A Path With Paws

Here’s a neat little formula for supporting young dogs with papilloma virus outbreaks.

If you don’t know, papilloma virus in dogs can cause warts. Young dogs can easily pass on the virus to other young dogs. Sometimes there is just a wart or two that forms in the mouth or on the face and other times you can have dogs with many, many warts. With time they will go away but I have found this formula really speeds up the time to resolution, often times with warts starting to fall off within a week of starting it.

It is a simple formula of four herbs

• Echinacea purpurea which is a strong antiviral and immune stimulant
• St. John’s Wort helps with its antiviral effects
• Cat’s Claw also often used for pain and inflammation also is a strong immune stimulant

and finally

• Licorice root helps to balance this formula and helps the body to integrate and use it. It is also though to have more direct immune stimulant actions.

This formula is usually well tolerated by dogs. I love making it because of the wonderful textures and colors of the four herbs. It is now available as Wart Immune Support in my Kingdom of Basil store.

My perception of the world has been blown. This weekend I had the honor of being able to attend a day of lectures by Jeffrey Yuan on essential oils. And I’m pretty sure I walked away a new person. If someone could have reached into my soul and opened up the reality of the world in a room buzzing with florescent lights I would have told you that was crazy. But that was exactly what happened. It seemed that we were all touched deeply, Jeffrey had a message for all of all not just on how we practice, but on who we truly are.

I thought I was treating the root of disease in my patients. I thought I was reaching for the root of my own problems. But I learned that there is a level far deeper than the root. In the end it is our perception of the world that changes us and cures us, not the root, not even the emotions that lie there.

This was a lecture about oils but it also applies to herbs, and acupuncture and psychotherapy. It was a lecture about our core beliefs of the world. With your intention, you apply oils and change the animal’s perception of the world, with that you change the owner’s perception of the world. Through our animals we heal, through us they grow. Chronic disease occurs when our view of the world is rigid. To make it move again we need to change the way we look at it. Not just processing emotions, not just healing emotional wounds, we need to open our hearts and take another view, not be bound by our beliefs or what we have been told or what we have been taught. When we perceive the world as not getting better our consciousness is stuck, we are rigid and disease occurs.

Through plants we can begin this work. Pu Gong Ying or dandelion “makes our grandfather more outstanding” or brings out our ancestral qualities. Did you know that other plants grow better around dandelions because dandelion provides nutrients to the soil? Just like a kind and gentle grandfather. Roots help to strengthen us and ground us and help us see where we belong. Seeds help us start a new beginning. Flowers change the way we view life and especially high altitude flowers and plants help us endure and start a new direction. They know what it is like to live in a place of low oxygen and can help us move into a place of love when there has not been enough love in our lives. Barks, which support a tree, help us when we are rigid and diseased in our bones and our support; they help us break out of chronic disease patterns there. Our inability to let go of pain settles into our joints.

I am so excited to get back in my pharmacy. What herbs will call out to help? What will I discover in the formulas I make? What new points will call out to me when doing acupuncture? What will facing the world from a different direction bring?

Now this isn’t an article about the occasionally bout of diarrhea or the garbage eating dog. For that kind of thing see Natural solutions to treat acute diarrhea.

This is for those of you with dogs that always have runny stool, for those people who have spent hours talking poo with their vets, for those who have been up evenings comforting a dog with an upset bloated tummy. Do you think more about poo then you ever imagined you could, know the exact shade of brown/yellow that your dog’s was this morning, check the back yard for evidence of what has happened while you were away?

If you know what I am talking about please read on and hopefully I can offer some help. This is not always an easy problem to treat but there is hope!

There are a number of syndromes that can cause chronic diarrhea and stomach upset is veterinary medicine. The one thing I see more than anything is the term IBD and IBS used interchangeably. There is a thought that they may be different sides of the same coin, IBD being a more serious form of IBS, however generally we consider them to be different diseases. With both there may be a food allergy component that can make things worse or their may not be.

So what is the difference?

