Food Therapy Principles & Diet Customization
Every food has a unique impact on the body. Understanding how foods operate within the body and using those to create a custom diet can help address persistent symptoms, support organ systems that may need extra attention, and restore balance in the body.
Lab work and Diet Examples provided below…
Each and every food that enters the body operates differently. Food is absorbed in different areas and contains a unique macro and micronutrient makeup that affect which organs it supports, and what influence it will have on the operations in the body. For thousands of years these principals have been used in different Food Therapy modalities successfully. Although they all vary slightly in their reasoning, terminology and approach… the key principals of these food therapies remain quite similar as they all view food as medicine, a tool to aid the body in daily function and assist it when certain systems are failing. In Traditional Chinese Medicine food therapy focuses on the energetic properties of food and it’s different affects on the body, allowing a diet to be created to restore balance by paying attention to each unique individuals personality and external factors such as seasonality. Similarly in Ayurvedic Medicine, food is categorized by different properties and their significant impact on the doshas (energy) within living beings allowing a specific diet to be tailored to each person/pets constitution.
Looking at nutrition as a sliding scale, a unique and customizable source of energy can help us build diets that work fluidly for each pet. Nutrition is incredibly specific to each and every pet, and when we look at conventional commercial diets for pets, each diet, even prescription diets are treated within a singular set of parameters. These parameters are based on research, feeding trials and the averages, but it fails to recognize health as a sliding scale. This is often why people find that these processed prescription foods do little to manage their dogs condition and rarely improve upon it. When a pet has a clear diagnosis, this provides general macro and micronutrient guidelines to help support the affected systems, but it does not account for the unique set of characteristics of that individual, such as; itchy inflamed skin, discharge or mucous build-up in various areas of the body, clammy skin, dry flakey skin, heat deficiency, circulation issues, etc. All of these are imbalances in the body, which can be addressed through food therapy, using the diet to manipulate the body to achieve desired outcomes and restore overall balance. By formulating foods with high-quality, minimally processed ingredients we can not only provide balanced and complete nutrition, we can also design diets that meet those clinical parameters for each condition, while simultaneously taking into account holistic food therapy principals that can not only help them survive, but thrive.
For Example…
Beef is Warming, it generates heat in the body by tonifying the blood. For pets that have issues with circulation or are heat deficient, this can be beneficial. For pets that are cool-seeking, are itchy and inflamed, this increased circulation and heat can exacerbate symptoms. Reactions such as these are not always related to a food intolerance, sometimes it is just related to your pet’s current imbalance and the affect that food encourages not being conducive to what your pet needs at the time.
Pork is dampening, it generates moisture in the body. For pets that are chronically dehydrated or older pets that have been kibble fed and have dry flakey skin, a crusty nose, pork can be extremely helpful at creating moisture in the body. However, for dogs with loose stool or too much dampness in the GI tract pork can exacerbate those symptoms.
The idea is to create balance in the body through it’s primary source of energy, food. This is just ONE of the reasons why diet diversity is so important. Feeding any one thing for too long can tip the scales and cause imbalances in the body. Pork when fed for too long can contribute to too much dampness in the body, creating an ideal environment for yeast growth. This is not exclusive to proteins, each and every food has different properties that aid different systems and encourage various responses.
Dandelion Greens tonify the bladder and help to drain dampness. Coix Seed drains dampness and encourages detoxification of the body through bladder emptying. Dairy increases dampness in the body. Cucumber helps clear heat. Nettle helps clear damp heat in the bladder and is softening which can help with the dissolution or passing of hard sediment in the body.’
Your pet’s diet can either be working for them, or against them. In my practice, I am a huge advocate for the power of fresh feeding when done responsibly (complete & balanced nutrition, with appropriate macronutrient proportions for each species). However, your pet’s fresh food diet can actually be contributing to their symptoms as well, which is why it is important to understand the ingredients being used, and what you hope to be achieved with that custom selection. One of the most fascinating components of diet formulation for me has always been the endless possibilities and combinations, each ingredient has a purpose and creates a domino affect in the body. For pet’s with a multitude of conflicting health conditions, this can truly be one of the best options for them because of it’s adaptability. Working almost exclusively with dogs and cats with serious health conditions like; CSD, CKD, Chronic Pancreatitis, IBD, Heart Disease, Cancer, HUA, +more, requires us to be very fluid in our approach. When some of these conditions are combined together like HUA & IBD or HUA & Hypercholesterolemia (see example below) which are very conflicting in their general parameters it becomes like a puzzle, but a solvable one when using fresh foods.
Gently Cooked Diet Example for a Dalmatian with Hyperuricosuria, numerous food sensitivities and Hypercholesterolemia…
The example recipe below is provided solely as an example and attempts to replicate it at home should not be made. This diet was formulated for a very specific set of parameters and will not be suitable for all pets. It does not include a comprehensive list of required ingredients, nor does it specify the appropriate proportions—both of which are essential to the diet’s effectiveness.