From Diagnosis to Diet: Integrating Medical & Nutritional Strategies in Canine Chronic Enteropathy Care

Presentation Description / Summary: Chronic enteropathy (CE) in dogs presents significant diagnostic and therapeutic challenges in veterinary medicine. The diagnosis requires exclusion of various causes, often through costly diagnostics that may yield nonspecific results. Even intestinal biopsies often reveal lymphoplasmacytic inflammation leaving practitioners uncertain about the inflammation's role in clinical signs and optimal treatment approaches. Dietary intervention is paramount in CE management. While response rates to dietary changes typically range from 50-66% in referral populations, this can potentially increase to 80% with comprehensive nutritional assessment and targeted interventions beyond dietary protein modification. The nutritional approach involves: 1. Thorough assessment of the animal's characteristics, diet history, and feeding practices. 2. Creation of a prioritized nutritional problem list, considering patient-specific conditions and potential comorbidities. 3. Manipulation of nutritional factors beyond macro- and micronutrients, including feeding volume, timing, and frequency. 4. Use of monitoring tools such as fecal scoring systems, disease severity assessments, and quality of life indices, and dietary re-assessment forms. This integrated strategy allows for personalized management of complex cases, addressing individual patient needs and potential conflicting nutritional requirements. The approach necessitates client education about the chronic nature of CE, preparing them for possible side effects of the proposed dietary plan and potential symptomatic flares and equipping them with a "therapeutic toolbox" for home management to combat these issues. In this one-hour seminar, we will discuss how combining a thorough patient assessment, targeted dietary interventions, and consistent monitoring, can optimize the management of complex or refractory gastroenteropathies in dogs, improving long-term outcomes and quality of life for affected patients.

Learner Outcomes: 1. Demonstrate ability to use online tools to assess and monitor the dog's chronic enteropathy. 2. List the patient-specific factors, feeding management factors, and the macro- and micro-nutrients of concern for a dog or cat presenting with chronic enteropathy. 3. Be able to develop a targeted dietary plan based on patient-specific and feeding management factors as well as the nutritional factors of concern.