Another Bloat - Page 3

K9queen, the study I linked to above was done by Purdue University, and is quite recent. In some cases, it says that bloat was linked to food that had been moistened prior to feeding: 

Dogs fed dry foods containing citric acid and were moistened prior to feeding had a 320 percent higher risk for developing bloat.

That's enough to make me decide to NOT moisten the dry food, regardless of whether it contains citric acid or not!

Other factors linked to the type of food were said to be fat content, and the presence/absence of meat an bone meal:

 Several diet-related factors were associated with a higher incidence of bloat. These include feeding only dry food, or feeding a single large daily meal. Dogs fed dry foods containing fat among the first four ingredients had a 170 percent higher risk for developing bloat. Dogs fed dry foods containing citric acid and were moistened prior to feeding had a 320 percent higher risk for developing bloat.

Conversely, feeding a dry food containing a rendered meat-and-bone meal decreased risk by 53 percent in comparison with the overall risk for the dogs in the study. Mixing table food or canned food into dry food also decreased the risk of bloat.

During the past 30 years there has been a 1,500 percent increase in the incidence of bloat, and this has coincided with the increased feeding of dry dog foods. There is a much lower incidence of bloat in susceptible breeds in Australia and New Zealand. Feeding practices in these countries have been found to be less dependent on dry foods.

The recommendations to avoid bloat have changed over and over again, depending upon the study. Owners that follow the guidelines still have dogs that bloat.  People thought that dogs fed raw didn't bloat, but they do.  More attention needs to be paid to genetics and passing on the tendency to bloat, no matter what is thought to be the cause, causes or the unknown.

ShadyLady,

I am curious.  You said, " People thought that dogs fed raw didn't bloat, but they do."

Where does this information come from?  Is there a reduced incidence?

I feed raw and so I would really like to know.

Michele

I googled  "raw fed dogs bloat".  I really want to know the incidence of bloat in raw fed dogs.

There isn't much but I found the following links interesting.

rawfeeding.net/448/raw-feeders-experiences-of-bloat/

www.pedigreedatabase.com/german_shepherd_dog/bulletins_read/365843.html

www.boerboelpuppy.com/Boerboel_public_html/Boerboel_html/Boerboel_feed.html

www.danebytes.com/ladyR/BLOAT-SIMETHICONE.htm

Michele

Libby seems to be doing well and is being a very good patient.

Here are some pictures of her incision. Amazes me how well dogs move around after having major surgery.

Poor little thing...that reminds me so much of my female who had a Gastric volvulus about 2 years ago...It took two days after she came home and started feeling better..This was such a nightmare because she just had 9 puppies five days before it happened so we had to bottle feed all of them until she was better..

She is fed raw..didn't prevent it..

It runs in some families (not hers thought but still we don't know everything).  So I think it is hereditary (at least a ggood percentage) and some dogs are predispose if they have other conditions of the GI tract like EPI-Bacterial overgrowht-IBD etc..and just being a GSD makes you at risk!!

OK I know I'm going to sound like a lunatic here, but has anybody heard anything about an acupressure place on the knee that supposedly stops the bloat? NO, I never tried it; my bitch totally overate on several occasions and I expected bloat and actually she might have bloated, but no torsion happened. So when the OP speaks of "bloat," is she actually speaking of torsion? Heck, my dog bloats like no other but doesn't torse. For example, she once ate about 15 lbs of dog biscuits. She puffed up HUGE from the yeasts and gas, you have no idea, but they just drilled a hole in her side to let the air out. Her stomach never twisted, so she bloated all right, but didn't torse. She has had a couple more pigout episodes, the jackass (my life is all about trying to put food where she won't get it), but no torsion. So I guess what I'm asking is, 1) could the two issues be separate and 2) could that acupressure thing help with the torsion half of the issue? I've talked to people who said it worked for them, but don't know if it was just coincidence.

VomMarischal:

Falon bloated as you describe, but  belly only swelled a little.  She was attempting to throw up and was pacing and licking the carpet.  She was acting generally strange and uncomfortable.   The xray showed she was filled with gas, but no torsion.  They were able to treat her and she was released the next day.  About 6 weeks or so ago, Molly bloated - stomach looked huge, but no throwing up, so again I rushed to the er, exray showed even more gas than Falon but also no torsion.  They treated her over night and she went home the next day.

Libby stomach did not look as huge as Molly's, however she started throwing up a white foam.  At first I thought she had thrown up a long piece of plastic.  I felt her stomach and it felt hard, so I called the er vet and rushed her over.  As soon as I felt her stomach at the vet, I could feel a bulge of sorts on one side, which the vet said was the torsion. 

So in each case similarities, but also a little different.  Libby was definately whining more and would react to her stomach being touched whereas the others did not.

It also happened so fast.  I was thinking that maybe she was filled with gas like the others and I could just give her something to relieve it but once the vomiting started and her crying I knew I could not waste any more time.

I would be interested in knowing if acupuncture would work to relieve the gas as my dogs seem prone to bloating.

Cheryl

Well...what if they had let the gas out before it got to the torsion part? I don't know, just asking. See, my dog only gets that from pigging out on a 13 lb raw turkey. I don't understand how it happens when a dog gets it from barely eating anything.