The Truth about Pancreatitis in Dogs

Roadie

About 20 years ago, I got a call from my sister about her 2-year old Pomeranian, “Roadie”. It seemed he had a severe case of Pancreatitis and was having to spend the night at the ER. I don’t remember if the call came before Roadie got home or after. But my sister already knew it was going to cost her $1,000, not to mention a lot of worry and heartache watching Roadie suffer. So, she wanted to know how to avoid a recurrence.

At that time, I was just developing the model of feeding that would later become RMF. Just about everybody knows nowadays that pancreatitis is caused by fat. But I don’t think I knew it at the time. It didn’t matter, though, because I had already connected the excessive animal fats in the diets of domestic dogs to most of the maladies that plague them. So, the diet I recommended to her, naturally, was low in fat.

My sister followed my instructions, and Roadie never had an acute recurrence. In fact, Roadie did not return to the vet ONCE in the remaining 14 years of his life. He did have a couple bouts with appetite loss, which may have been caused by the damage that was done to the pancreas by his previous diet. When that happened, I usually got a call from my sister about what to do. I always told her to simply fast him until his appetite returned. A couple days of fasting always brought him back to his happy, energetic little self. (For more info about nature’s best healing method, fasting, here’s an article about it. Many books have been written on the topic as well.)

Pancho

Many years later, I had another encounter with Pancreatitis that had quite a different outcome. “Pancho”, an 8-year-old Golden Retriever, was in my care because his owners were traveling. He was showing some signs of pancreatitis, including lethargy and lack of appetite. After conferring with the owners, I took him to the vet. At the request of the owner (a surgeon), Pancho received an injection of an antibiotic drug called “Convenia”. The vet confided to me that she would not normally have administered an antibiotic for suspected pancreatitis. She had only done so at the owner’s behest.

Pancho recovered, but a couple months later was again showing symptoms of pancreatitis. The owners travel a lot, so once again he was in my care. When he stopped drinking on his own, the owner and I decided I should take him in. All I instructed them to do was administer sub-q fluids and run some diagnostics. The vet, seeing the request for Convenia on his chart, once again administered it.

This time, Pancho collapsed into a coma. Two hours later, he was carried unconscious to my car. The owners had to euthanize him later that night at an after-hours clinic. He had been lethargic and dehydrated when we walked into the clinic that afternoon, but certainly not near death. I’ve since learned of many other deaths that have occurred to dogs and cats after getting “Convenia”.

To add insult to injury, the vet offered to take the Convenia shot off the bill. A short time after this incident, she left that practice and now calls herself “holistic”. I don’t know if the two events are related, but I suspect they are.

If death certificates were done on dogs, I’ve no doubt that Pancho’s would say that “pancreatitis” killed him. In the medical world, disease is blamed when outcomes are bad and drugs are credited when outcomes are good. Pancho was not killed by pancreatitis, that’s for sure.

What does the pancreas do?

To understand the causes of pancreatitis, we first have to know what the pancreas is tasked with in the body. The VCA website correctly tells us that the pancreas “produces enzymes to assist in food digestion and hormones such as insulin, which regulates blood sugar or glucose metabolism.” These digestive enzymes are then secreted into the small intestine and subsequently the hormones are ushered into the bloodstream. Through various processes, these secretions allow the body to make use of glucose, or sugar.

What is pancreatitis?

The suffix “itis” simply means inflammation. So, pancreatitis means inflammation of the pancreas.

Inflammation has long been the perceived nemesis of the medical profession. Doctors and vets alike view it as a mistake made by the body that needs correcting with drugs. Typically, microorganisms are blamed for “invading” the organ or tissue involved, and the inflammation is thought to be the body’s attempt to rid itself of the invaders.

That’s why in most cases of inflammation, some drug or remedy aimed at killing or “neutralizing” bacteria is administered. But inflammation, wherever it might occur, is not caused by any microorganism ‘invading’ a dog’s body. It is the body’s own intelligent action of bringing heat and fluids to an area where healing needs to be accomplished. It does this to dilute wastes deposited there and accelerate their elimination. It’s not a mistake, and it does not need to be forcibly stopped with drugs. It requires only our COOPERATION. We just need to understand the body’s REASONS for implementing it. Then all we need to do is simply REMOVE those reasons, so the body can then heal itself and resume normal function.

