Need help with sensitive stomach diet

[Lolli_lah]

So today I got back from what is hopefully our last vet visit for a while. Lolli has been doing really good and everything so now we are to introduce a real diet back into her life. The vet says we could get a prescription diet for Hills ID, but he doesn't entirely think we need to at this time. He says if we want to try an over the counter sensitive stomach diet, it will cost us less and we may be able to stick with a diet like that instead of a prescription.

So I did a tiny bit of searching at PetsMart today at the various sensitive stomach/digestive health diets and I wrote them down and any specifics it said about the diet. So I'm hoping someone could help lead me in the right direction on what might be a good one to try. I had some good advice given to me by a fellow YTer and she mentioned that brand name isn't always as important when dealing with a food sensitivity and it's just moreso important on what works for your dog. The problem is, we have no idea. So perhaps someone might be able to give some enlightenment on something.

So here's my list of what was available at my local Petsmart (if it's just a brand name listed, that means it was for sensitive stomachs and it didn't necessarily specify anything diet-wise or anything else on the label right away):

Science Diet (isn't this Hill's in non prescription?)
Eukaneuba
Purina
Purina One (Sensitive Systems)
Natural Choice (w/ Oatmeal for sensitive stomachs)
Natural Choice (sensitive skin & stomach w/ brown rice)
Nature's Recipe (Easy-to-Digest, chicken or salmon "meal")

[Ellie May]

Although I would try to find something a bit different, if this is all you have to choose from, I'd go in this order:

SD
Euk
Purina One
Purina

No Nutro ever!
Nature's Recipe...haven't really looked into it.
Some dogs with intestinal issues do well on novel ingredients.
You could try something like Natural Balance Duck, but if it doesn't work out, the vet may not be all too happy that you didn't go with a sensitive stomach formula.

[Lolli_lah]

I had her on NB Duck before. She didn't do bad on it but she did have on very rare occasion some mucus in stool but it could have been treat related. I'm sure it is because even though I did really nice giving her a decent quality food, that I didn't take the same precaution with treats. I didn't want to try the Nutro stuff (the bag/label even looks crappy) but I just wrote everything down that had a sensitive stomach diet choice regardless, so that I could get input on it all.

I think I might try Science Diet. Is Hill's by SD? Because I saw some kind of food there in a white bag saying vet recommended and it says Hill's on it, then science diet in smaller. Just curious question really.

Thanks for your input Ellie, as always.

[dwerten]

Originally Posted by Lolli_lah

I had her on NB Duck before. She didn't do bad on it but she did have on very rare occasion some mucus in stool but it could have been treat related. I'm sure it is because even though I did really nice giving her a decent quality food, that I didn't take the same precaution with treats. I didn't want to try the Nutro stuff (the bag/label even looks crappy) but I just wrote everything down that had a sensitive stomach diet choice regardless, so that I could get input on it all.

I think I might try Science Diet. Is Hill's by SD? Because I saw some kind of food there in a white bag saying vet recommended and it says Hill's on it, then science diet in smaller. Just curious question really.

Thanks for your input Ellie, as always.

do you have a petco near you as i much prefer natural balance over any of these and did he vet food work? If so i would stick to it as mine have been on vet food for 4 years and I do not take any chances as we almost lost him so if your dog was sick and doing well why mess with success just a thought - it may be more expensive but if it is working i say do it til it does not work

[Lolli_lah]

No in my initial post I said that he said we could try to get a prescription diet but since we have not tried a prescription diet yet, that we could try an over the counter sensitive kind of diet first before going the prescription route. If she can be good on a non-prescription food then there would not be a reason to prescribe. And if it doesn't work either we can go that route when we need to. That's what he told me, so basically he was 50/50 on it and left it up to us. I mentioned to him if he knew what brands were good and he just said it's something that people just have all personal opinions about, that there was Purina and Science Diet and all kinds. So he didn't have any recommendation really, just something without corn and is made specifically for sensitive stomachs/digestive.

[dwerten]

Originally Posted by Lolli_lah

No in my initial post I said that he said we could try to get a prescription diet but since we have not tried a prescription diet yet, that we could try an over the counter sensitive kind of diet first before going the prescription route. If she can be good on a non-prescription food then there would not be a reason to prescribe. And if it doesn't work either we can go that route when we need to. That's what he told me, so basically he was 50/50 on it and left it up to us. I mentioned to him if he knew what brands were good and he just said it's something that people just have all personal opinions about, that there was Purina and Science Diet and all kinds. So he didn't have any recommendation really, just something without corn and is made specifically for sensitive stomachs/digestive.

oh ok then i would go limited ingredient as too many ingredients can upset them. I like NB fish and sweet potato, NB venison and sweet potato - the white potato is a concern for me so duck and potato would not be my favorite for ibd issues and if you tried it then i would try one of the others

[Lolli_lah]

I tried NB already I think I mentioned that, too. I don't know if I tried other flavor other than the duck but we changed her to Wellness Simple Solutions after that and she was ok on both? But she had small signs of mucusy stool on both so then after a while on Wellness like a couple months or so, that's when she got sick. But I cant be 100% sure it's just the treats, because there was a long while I didn't give her many treats outside of her food. I just can't remember the exact time line to be able to be sure whether it's treat related only, or food included or alone.

