Search Results for: homemade diet

Salmonella and Other Risks of Raw Pet Diets

Primal Pet Foods, a popular marketer of commercial raw diets for dogs and cats, recently announced a recall of one of its raw cat foods because testing has suggested the diet may be contaminated with the bacteria Salmonella. Such recalls … Continue reading

Posted in Nutrition | 11 Comments

Raw Diets for Pets: Still No Evidence of Benefit but a Real Risk of Harm

I’ve written before about raw diets for pets, and at the time my conclusions were these (see the previous articles for details 1, 2): 1. The theoretical arguments presented to support feeding raw diets to dogs and cats are mostly … Continue reading

Posted in Nutrition | 15 Comments

PetDiets.Com: An excellent source for science-based pet nutrition information

I just wanted to point out a web site I found recently which offers excellent information on pet nutrition. PetDiets.com is the site of Veterinary Nutritional Consultations, Inc. (VNC). This organization is a independent consulting group that provides nutrition information … Continue reading

Posted in Nutrition, Science-Based Veterinary Medicine | 11 Comments

Raw Diets for Dogs and Cats

What’s All the Fuss About?   Pet owners are naturally concerned about providing the best care for their pets, and no form of care is more direct and meaningful that what we feed our animal companions. Rare but serious problems … Continue reading

Posted in Nutrition | 1 Comment

Food is Love- Veterinarians and Nutrition

Food is LoveAs a child, I was a big fan of the Peanuts cartoons. One of my favorite characters was Snoopy, a suave, bipedal beagle who wrote novels and engaged in breathtaking aerial combat with his nemesis, the Red Baron. … Continue reading

Posted in Nutrition | 19 Comments

A Detailed, Evidence-based response to Petco’s Ban on “Artificial” Food Ingredients

Here is an article from Veterinary Practice News responding to the ridiculous marketing ploy by Petco declaring a ban on “artificial” food ingredients. Since the late 1980s, individuals and organizations have been trying to warn the public about a deadly … Continue reading

Posted in Nutrition | 20 Comments

Science-based Veterinary Nutrition Success Stories

In all the debates here and elsewhere about the relative merits of commercial pet diets and homemade, raw, or other alternatives, advocates of alternative diets often claim that conventional diets are unhealthy. Scientific evidence is not typically provided to support … Continue reading

Posted in Nutrition | 36 Comments

Veterinary Medicine is a Business, and that Includes Alternative Medicine

Medicine is a business. That is an often uncomfortable but always unavoidable fact. There is plenty of room for debate about whether or not it should be, but as things currently work, veterinary medicine is a business. It is not … Continue reading

Posted in General | 1 Comment

SkeptVet Gets Hate Mail: Update 2015

As regular readers will know, I don’t allow abusive comments or personal rants on the site. Primarily, this is because such nonsense contributes nothing productive, and I am under no obligation to provide angry or crazy people with a forum … Continue reading

Posted in General | 37 Comments

Evidence Update: Flame Retardants (PBDEs) and Hyperthyroidism in Cats

The words “chemical” and “toxin” are among the most popular and misused words in the alternative medicine lexicon. They are often more a vague code for “evil spirits” rather than a specific reference to true environmental health hazards, and they … Continue reading

Posted in Science-Based Veterinary Medicine | 7 Comments