IBD – inflammatory bowel disease. This is an immune mediated disease aka autoimmune. The animal’s immune system is attacking the gut wall and causing inflammation. If you biopsy the gut you will see inflammatory changes. People will often see blood in their dogs stool with this disease, many times these animals will be very sick and there is often a nausea component with this disease. There can be a fairly severe pain component with this disease. There is also often weight loss and or loss of appetite. If gut inflammation is severe there can be a loss of protein from the body that can in excess be fatal. This can be checked on blood work. This disease is commonly treated with steroids.

IBS – irritative bowel syndrome. This disease is milder than IBD. These animals will often rotate between bouts of constipation and diarrhea and may have bloating and pain in their abdomen. If you biopsy the gut of these animals it will look pretty normal. These animals will not have gut damage that results in a low protein level. It is thought that this is more of a nerve mediated disease involving abnormal gut motility. Stress can very much make this syndrome worse.

Another disease that can look very similar is chronic pancreatitis. In this disease the pancreas has chronic inflammation which can manifest with all the symptoms of IBD or IBS however biopsy of the gut will often be normal. I test called a PLI/TLI can help diagnose this disease and sometimes pancreatic inflammation can be seen on an ultrasound.

In Chinese medicine you do not need a biopsy or even test results to treat these diseases. However, if you have not done basic blood work and a parasite check including for giardia, please do so before going any further. There are many very serious diseases such as kidney or liver failure that can manifest with gut signs. Parasites that are not treated can be extremely harmful. Low protein can be a serious condition. In addition some forms of cancer can cause similar symptoms. If you have not been to a veterinarian for a full work up please make sure to do so to rule out any illness that needs to be addressed immediately.

There are a lot of drugs that are commonly used to treat the causes of chronic diarrhea including metronitazole, Tylosin, Cerenia, Famotidine, prednisone, and many more. There are many articles that mention these treatments so I will not go into details about them. In my practice many of the animals who come to me are already on some of these drugs. I usually make changes and add in treatments and then work with the animal’s western veterinarian to discontinue western treatments only after we get the dog feeling better.

In treating chronic diarrhea in dogs it is very important to look at the patient as a whole. In Chinese and holistic medicine the main focus is on balancing the dog’s body for lasting health. I do this through four different holistic approaches.

• Diet
  Diet is extremely important for these guys. We want a food that has vitality and is anti-inflammatory. You are what you eat! A lot of these dogs will do very well on a raw diet however if they have had damaged digestion for a long time or have been on kibble the transition can some times be too great all at once. I usually move them to a canned, homemade or dehydrated raw first. In addition sometimes there is a food allergy component to their disease. Sometimes I can get a feel for if there is an allergy when I am doing the initial interview. For example if the dog has periods of normal digestion usually it is not a food allergy. If they are always sick or always have diarrhea it has to go higher on my list. Sometimes owners will also notice that there are certain foods that they have more problems on or they will show other signs of allergy when they eat certain foods (like itching).

  If there is not evidence of allergy I usually start out assuming there isn’t. If symptoms fail to improve I then explore food allergy later on. To determine a food allergy you usually need to feed a single protein for 4-6 weeks that they have never had in their diet before such as buffalo, rabbit or venision.

  Here is where I start

  • Home cooked diets. A simple home cooked diet is cooked chicken/turkey with sweet potato/yams/pumpkin 70% meat:30% yam. The yam or sweet potato can be canned just make sure it does not have added sugar. If your dog stays on this for more than a few weeks I recommend adding in a calcium supplement. I also recommend adding in the green vitamineral powder I’ll talk about later. After they have been on the simple diet for a month start adding in vegetables one at a time and then giving a variety of vegetables on a regular basis. There may be some vegetables they can eat and some they can’t – go slow with new additions.

  But I don’t have time to cook for myself let alone my dog!

  Yep got it! Here is some options if you don’t want to cook.

  • Honest Kitchen makes a dehydrated raw that I have found works well – I recommend Force
    or Embark.

