occur she pants, shakes, and is unable to settle down. It happened twice last winter and then three times in November. It takes three to four hours before they pass. Tate has been seen by her vet, who performed...

When it comes to letting you know about pain, dogs are a piece of cake compared to cats, says Alicia Karas, DVM, Director of the Pain Consultation & Referral Service at Tufts Cummings School of Veterinary Medicine. Cats are secretive by nature, she says, and will not disclose everything from I just dragged in a mouse from the street …

If your veterinarian has used all the tools at her disposal to give your dog relief from pain but your pet is still in significant discomfort, you may want to seek the services of a veterinarian who specializes in pain management. There still is no board certification for vets wanting to provide relief from pain. But more and more veterinarians are becoming trained in pain mitigation, with a number of them receiving certification from the…

You sit anxiously in the waiting room while your dog undergoes surgery to remove a cancerous mass. Finally, after what seems like forever, the doctor comes out in his scrubs and tells you he was able to excise the malignant tumor and that he believes he got it all. Relieved but not yet out of the woods, you wait for the pathology report. Sure enough, it confirms the surgeons belief that he excised the cancer in its entirety. There are clean margins.

Why, then, does the tumor grow back in the exact same spot some months later?

Says soft tissue veterinary surgeon John Berg, DVM, who operates on cancerous tumors …