Spaniel recovering from pancreatitis - advice

[S_Ross]

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Cocker Spaniel
Female, aged 9.

Hello, My spaniel had suspected pancreatitis a month ago. She recovered after taking an antibiotic (metrobactin) and probiotics (Purina Fortiflora). When she was ill, she was toileting in the house overnight.

She was on an easily-digestible low-fat diet (Purina EN Gastrointestinal tins) and over the last 2 weeks we've gradually transferred her back to her regular kibble (IAMS senior chicken). It's been going okay until last night - after 3 days of 100% back on the kibble, she toileting in the house overnight again (first time in a month).

The vet warned that she might need to avoid fatty food. The IAMS kibble is 12% fat. So maybe back to 100% is too fatty?
The vet also talked about chicken being a common allergy - but that being unlikely for her as it would likely have shown up before she was 9, and earlier as we were reintroducing her kibble.

Does anyone have experience similar to this? What diet is your dog now on?

 

[JoanneF]

Hi. Low fat foods are recommended as fats can trigger the pancreas, I don't have time to explain in detail right now but you also have to calculate the fat content by dry matter - two foods with, say, 12% fat, will actually be different if one has 10% moisture and the other 8%.

 

[Feverfew]

My little collie has bouts of pancretitis and also has allergies, mainly environmental but also some suspected food allergies.

She did well for several years on Naural Instinct sensitive raw, but I switched to Hill's Z/D formula (soaked kibble or tinned) after the raw started to upset her stomach, mainly causing her to hump after meals due to abdominal discomfort.

She has consistently been on Denmarin (non-prescription - buy from Pet Drugs Online) for nearly 3 years now, and while it's hard to know if it makes a difference, she is still doing well 5 years after diagnosis and sky high Alk-phos levels.

She doesn't have any additional fat, so for example she has her Denmarin tablet in fat free cottage cheese, and her treats are either raw carrot or Hill's hypoallergenic treats.

Your dog may have a completely different set of circumstances of course, but I hope some of that is helpful to you. The 'All About Dog Food' website is a very useful, independent guide for calculating fat proportions in most commercial foods. Good luck - at one point, things looked pretty grim for my little collie, and that was 5 years ago - she's coming up to 14 and is fit and happy.

 

[JoanneF]

I'm back.

To calculate a comparable level of anything (fat, protein, whatever) you need to make a comparison 'by dry matter'. Bizarrely I couldn't see the moisture content of the IAMS that you are using, but a food you might want to look at is Burns. This product shows 8% fat, and coincidentally 8% moisture.

Burns Sensitive+ Duck & Brown Rice Review & Rating

When you remove the moisture content from the food you are left with "dry matter", so if a food was 8% moisture it would have 92% dry matter.

The fat content on the label is 8% so you divide the %age of the fat by the dry matter and multiply 100 (to arrive at the percentage overall)

ergo

8 ÷ 92 x 100 = 8.69 % ACTUAL fat by dry matter.

If you can see the moisture content on the IAMS let me know what it is.

 

[S_Ross]

Thanks so much Feverfew! I've made a note of those products to follow up on and the website looks like it'll be a great help. Great to hear your collie is doing well.

 

[S_Ross]

Hi Joanne,

That's so interesting about moisture content, thank you for taking the time to explain. I can't see it for the IAMS unfortunately.
I've had another suggestion for Burns so I'll definitely take a look at that, 8% sounds great.

 

[Feverfew]

Hi Joanne,

That's so interesting about moisture content, thank you for taking the time to explain. I can't see it for the IAMS unfortunately.
I've had another suggestion for Burns so I'll definitely take a look at that, 8% sounds great.

Another upvote for Burns, their food is good quality and they do some combinations that aren't available elsewhere, eg do a rice, egg and vegetables pouch, which is great for post-operative care.

 

[JoanneF]

Hi Joanne,

That's so interesting about moisture content, thank you for taking the time to explain. I can't see it for the IAMS unfortunately.
I've had another suggestion for Burns so I'll definitely take a look at that, 8% sounds great.

The moisture content is likely to be similar to the Burns, both being dry food. If it had 8% moisture (and it may not; we don't know for sure) the calculation would be 12 (fat) ÷ 92 (guessed dry matter) x 100, which is a comparable fat content of 13.04%.

So, higher than it appears on the label.