  • If you are in the Seattle area, Natural Pet Pantry makes a cooked stew available at their stores in Burien and Kirkland. It is also available at All the Best Pet Stores.
  • I have also had good success with some of Merrick’s canned food such as
    Thanksgiving Day Dinner .

  

  • If your dog has been eating a canned food, home cooked or dehydrated raw you may be able to switch over to a raw diet. I really like Darwin’s line of raw food. If you are in Seattle Pet Pantry also has a great raw line. If you are out of state also check out Small Batch, Nature’s Variety, and Primal. My preference is for frozen raws over freeze dried. Make sure you start out slowly and cook the food for at least the first week.
• As most of you know who read my blog, I am not a supplement person. However this is a supplement that I really like and diarrhea is a disease I like to use it for. This Healthforce Vitamineral Green Powder not only is full of good nutrients but also probiotics and digestive enzymes. I find it can really help with digestive issues and highly recommend it for my dogs with diarrhea and absorption issues. If you don’t use this product I recommend using another good quality probiotic.
• Herbal formulas – Ok now we are getting to the part of this I love! I have been so impressed at what these herbal formulas can do.
• To begin with – I almost always start out dogs with chronic diarrhea on a formula I make called Zhi Xie San. I learned about this formula from my acupuncture teacher Richard Panzer and boy does it work well. The majority of dogs I use it in have a positive response. It helps firm up the stool and helps with intestinal inflammation. Most dogs tolerate it well mixed in with their food. I try not to self promote but I don’t know anyone who makes it besides my Kingdom of Basil herbal shop. I’m happy to pass on the recipe to any herbal pharmacy or your veterinarian.

Usually this formula can help these dogs but often I need other formulas to get to the underlying issues of disease. I use Zhi Xie San and then usually add in one of the following four formulas. If at all possible consult with a holistic vet to find out if these formulas are right for your dog. If your dog is on other medication please check with your vet before starting anything new.

• Xiao Chai Hu Tang – this formula is often best for dogs with more upper gastric symptoms such as nausea and bloating and tummy gurgling. It can also help with pain in the abdomen. I rarely use this formula for dogs under five years old. These dogs tend to often have some anxiety.
• Xiao Yao San with or without He Huan Pi is one of my favorite formulas for chronic gastrointestinal issues. It works best for dogs that have worsening of symptoms when they are stressed. It is also good for dogs who have a human who is very stressed or anxious. These dogs can also have stomach pain and can experience nausea and or diarrhea and sometimes constipation. I often add an herb called He Huan Pi to this formula which helps stress in the household from effecting the dog.
• Si Miao San – This formula works well for dogs with lots of inflammation. Their stool often times has mucous in it and can be yellow in color. It is often smelly. They also may vomit up yellow bile. They may have other inflammatory disease such as skin or ears issues. They are sometimes overweight but never underweight.
• Eight Treasures – This formula is good for the dog who is too thin and can not keep weight on. In older dogs this is one of the first formulas I reach for. This formula helps support digestion and is an overall qi and blood tonic.

In addition here are a few treatments that I use as needed to treat symptoms

• Marshmellow/slippery elm balls – I love to roll little balls made from a 50:50% combo of ground marshmallow and slippery elm powder with a little honey. These two herbs help with inflammation in the gastrointestinal tract. The honey is anti-microbial and soothing and support digestion. This can be used in any animal especially if there is nausea or upset tummy and can help with diarrhea. You can buy these powders from herb companies like Mountain Rose Herbs or in mixed together from Kingdom of Basil. You will need to mix with honey yourself. I recommend a raw local honey if possible.
• Phytomucil is a tincture made by Animal Apawthecary that contains both marshmallow and slippery elm plus other gut soothing ingredients. It is a liquid that can be given easily for any digestive upset and does not have to be mixed with food.
• Last but not at all the least of treatments is acupuncture. I find acupuncture really can help with these chronic digestive diseases. I highly, highly recommend finding someone in your area to work with who is a veterinary acupuncturist. Many of these folks will also have herbal knowledge and can help direct you to help with diet as well

Wishing you solid poo and happy tummies!