Invaders are not blamed THIS time

The medical theories surrounding pancreatitis are a little different, and do not generally involve microorganisms. For this reason, antibiotic treatment in cases of pancreatitis is regarded to be “controversial” even by mainstream medical authorities. I suspect that’s why the vet told me she hardly ever uses them for pancreatitis.

In general, the medical profession is not well known for its dogged determination to find the underlying causes of illness. True to form, their claims relative to pancreatitis causation are vague and misdirecting. What they claim, essentially, is that “something” causes the pancreas to “overproduce” the enzymes that normally break down food. These enzymes then begin to destroy the pancreas itself. This, they speculate, is the reason the pancreas becomes inflamed.

What’s wrong with this theory?

Well, firstly, it only sends us looking further upstream for answers. It doesn’t solve the riddle. What’s the “something” that causes the “overproduction”? That’s the question we have to answer if we’re going to get to the bottom of pancreatitis. Remarkably and revealingly, this is where the medical profession stops investigating. Their solution at this point is to simply stop the body from what it does in response to the “something” which causes the “overproduction”.

Later in this article, I’ll take a look at these “solutions” and the additional harm they cause.

The symptoms

So, what are the symptoms of pancreatitis? If you have a pancreatic dog, you already know that they are usually lethargy, lack of appetite, vomiting, diarrhea, abdominal pain and/or swelling, and perhaps fever. As we know, symptoms are either the body eliminating wastes, protecting itself, or compensating for some harmful influence. In the case of chronic disease, which acute pancreatitis is NOT, it’s the result of damage done to the organ in question.

Let’s look at each of the symptoms of pancreatitis, and what they really mean.

Lethargy

This is the body effectively saying, “We don’t have enough energy for outward activity today. We’re spending it all trying to deal with this piled-up waste in here. AND, there seems to be a problem getting sugar into our cells in order to produce energy. Take a nap and check with us later”.

To help you understand this, I have to tip my hand here and reveal the real causes of pancreatitis. If you know anything of Natural Hygiene, you’ll already be aware that accumulated waste (also known as a state of “toxemia”) is the cause of all disease. In the case of pancreatitis, this accumulation is only partially responsible. The other causative factor is DIETARY FAT. I’ll get to a full explanation of that later.

Lack of appetite

The last thing a sick dog needs is food. Food is work for the body before it is fuel, and most domestic dogs have several weeks’ worth of fuel already on their bodies. If you doubt that, you need to do some research on the incredible fuel efficiency that is built into every dog’s body. Lab research has confirmed this and field studies have as well, and even the popular media does once in awhile. But it’s not information you can get from your vet. Even though it’s a very important concept to at least be aware of, they are not taught about it in their training.

Most dogs listen to their wise bodies and refuse to eat when their pancreas is inflamed. Very often they won’t even eat the tempting ‘human’ foods that their owners offer them in desperation.

Speaking of which, it’s difficult to overstate how counterproductive it is to attempt to override a dog’s lack of appetite. It’s like if you have the flu and your mom comes in and begs you to eat a couple cream puffs. You might do it just to please her, or maybe because you think you “need” food even when you’re sick. That’s one of the medical industry’s favorite lies. But your body would soon tell you the truth. Your mom will have done you no favors, and she’ll just have to watch you suffer more.

It is cruel to feed a sick dog, especially one that has no appetite. It only guarantees that the sickness will linger and even escalate.

Vomiting/Diarrhea

Two ends of the same problem, as it were. The body can’t process food, so it expends the energy and resources needed to quickly get rid of the food that’s already inside. These two symptoms ONLY happen if an owner is foolish enough to feed when they know they have a sick dog on their hands. Domestic dogs sometimes eat out of habit, even when it requires them to ignore the “do not eat” signals they’re getting from their bodies.

Abdominal pain/swelling

We already know that the body uses inflammation to bring fluids and heat to the site where healing needs to be accomplished. It’s a self-protecting, self-healing process that must happen. It is not supposed to be comfortable. If symptoms were pleasant, there would be nothing motivating us to stay healthy. Symptoms are our “comeuppance” for having done something harmful to ourselves, typically by what we chose to eat. In our dogs it’s the same, but they’re paying for OUR mistakes. The ONLY responsible course of action is to: 1) figure out what we did wrong; 2) stop doing that; 3) do better from now on, and 4) not make the current sickness worse, or guarantee recurrence, by administering drugs and junky foods.

