Frequently Asked Questions

Q

A

If my dog refuses to eat a new food can I give fish oil on top of the present feed?

Fish oil can be added to regular grocery store brand dog food, but it is ideal to know how much omega-3 fatty acids is already present in the food. A typical beagle, eating a typical grocery store brand food will eat about 6 grams of omega 6 fatty acids a day and only 100 mg of omega-3 fatty acids, so to get to a 1:1 ratio, you would need about 6 grams of omega-3 fatty acids from fish oil. Remember that only 30% of fish oil are omega-3 fatty acids, so you have to triple the fish oil given, thus 18 grams or just over a tablespoon is needed each day.

My dog doesn't like the fish oil. Can I give another source of omega-3 fatty acids?

Flax-seed oil is rich in linolenic acid, a EPA-DHA precursor. It may prove interesting but its clinical efficiency has not been demonstrated with respect to cancer. Another alternative is to feed descented fish oil or lemon flavored fish oil.

If an owner wants to use various antioxidants, which are recommended, and when should they be given if radiation or chemotherapy treatment has been initiated?

The antioxidants that are likely to be safest are those that have the most clinical and cell biological research behind them. Often vitamin E and vitamin C come to mind. Recent research on thiol antioxidants like lipoic acid and the glutathione precursor s-adenosyl-methionine, both of which have few to no known side effects, maybe of interest. If owners feel strongly about using these antioxidants, it is ideal to use them as directed by the manufacturers, and using veterinary formulated products is often safer than using human formulations. If dogs are receiving chemotherapy/radiation treatments then removing all supplemental antioxidants one week before treatment and continuing them again one week after the treatment protocol has been terminated is likely to be the safest approach at this time.

Some owners feel that changing their animal to a "holistic" or "homemade" diet would provide some benefit during cancer, is this a wise approach?

Often owners find diets on the internet that have been designed for canine cancer patients and will implement them, hoping they will prolong survival or cure the neoplasia. More often than not, there are gross imbalances in vitamins and minerals in these diets. It is ideal to have a veterinary nutritionist intervene in these cases and analyze the proposed diet to ensure that there are no gross imbalances.

Often in the anorexia/cachexia syndrome it becomes difficult to implement the diet changes needed, and a diet with lower caloric density may be the diet of choice by the patient? What should the owner do?

In those cases it easier to let the patient choose their feed and attempt to supplement fat and protein sources to increase the caloric density and protein content of the meal. Remember during anorexia/cachexia some caloric intake though not optimal for the disease is better than no caloric intake at all.