Would you like to be part of Kingdom of Basil? Do you know a veterinarian who would like to be?

At Kingdom of Basil have more clients than we can work with and would love to have a new veterinary acupuncturist in our clinic who we can refer clients to. We are a collective of various practitioners who share referrals but we all run our own businesses. I consider my practice to be referral only – all of my clients have western veterinarians they work with.

What we are seeking

• You love what you do and enjoy both animals and the people they are connected to
• You are certified in veterinary acupuncture
• You are knowledgeable in herbal medicine or want to learn
• You have a desire to run your own business
• You are ok with having a limited practice that does not include anesthesia, dentals, and painful procedures
• You are open to what western medicine offers and can work well with western veterinarians who refer animals to us. You see a combination of western and holistic medicine as being the best for all involved

What we have to offer

• A beautiful space with lots of light and love that people and animals love to come to.
• A chance to be your own boss
• Mentoring in herbal and holistic medicine if you are just starting out
• Possible reception help if you desire
• Possible sharing of my extensive herbal pharmacy and grinders
• Multiple client referrals (I may be biased but I feel like I get some of the best animals and people to work with in the world)

How it works

• We have a full room and a half room currently available. You would pay a monthly rent for use of the room (or half a room) with access to shared bathrooms, small kitchenette, waiting room and reception area.
• If you wanted to have reception help it would be a % of your income from appointments (not products)
• Having multiple practitioners have successful businesses helps us all so we are highly motivated to help you have the clients you desire

Please contact us if you are interested at contact@kingdomofbasil

Please join us for an
Open House at
Kingdom of Basil Wellness Clinic
for people and their companion animals
June 22nd Sunday 3-5pm

We believe that families can include many species and that good holistic health should not be limited to just people. We provide holistic health for the whole family through acupuncture, massage and naturopathic medicine.

Our new clinic is located in the south end of West Seattle. Please come and see our new clinic, meet our practitioners, and learn about our herbal business. Animals welcome as long as they can get along with others and are on leash.

We are located at 9431 17th Ave SW Seattle, WA right between Delridge and Roxbury. For questions please call 206-937-6288 or email contact (at) kingdomofbasil (dot) com

For more information also see our website Kingdomofbasil.com

Natural Pet Pantry has long been somewhere I recommend to clients for food but I have yet to actually make it there myself. Today Randi dropped off some samples for me and my clients and who better to try them on than my own fur kids. Everything is made fresh at their kitchen in the south park neighborhood in Seattle. They are a great locally owned company with retail locations in Burien and Kirkland and sell at many of the local pet supply stores. They also do some home delivery in the Seattle area.

While they make a great raw product, they are one of the only companies that offered cooked stews for cats and dogs.

Their cat food is made with fresh ingredients and is mostly meat, as it should be. This is the raw turkey.

I have four kitties with difference preferences. Three of them jumped in immediately, the forth had to sniff for about 30 seconds and then went to town. Rating – four cat approval!

Melody got left out of the first photo. She is my toothless little girl and had no problems eating this.

Alli has been on a raw diet since I got her but decided to try her on NPP’s turkey cooked stew. There are so few good options for cooked homemade foods for dogs.

Alli was in love with this food!

More food love. It disappears in about a minute. Overall Natural Pet Pantry Rating – 5/5!

I hold no special magic that others can’t have. I do write a lot, I try to write articles that others can follow and that give good solid information. There are many vets out there that do what I do and do it well but don’t write articles. I don’t know them all. Many of them don’t know me.

Part of why I started writing is that I was one person and only one person. I could not help everyone who needed my help, even just in my city of Seattle. There was only so much of me. I received calls and I had no appointments for weeks or months. Peoples’ animals were dying and I had no time to help.

So I began to write and I found in writing I could help more people and I was able to use a talent that I have had since I was young. The ability to share part of who I am through words on paper.

