Senior dogs tend to be more prone in different health conditions basically because of their age. This article will tackle about different common health problems that older dogs might have encountered and how to avoid getting illness, skin disease, virus, cancer, and any problem that causes difficulty to your pet.
Arthritis
Arthritis simply means inflammation of the joints. Ensure that your dog is always at a healthy weight. Also, maintain your dog to be physically active throughout his entire life. It may help control your dog from developing arthritis and other joint-related disease as they grow old.
Talk to your holistic veterinarian and discuss some supplements that you can add to your dog's diet to keep his joints, tendons, and ligaments healthy and to make sure that your pet's immune system are always strong. Some of the recommended supplements are the following:
Omega 3-fats
- Supergreens like spirulina and astaxanthin
- Glucosamine sulfate with MSM and eggshell membrane
- Ubiquinol
- Adequan injections
- Natural anti-inflammatory herbs
- Cataracts
Cataracts are very common in senior dogs. One way to avoid your dog from getting cataracts is making sure that your dog is not overweight, avoid giving them a lot of food in a day. Being overweight may lead to a much more complicated condition like Diabetes. Diabetes can lead to diabetic cataracts and can result into blindness.
Another cause of cataracts is having too many toxins and bacteria in the body. Make sure that you feed your dog a healthy and all natural ingredients or natural diet. Keep in mind that you should avoid giving drugs that aren't necessary as this may add up to the level of toxicity in their body.
Constipation
Low activity level can contribute to constipation in older dogs. However, if your pet is otherwise healthy, you should not assume that your dog may develop this in his senior years.
Feed your dog a healthy diet and make sure that he is getting plenty amount of water on a daily basis to avoid any pain. Getting his daily exercise by doing a lot of physical activities will also ensure a good muscle tone in his GI tract. Thus, avoiding him to get constipation presently or in his golden years.
Tooth and Gum Disease
A healthy and good oral hygiene is necessary for dogs of any age. It is important to keep your dog's mouth clean to avoid getting tooth or gum complications and also to avoid getting any kind of infections as he grows older. If you do otherwise, then your dog might spend his golden years with missing teeth, worse, suffering from gum disease.
You could maintain a good oral hygiene for your dog by doing the following:
- Brush your dog's teeth regularly, preferably every day. Invest in a good doggy toothbrush and toothpaste.
- Perform mouth inspections. This will enable you to see if your dog is suffering from any tooth or gum complications.
- Do regular oral exams and if necessary, have your vet perform a professional mouth cleaning on your dog.
- Give your dog a high- quality dental dog chew.
Senility
Some of the signs that indicate your dog's brain condition would be increased amount of sleeping time, inattentiveness in his surrounding, decreased alertness, and increased level of stress and anxiety. You may determine that your dog is anxious if he keeps on panting, moaning and/or shivering.
In addition to feeding your dog a quality diet and exercising regularly, do the following to keep him mentally sharp:
- Bond and play with your dog. It is important that you have ways to keep your dog socializing with people and other animals, make them feel that they have family because it helps a lot.
- Provide stimulating toys.
- Consult a holistic veterinarian for supplements that will help stimulate his brain and increase his alertness. Some supplements to be considered are resveratrol, phosphatidylserine, and gingko biloba.