Fever

Just as with inflammation, the body uses heat (energy) to accelerate the process of healing and waste elimination. Fever requires a great deal of energy to produce, so it is not seen in all pancreatic dogs.

Fortunately, even the medical profession is beginning to understand that fever should not be treated. That’s not to say they haven’t made up a bunch of nonsense that aligns with their other lame theories to explain why not. And it’s only because treating fever clearly makes illness worse that they are finally starting to back off on their normal advice to bring it down. The bottom line is that fever should not be treated!

The veterinary “solution” to pancreatitis

Let’s take an OBJECTIVE look at the drugs that are commonly used to treat pancreatitis.

Cerenia, Maropitant, Ondansetron

These are all anti-emetics, which means they stop the body from removing food that it cannot use. People who prescribe and administer these drugs seem to think that the body is making a mistake when it chooses to rid itself of food quickly to cut down on its internal waste burden.

Is this a mistake? Should the body be forced to digest food it is not capable of digesting? No, and no. The body is not making a mistake. It always acts in the dog’s best interest. It cannot do otherwise.

These drugs would not be necessary at all if a dog is not fed, obviously. Unfortunately, vets have a great deal of ignorance and unfounded fear around allowing dogs to go without food. So, they tell dog owners to feed their dogs and then the owners must deal with vomiting. They then give drugs that force the body to retain the food.

If food caused the original problem and all this is being done to ensure that the causes stay in place, is it any wonder that pancreatitis becomes chronic? That’s when the tissues within the pancreas simply die, which means permanent damage. When causes continue, so do effects.

In addition to the harm that the digesting of food and the waste it produces will cause, these drugs all have other harmful effects. These are commonly called “side” effects. But this is a very clever euphemism. It’s the medical industry’s way of persuading you that these effects are either not important or a reasonable trade off. They are not. They are simply changed symptoms. Sometimes they are even worse than the original symptoms. It happens all the time that a person will begin taking a new drug and discover that the “side effects” are worse than the ‘disease’. So, they can choose to stop taking it. Unfortunately, dogs can’t do that.

Cyporheptadine, Remeron

These are “appetite stimulants”. It is normal for the body to shut down appetite when there is healing to be done. The body knows that food caused the problem, and it’s trying with all its might to solve it. It is nature’s wisdom. The vet industry’s answer to this is to stimulate the appetite. These fool a dog into ignoring his wise body and abusing it with more of the original cause of the pancreatitis. Sometimes the drugs don’t work or “stop working” and the owners must also resort to very junky tempting foods to get their dogs to eat. It’s a wonder that every dog treated this way does not die once pancreatitis sets in. It’s certainly no mystery that it very often becomes chronic, and that other organs become affected.

Tramadol and fentanyl

These are pain medications. Pancreatitis is painful, of this there is little doubt. To the extent that we must keep a dog comfortable, it may be necessary to manage pain. However, it is risky to make a dog’s discomfort completely go away, because it may cause them to become active, eat, or otherwise do behaviors that will not aid the healing process. That’s why I recommend starting with something milder and less toxic than pharmaceutical pain meds. Many factors need to be considered, and it is a very subjective matter to ascertain how much pain a dog is in.

Since managing pain with pharmaceuticals always causes the original problem to worsen, it is my considered opinion that they should not be used unless the pain is severe. Pharmaceutical pain drugs should definitely not be administered as routinely as they typically are. The people who prescribe these drugs are not properly schooled in the additional harm that serves to offset the benefits. So, they tend to see only the benefits, as is the case with much of what they do. In any event, pain management is very situational and requires individual assessment.

So, what causes pancreatitis?

The bullet points below are the ‘theorized’ possible causes of pancreatitis. Below each one is objective, rational information relating to true causes.

• “Eating something with a high-fat content, particularly if it is not part of their regular diet”

There’s no doubt that dietary fat is the primary cause of pancreatitis. Even vets know and acknowledge this obvious fact.