I do hold magic, its just not unique to me. I know how to put love into what I do. I know how to appreciate animals and people for who they are and where they are at. And I’ve learned to use the incredible brain I was given that processes medical and botanical information well (but can’t spell the most simple of words – thank good for spell check) and combine that with the intuition that comes from my heart. I’m grateful for this.

The more I write, the more emails and phone calls I get asking me to help specific animals. I can’t help them all. I know that every animal out there is unique and loved. And it pains me that I am not able to help every furry companion and family member. My main magic lies in those animals I can see in person, with people I can look in the eye and guide. I can’t do what I do best on a phone, over distance.

When I write an article it helps thousands of animals. I need to keep my blogging work on articles and my local practice on seeing animals.

I know people will continue to ask, I know I will continue to hurt that I can’t reach out to everyone individually.

But there are other great veterinarians out there that can guide. Nothing compares to having someone in your community to guide you through your animals’ chronic illnesses. It is not a one stop visit with chronic disease. Sometimes that guide is a great western veterinarian, more and more I find that my profession is opening to some of the holistic medical options. Many times it is a wonderful holistic practitioner.

I know there are those who will be their our guides, those that live 500 miles from the nearest holistic veterinarian. I have tried to make my articles the most straight forward yet detailed I can. Consider taking them to your western veterinarian and discussing. We need to get more veterinarians interested in holistic medicine. There is nothing as frustrating as having a chronic disease without options. If there are no good western options many vets will be open to something more unconventional.

I know this article doesn’t help animals. It helps me. I have tried in so many ways to express this to everyone who asks for help. I can’t type it any more. Thank you for listening.

To find a holistic vet in your community
How To Find a Good Holistic Vet To Work With

If you are working with an animal with cancer
Integrative and Holistic Treatments for Cancer in Dogs and Cats

Treating and stabilizing cancer and chronic disease long term is sometimes like learning how to ride a bike. At first it feels impossible and every small setback or fall you think I can’t do this, this is the end. However at one point you realize that you are going on your own and that you actually have a lot of power in this process.

Ok so maybe a bad comparison. Bikes don’t normally kill you and most of us learn to ride them eventually. But I have found one of the hardest things for people with companion animals with cancer is that they have no control over the process. They see their animal suffering. They are told they are going to die. And then they are left trying to figure out what direction to go and that becomes extremely difficult to decide with someone you love.

In addition when they turn to the Internet they are blasted with an amazing amount of articles, supplements, stories about what you should do for an animal with cancer and chronic illness. It is almost impossible to find a right course. I have seen that even when people have their dogs or cats on multiple cancer supplements/treatments that they go back again and again to the internet hoping for a new article, a new cure.

There is no solid cure for cancer and many other chronic diseases. However there are many things that help to control the pain and symptoms and sometimes we get cures.

But one of the most important things for any practitioner working with people who are facing cancer or chronic illness in a loved animal is to make these wonderful people part of the cure. It is only natural that when we see our animals suffer that we want to help. We don’t want to be the one in control but we do want to have something we can do that gives us some control and some power over suffering. This eases anxiety and turns worry into actions.

I find it is different client to client but I try to add in some treatments they can do at home. Acupressure points that help with stimulating the immune system. A diet or additives they can cook to help with health. Topical treatments that can be applied at home. Medication for when there is pain or nausea or other difficulties. Herbals that they can lovingly mix in with their dogs’ food, that actually help and work. While I do have people use capsules if an animal will not eat the herbs I provide, my preference is for the whole herbs I make that smell good and fresh. If people do use capsules they are filling them on their own which also involves them in the healing process.

In my own herb business we have a rule that herbs can only be made if you are in a good place. If anyone is in a particularly bad mood they cannot make herbs, because their energy can effect the herbs. The funny flip side of that is that the herbs seem to make all of our moods better. If I am in a bad place I simply go sit with the herbs for a while and the world seems better. Every herbal we make gets a hand drawn heart on the package. That is the love that is added. I learned that years ago from my first herbal teacher’s wife. Always add love, it does make a difference.

