Open wide!

Feb­ru­ary is National Pet Den­tal Health Month per the AVMA.

Are your pet’s teeth a reg­u­lar part of rou­tine care?  They should be.  Did you know that oral hygiene can also affect  inter­nal organs?  We had a Choco­late Lab client who had to post­pone train­ing because he got sick from what was ini­tially thought of as a stom­ach prob­lem.  Turned out it was the bac­te­ria in his mouth he was swal­low­ing that was mak­ing him so sick.  A trip to the vet for a pro­fes­sional clean­ing was all he needed to make a full recovery.

When you take your pet for a den­tal clean­ing, the vet has to anes­thetize him.  Don’t get me wrong, I know loads of peo­ple who take their pet in once a year for a pro­fes­sional den­tal clean­ing and all goes well.  Usu­ally every­thing is fine, and in all my years of work­ing with ani­mals I have only known one per­son to lose their cat to a rou­tine den­tal, due to com­pli­ca­tions with the anes­the­sia.  And for me, one is enough.  My per­sonal opin­ion is if there’s a way to pre­vent it, then pre­vent it.  Why put your pet under if you don’t have to?  And when you think about this, older pets are the ones who usu­ally have den­tal prob­lems — and older pets have the high­est risk under anes­the­sia.  Why take the chance?

Thank­fully oral hygiene for dogs and cats has become more pop­u­lar.  These days there are prod­ucts out there to  com­bat tarter and gum dis­ease with enzy­matic tooth­paste, pet tooth­brushes, fin­ger brush, den­tal chews, den­tal rinses, toys, treats, and starter den­tal kits. (All these links per­tain to dog den­tal care.  There are also a ton of prod­ucts out there for cats as well.)  My dog’s favorite den­tal toy is the Nylabone Dou­ble Action Chew. I put his dog­gie poul­try fla­vored tooth­paste in the groves and he goes to town!  He also loves to get his teeth brushed.

There is a very easy way to intro­duce your dog or cat to teeth brush­ing which has worked for every sin­gle per­son I have ever met.  (The video is at the bot­tom of this post for your view­ing plea­sure.)  Here is a brief re-cap for you.

Step #1.  Get a species appro­pri­ate  fla­vored tooth­paste your pet likes.  (Use dog tooth­paste for your dog, and cat tooth­paste for your cat.)  Most brands have poul­try, beef, malt, and even seafood

Step #2.  Put the tooth­paste into the bris­tles all the way down to the base of the toothbrush

Step #3.  Hold out tooth­brush in front of your pet as still as pos­si­ble.  You want to be non-invasive.  Let the pet come to the tooth­brush, don’t charge it down his throat.

Step #4.  Let your pet really get chew­ing and feel com­fort­able before you manip­u­late it around his mouth and start actual brushing.

One last piece of den­tal advice I will leave you with is be care­ful about what type of food you feed your dog.  If you give your dog pizza crust, make sure the bread isn’t stuck rot­ting in the back of your dog’s mouth.  Avoid sugar sweets, and always check with your vet if you have any questions.

If you are hav­ing trou­ble play­ing the video, go straight to You Tube HERE.