• “Being overweight”

Being overweight is not a cause of any disease. Pancreatitis and the state of being overweight are two co-existent effects of the same underlying problem. That problem is dietary excesses.

• “Pancreatic infections”

This kind of diagnosis typically signifies that either a microbe has been found at the site of the inflammation or is suspected to be there. It is speculated that this microbe brought or caused the problem. This is akin to blaming garbage on flies, stagnant water on mosquitos and fires on firemen.

Bacteria DO NOT BRING DISEASE. When they show up, they are actually MANUFACTURED by the DNA to help clean up wastes that are interfering with healing. It is their job to consume (break down) morbid matter. That’s why they reliably show up at the site of inflammation, right on cue to serve as industry’s favorite scapegoat. It solves nothing to kill or ‘neutralize’ them. This only forces the body to stop its own healing processes. The inflammation may stop, but the underlying problem has not been solved and is guaranteed to recur. This is how pancreatitis becomes cyclical or “chronic” and becomes a guarantee of future income for vets.

• “Having other medical conditions like Cushing’s disease, diabetes mellitus, or abnormally high levels of fat in the blood”

Conditions do not cause each other. They just lie up or downstream of each other, or they occur concurrently. To blame one disease on another is to completely misunderstand the concept of ‘underlying cause’. It’s absolutely true that an abnormally high level of fat in the blood can cause pancreatitis. But what vets don’t tell us is that it’s usually because a dog owner is feeding exactly what they typically recommend, or some homemade replica.

• “Exposure to some types of medications or toxins, including organophosphates, L-asparaginase, azathioprine, corticosteroids, sulphonamides, potassium bromide, phenobarbital, and zinc”

Yes, drugs can damage the pancreas. This is often not considered by the people prescribing and recommending these drugs. Again, they consider only the target symptom that they are intending to suppress. Ironically, even the drugs given for pancreatitis can harm the already compromised pancreas.

• “Abdominal trauma that affects the pancreas”

Damage caused by trauma to the pancreas is certainly a possibility. However, it is known that the most common cause of pancreatitis is fat. And with the excessive amounts of fat typically being fed to dogs, trauma must account for a very tiny percentage of pancreatitis cases.

• “A genetic or breed predisposition (Miniature Schnauzers, Yorkshire Terriers, Silky Terriers, Miniature Poodles)”

Breeding certain physical features into dogs creates mispositioned organs, faulty morphology and abnormal function. This can certainly account for WHERE disease happens in dogs. It can never solely determine whether disease will happen at all, however.

Here a bit of explanation about genetics would be helpful. Genetics has been presented as a primary cause of disease by the medical profession because it allows them to avoid investigating real causes. And the profit motive is ever-present, of course. The burgeoning field of genetics is a dead end from a practical standpoint, but a bottomless pot o’ gold for the “research” industry. The money keeps flowing and the promises of “cures” right around the corner keep making the headlines. It’s a very easy sell because everyone wants to think that the answer to all disease will one day come out of a lab. So taxpayers are happy to foot the bill for all this important and “promising” research.

Genetics is a very appealing potential answer to the problem of disease. What’s not to love about being able to blame your diseases on the errant genes your ancestors passed down to you?

The truth is that genes have NO power to cause disease. If they did, every chronic disease that is attributed to them would occur in infancy. Instead, chronic disease typically occurs after a lifetime of self-abuse. Or in the case of our dogs, mis-feeding. We have the power within us to prevent disease in both ourselves and our dogs. And where pancreatitis is concerned, we have the ability to get out of the body’s way and allow it to resolve the problem once and for all.

• “A history of pancreatitis”

A pancreas damaged from previous dietary mistakes is in even more need of proper feeding. In most cases, even dogs with a previous history of chronic pancreatitis can remain symptom free if they are fed properly.

• “In many cases, no specific underlying cause can be identified.”

It doesn’t matter what the veterinary industry were to claim as a “cause” anyway. That’s because their “causes” and consequent ‘solutions’ always leave us back at the beginning. That is, with a bunch of original symptoms and “side effects” to deal with.

