Episode 2: A Better Understanding of a “Complete” Diet

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Episode 2: A Better Understanding of a “Complete” Diet

• The first question asked by many pet owners: “What should I feed my pet?”
  • Start with the big concepts and work toward the specifics
  • There is not a perfect food for everyone…just like people

• “No single act or influence alters the environment of the cells of the body more than the ingestion of food.”

{The role of nutrition in genetic expression. Purina Research Report 1999}

• Important questions to ask (and answer) when trying to understand nutrition,  pet foods, and nutritional supplements:
  • Is nutrition a completed science or are we continually discovering new knowledge?
  • Are there substances beyond proteins, carbohydrates, fats, vitamins, and minerals which, in many cases, we have not yet identified or studied their effects?
    • Are these ‘unidentified’ food factors (“non-nutrients”) important?
    • If they are valuable, how best to obtain them?
• Does food processing destroy vital nutritional factors and affect the health of the animal?
• Can synthetic vitamins replace those factors lost or damaged during processing?
• Are synthetic vitamins equivalent to those found naturally in food?
• Questioning assumptions about pet foods
  • Have you ever seen a dog food advertisement for a complete and balanced food that has been “improved” or is “all new” or …?
    • If it was “complete and balanced” before, how can it be more complete or more balanced than balanced?
• Where are the veggies?
• The clinical interpretation bias – Is it nutritional or not?

• 2 primary paradigms of pet nutrition
  • Fresh/whole/raw foods
    • Reliance on natural sources of naturally-occurring substances to feed the body according to design
    • Recognition of:
      • Natural biochemical complexity of food ingredients
      • Limited understanding of complex interaction of functional nutrients in complex biochemical/genetic systems

• The “complete and balanced” diet
  • Most common model for understanding nutrition
  • Promoted by nutritionists (the ‘experts’) and the pet food manufacturers
  • Assumes complete knowledge of nutrition
  • Reality??

• Commercial diet – Basic Objectives
  • Cheap
  • Convenient
  • Reasonably nutritious
  • Meet the minimum standards (AAFCO)
    • Provide adequate nutrition for the average animal
    • AAFCO “protocols are not intended to ensure optimal growth or maximize physical activity”

{Small Animal Clinical Nutrition 4th Ed p. 9}

• Nutritional profile (formulation method): no assurance of absorption or bioavailability
  • “Although the AAFCO profiles are better than nothing, they provide false security. I don’t know of any studies showing their adequacies or inadequacies.“  Dr. Quinton Rogers
  • Feeding trial (protocol method): only six month duration, only eight animals required
    • “Some foods that pass the feeding trials still won’t support animals over the long term.” “There is no way to tell which foods these are.” – Dr. Quinton Rogers          

{Smith CA. November 15, 1993. Changes and Challenges in Feline Nutrition , J Am Vet Med Assoc Vol. 203, No. 10 pp.1395-1400}

• Expert recommendations to avoid nutritional imbalances?  …Change the foods regularly “The recommendation to feed one food for the life of an animal gives nutritionists more credit than we deserve.  Cats fed one diet usually remain healthy. But, when a problem arises, a fairly consistent finding is that the animal was fed one thing for a long time.” – Dr. Tony Buffington

{Smith CA. November 15, 1993. Changes and Challenges in Feline Nutrition J Am Vet Med Assoc  Vol. 203, No. 10 pp.1395-1400}

• Complete for all animals?…What about the genetic/biochemical uniqueness of each individual     
  • “…certain animals may have genetic or metabolic differences that may respond to intakes greater than are considered adequate to avoid recognized dietary deficiencies.”

{LaFlamme DP. 2000 Healthy Skin And Haircoat: The Importance of Nutrition Purina Research  Report pp.1-4}

[The beginnings of acknowledgement of nutrigenomics – the effects of nutrients on genetic expression]

• Commercial Pet Food: Following an Old Paradigm
  • 1910-1940’s – Time of discovery of many vitamins
  • Focus of nutritional science was single nutrient deficiencies and RDA’s
    • Identification of the ‘active ingredient’
    • Still predominant thinking for many nutritionists
      • “Nutritional essentiality” based on this paradigm
      • Formulation of commercial pet foods is founded on ‘nutritional essentiality’.
        • “Unless a clinical disease has been related specifically to the deprivation of a certain nutrient, then that nutrient has not been considered essential.”

{Small Animal Clinical Nutrition 4th Ed p. 9}

• Foods considered ‘adequate’ are only required to contain ‘essential’ nutrients in amounts that meet estimated needs.
• Two columns: “essential” and “nonessential”
  • Many things left out of commercial diets –by definition
  • “Prescription diets” …More Complete?
    • Despite the fact that all ‘essential’ nutrients are present in the commercial, AAFCO-approved foods in the correct balanced proportions, nutritionists recognize that alteration of nutrient content may help to:
      • Correct imbalances
      • Manage disease processes
        • a/d,    b/d,    c/d,     d/d,    h/d,   j/d,     k/d,    r/d,     w/d,   z/d, …

• Food is more than just “5 nutrients” – Protein, Carbohydrate, Fat, Vitamins, Minerals
  • Food is much more complex than once thought and there are many chemical components in plant and animal tissues that have powerful, beneficial physiologic effects.
  • Many of these compounds are not currently considered ‘essential’ and are therefore not included, or not quantified, in commercial pet foods

• “Complete-ness” is a myth … and a deception

• Food is food…pet food is convenience food
  • “The pet food industry convinces veterinarians and pet owners that only commercially prepared foods offer complete and balanced diets. The industry claims that medical problems will be encountered by feeding owner-prepared diets. It tells the public that feeding human food may actually harm American companion animals…Unfortunately, commercially-prepared diets are not always complete and balanced, and just as important they offer no choice about quality and wholesomeness, which are of utmost importance.”

{Strombeck, DR. Home-Prepared Dog and Cat Diets: The Healthful Alternative 1999 p.ix}