I know that was a bit off topic but I guess what I am trying to say is that in medicine we have worked so hard to remove the connection between medicine and love. Love can be medicine and when we involve people in their animals’ treatments, we are adding love. And that is no small thing.

We are all connected, let’s use that connection to heal!

Further reading

• Acupressure For Animals with Cancer
• You Are What You Think

Those of you that follow my writing know that I am not a huge supplement pusher. I believe that whole good quality food goes a long way in our cats and dogs and if you feed a great diet you really don’t need a lot of powders and liquids.

That being said I often get questions about what are the best supplements and you will notice in my homemade food recipes that I often add supplements. See Diets for cancer in cats and dogs. By the way these diets are great for animals without cancer as well.

So for those of you out there that want to add in a little extra to your dog or cat’s food here are my favorites. And yes there are only three.

• Healthforce’s Vitamineral Green Powder is one of those truly great supplements. I first learned about this powder after getting an amazingly good smoothie at our local Chaco Canyon cafe. Everytime I would order it I felt like I had a little more energy and my digestion was a little better. It contained this product and I soon ordered it and not only took it myself but also added it to the homemade cat food I made instead of kelp. My cats’ digestion also improved and the volume in the litter boxes decreased. Clearly they were utilizing their food better. I highly recommend this for any animals with digestive issues or as an extra health tonic in healthy animals (or humans)



• I often get questions about medical mushroom supplements for our companion animals. Fungi Perfecti is my favorite company by far. They have a great reputation in the holistic community and really know their stuff. They also make a great companion animal product called MUSH.If you have a breed that is prone to cancers adding in a mushroom supplement can be highly beneficial. Mushrooms are also a wonderful immune booster and unusual that they can be safely used in animals with autoimmune disease or on immune suppressing drugs.



• Not all fish oils are created equal. In my opinion all liquid products should be refrigerated once opened, if they aren’t that is a problem. I don’t trust many of the animal fish oil products and prefer going with companies that also make human products that regulate for heavy metals, contaminants, and quality. My favorite company, Nordic Naturals, makes a pet products which has the same high quality of their human grade oils. I prefer their Cod Liver Oil for Pets above all other products. Fish oils and cod liver oils help with skin issues, support immune help, decrease joint inflammation in dogs and help with weight loss in older and sick animals. They can also be an added health booster for healthy dogs and cats and because of the stinky fishy taste are usually not only tolerated but liked by our animals.

My cat clients have long had the benefit of being able to use my specially made herbal tinctures. For the first time they are now available on etsy! While any of my herbal mixes can be made into a tea for the kitties, the tinctures come made to give. All my tinctures are made with love and with glycerin instead of alcohol so they are not too strong on the tongue. I can’t say that cats like my tinctures because they do still have a herbal taste and let’s face it, cats don’t like anything that is put in their mouths by someone else. However, they go down easier than most of the medications out there.

I am starting with offering my four most commonly used tinctures in the one ounce size.

• Kidney support is also available in powder form to tea. It is the traditional formula, Liu Wei Di Huang Wan and is one of the main herbals I use for older cats with kidney deficiency. Also see my article Kidney failure in cats – how Chinese medicine and diet can help
• Constipation support combines cascara which promotes gut motility with licorice root and ginger to prevent painful spasms in the colon.
• Anemia support contains two herbs, dang gui and huang qi that promote the production of red blood cells in the body
• Heart, brain and blood pressure support contains hawthorn and ginkgo which help regulate blood pressure, improve blood circulation into the brain to help with memory and support healthy heart muscle.

I often times combine kidney support and anemia support for cats with both kidney disease and anemia. Many cats with kidney disease also have high blood pressure, so sometimes kidney support gets combined with the hawthorn/ginkgo combo. I can also make either of these combinations. The constipation support I always use as a separate tincture.

I hope these tinctures additions are able to help more of the kitties out there! And I’ll be adding more formulas and sizes as we move along.