The REAL causes of pancreatitis

I recently heard that a new ‘theory’ is being floated about pancreatitis causation. Like everything else bad in the world of health, pancreatitis is now being blamed on carbs! Since the pancreas is involved in sugar metabolism, not fat metabolism, it is posited that carbs are the culprits.

While that might seem plausible because of the pancreas’s inherent function, it’s definitely not the case that pancreatitis is caused by carbs. Pancreatitis is caused by FAT, and here’s why: When fats are overeaten, their abundant presence in the bloodstream inhibits the uptake of sugar into the cells. To compensate, the pancreas overworks itself producing the enzymes that normally accompany sugars which allow sugar to be taken in by the cell.
This overworking greatly taxes the pancreas. The body attempts to assist by bringing energy (heat), fluids and other bodily resources (like white blood cells) to the beleaguered organ. This is inflammation. Pancreatitis is the acute phase in the development of pathology that later manifests chronically as diabetes. Pancreatitis is when the pancreas is still able to overwork itself into an inflamed state. Diabetes happens later, when it is exhausted and no longer able to produce sufficient enzymes (insulin, etc.) at all. Pancreatitis is acute; diabetes is chronic: They are two points along the same disease development time-line.

That’s not to say that diabetes is always preceded by pancreatitis. Irritation or inflammation of the pancreas can occur at a lower severity that does not even motivate a vet visit or a diagnosis. If it occurs repeatedly and sufficiently to wear out the pancreas, it will set the stage for chronic disease. This is especially true in certain breeds that are said to be “predisposed” to sugar metabolism disorders. In any dog, however, diabetes can happen without the dog ever having been known to suffer pancreatitis.

Removal of cause

Now that we know what the causes are, doesn’t the way forward seem clearer? If you can figure out what YOU did wrong to create your disease, or your dog’s disease, YOU can fix it. By rights, you’re the ONLY one who can! That’s precisely what the medical world does not want you doing.

Is raw feeding the answer?

Many people will tell you that feeding your pancreatic dog a raw food diet will solve the problem. If you think that, go join some of the raw feeding groups on Facebook and see how many owners still complain about pancreatitis symptoms in their dogs. Raw feeding alone is not enough to solve the problem, particularly if the owner chooses one of the commercial raw frozen foods. These foods contain far too much fat for a pancreatic dog, or any dog, for that matter.

Below I’ve compiled a list of 5 very popular raw frozen dog foods from the Dog Food Advisor website. It shows fat content by weight versus by calorie. The “guaranteed analysis” percentage shown as “crude fat” is always calculated on WEIGHT. Since fat weighs less than protein, this can make the fat percentage look very low. In reality, what’s important is the percentage of the food represented by fat CALORIES, not weight. That’s why the caloric calculation is almost never provided on dog food labels! Take a look at these label percentages vs. real percentages.

BRAND (all frozen raw grinds)	% fat content shown on label	% fat based on calories
Raw Wild	10	57
Primal Raw	7	56
Instinct	8	50
Small Batch	8	52
Northwest Naturals	8	52

Do you see the problem?

FAT is what dog food producers love to hide. Their products all contain too much of it, and they know it. If they didn’t know it, why would they go to so much trouble to hide it from you?

Fat is cheap and abundant. It serves the same purpose in dog food that grains did before factory farming. Because agricultural animals are raised so intensively now, fat has become the “filler” ingredient that grains used to be.

What about dried, canned or freeze-dried foods?

If you’re thinking commercial raw food contains more fat than the dry, canned or freeze-dried versions, you’re wrong. The commercial raw grinds shown above are typical of all dog foods with respect to fat content. Please go to the Dog Food Advisor site and plug in the food you’re currently feeding your dog. (If you do that, by the way, pay no attention to the ratings they give dog foods. They clearly aren’t aware of the hazards of feeding commercial foods to dogs. And their ratings are all within the context of commercial food. It is not difficult to be a standout when the competition is abysmal.) When you see the breakdown of ‘your’ food, if your dog has pancreatitis or diabetes you’ll know precisely why.

What about a “low fat” dog food?

In response to all the problems that high fat dog foods cause, some brands have offered what they call “low” fat foods. Hills Prescription I/D is one of the most popular brands. Let’s take a look at how they solve the problem of too much fat in a dog’s diet. Here’s a breakdown of the “guaranteed analysis” vs. percentage of macronutrients by calorie.

Hills Prescription I/D
LABEL (“Guaranteed Analysis”): Protein: 27% Fat: 15% Carbs: N/A
REALITY (Percentage of calories): Protein: 24% Fat: 32% Carbs: 44%

The fat percentage looks better, but there are other problems with this food that I will get to shortly. It would be very expensive for Hills to create a low-fat food the correct (biologically appropriate) way. That would require them to use much more of the most expensive ingredient (lean protein) and much less of the cheap ones (fat and carbohydrate). So instead of doing that, they do what dog food producers used to do — they use grains. Here is the ingredients list:

Brewers rice, whole grain corn, chicken meal, pea protein, egg product, pork fat, corn gluten meal, chicken liver flavor, dried beet pulp, lactic acid, pork liver flavor, soybean oil.

The list is actually longer, but the remaining ingredients are only synthetic nutritional supplements. A troubled pancreas might get a break with this kind of food for a while. But if you think these foods will not court disease in your dog’s body, keep reading. Brewer’s rice is a waste product of the rice industry. Floor sweepings and vat scrapings, in other words. Even if it wasn’t, rice is entirely inappropriate for dogs. Corn that is grown for agricultural purposes is extremely starchy. It is called “field corn” and is not even palatable by humans because of its very high starch content. Chicken meal is an extremely overprocessed brown powder made from slaughterhouse waste. Below is a photo I found of some chicken meal after a great deal of searching. The dog food industry does not want us seeing photos of chicken meal apparently.

Need I go on?

Where on earth did the idea come from that dogs are so adaptable that they can live healthfully on these kinds of ingredients? If it was possible to design a shelf-stable, cereal-like product that would provide complete nourishment cradle to grave, wouldn’t we have put something like that together for humans? Think of the time that parents would save not having to shop for, schlep and prep all that wholesome homemade food we’re always being told to feed our families!

Or maybe just put everything in a handy little capsule that the kids could take with their Slurpees? Convenience is EVERYTHING, right? Isn’t it?

WHY do we think convenience so important?

Maybe it’s because this is the idea that’s been planted in our heads by the industries that produce all this “convenient” food. I’m as short of time as anybody else, but I certainly don’t put convenience at the top of my list when deciding how to feed my dog. My dog means more to me than that!

If commercial pet foods are out, what’s the answer?

Raw meat and bones should certainly form a varyingly significant portion of a dog’s diet. But if the diet is meat centered and commercially produced, it’s almost guaranteed to contain too much fat for a pancreatic dog. Any dog fed these fatty foods on a long-term basis is at risk of pancreatitis and many other diseases. If your dog has already been diagnosed with pancreatitis at any time, you’re going to want to avoid them completely.

RMF is THE diet for the pancreatic dog

There’s every reason for the owner of a pancreatic dog to expect the same excellent outcome my sister had with Roadie. Whatever previous damage has been done to the pancreas by a fat-laden diet can only be healed if the causes of the original damage are eliminated completely. The body has amazing powers of self-repair when it is given full rein. And if there is permanent damage, there is no medicine or remedy that will resolve it. All that can be done is to avoid overburdening the compromised organ in the future.
To do that, an owner must make sure the diet is CLEAN, first and foremost. By “clean” I do not mean “organic”, “free range”, “locally sourced” or any of those other meaningless concepts that allow dog food producers to lure consumers. I mean fully, cleanly digestible. That means, primarily, foods that dogs have eaten throughout their long history on this planet. The foods we still see them eating in the wild. Those are the foods that form the basis of RMF.

Waste from the agricultural animal industry is what primarily forms the pool from which pet food producers acquire their raw materials. That’s why we have to be sensitive to the fat issue. Fats in commercial dog food are as prevalent and difficult to avoid as refined sugar is in foods aimed at children. The only solution is to stop buying commercially processed food products altogether, like health minded parents are having to do for their children.

The pancreas is not the only organ that is harmed by overconsumption of animal fats. Whether your dog has had problems with his pancreas or not, you can save yourself a lot of heartache and your dog a lot of suffering by learning how to properly home feed. Dogs need real food! The kind you can buy in the same stores where you buy your own food. Learn how to get started here.

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