So I think a food made specifically for sensitive dogs like my vet recommended is what we should do, since we are already in transition between kibble food. I don't want to go back and try things I already had before and know she had mucusy stools from. I'm only assuming that the food lines that say sensitive stomach or digestive health type have simple ingredients or leave out ingredients known to irritate the digestive tracts?

[Ellie May]

Originally Posted by Lolli_lah

I had her on NB Duck before. She didn't do bad on it but she did have on very rare occasion some mucus in stool but it could have been treat related. I'm sure it is because even though I did really nice giving her a decent quality food, that I didn't take the same precaution with treats. I didn't want to try the Nutro stuff (the bag/label even looks crappy) but I just wrote everything down that had a sensitive stomach diet choice regardless, so that I could get input on it all.

I think I might try Science Diet. Is Hill's by SD? Because I saw some kind of food there in a white bag saying vet recommended and it says Hill's on it, then science diet in smaller. Just curious question really.

Thanks for your input Ellie, as always.

Hills and Science Diet are the same.

[dwerten]

Originally Posted by Lolli_lah

I tried NB already I think I mentioned that, too. I don't know if I tried other flavor other than the duck but we changed her to Wellness Simple Solutions after that and she was ok on both? But she had small signs of mucusy stool on both so then after a while on Wellness like a couple months or so, that's when she got sick. But I cant be 100% sure it's just the treats, because there was a long while I didn't give her many treats outside of her food. I just can't remember the exact time line to be able to be sure whether it's treat related only, or food included or alone.

So I think a food made specifically for sensitive dogs like my vet recommended is what we should do, since we are already in transition between kibble food. I don't want to go back and try things I already had before and know she had mucusy stools from. I'm only assuming that the food lines that say sensitive stomach or digestive health type have simple ingredients or leave out ingredients known to irritate the digestive tracts?

not necessarily sometimes it is a marketing ploy - i would try the nb venison and sweet potato as i like nb over those other mfg - i know you stated duck and potato but that is not the same as venison and sweet potato. I would not give any treats and treat with the food only until you have a food she does well on for a long period of time and then even still i would not do treats. Dex gets his kibble as a treat as i am way too afraid to give him anything but his food after he was so sick - he does not even know the difference he thinks his kibble is a treat

[Lolli_lah]

Thanks very much, I definitely already learned this lesson as I made Lolli pretty sick. But she didn't act up more than just white spitty mucus in stool until recently. I only said I know for sure I tried the duck flavor, I might have tried venison and just don't remember it was a while ago. We don't know what her food sensitivity is, it could be not related to potato at all as I wasn't feeding her a potato food when she got sick, unless there was potato in the treats which I have no idea. I don't want to take the chances of back tracking. Maybe it's a marketing ploy, but usually they'd have ingredient/s that are made for sensitivity, yes?

I think I'll try the Science Diet as it's probably pretty close to what the prescription diet would be from Hill's, yes? It wouldn't be 100% the same but close as it's from same company? Not too sure on that one. And it is made specifically for sensitive. It just seems to fit the most, everyone that has mentioned prescription ID diets to me have mentioned the Hill's brand so that is why I want to trust it the most, but I am still new to all of this so what do I know?

[dwerten]

Originally Posted by Lolli_lah

Thanks very much, I definitely already learned this lesson as I made Lolli pretty sick. But she didn't act up more than just white spitty mucus in stool until recently. I only said I know for sure I tried the duck flavor, I might have tried venison and just don't remember it was a while ago. We don't know what her food sensitivity is, it could be not related to potato at all as I wasn't feeding her a potato food when she got sick, unless there was potato in the treats which I have no idea. I don't want to take the chances of back tracking. Maybe it's a marketing ploy, but usually they'd have ingredient/s that are made for sensitivity, yes?

I think I'll try the Science Diet as it's probably pretty close to what the prescription diet would be from Hill's, yes? It wouldn't be 100% the same but close as it's from same company? Not too sure on that one. And it is made specifically for sensitive. It just seems to fit the most, everyone that has mentioned prescription ID diets to me have mentioned the Hill's brand so that is why I want to trust it the most, but I am still new to all of this so what do I know?

give it a shot and keep us posted

[Lolli_lah]

So I had just been doing some searching at the pet stores around to compare prices and brands. Basically all had the same things, just some places had less options than PetsMart ended up having.

So I originally thought, as I posted before, that Science Diet would be a good choice because hey, they make the prescription Hill's diet so they should be pretty trust worthy. So I went to go purchase a bag, and as always I took a look at the ingredients, and what do you know? There's 2 or 3 types of corn ingredients! I am soooo confused! My vet told me specifically to try to avoid any corn ingredients. I know there are tons of diets with no corn, as I had been feeding them to her before. But then I thought well what do other sensitive stomach diets have in their ingredients list? ALL HAVE CORN?! The only one that had the lesser evils was Purina One, with corn gluten meal, as I understand this to be a type of corn flour. I could be wrong on that, though.

So I went ahead with that, as the vet said she could be okay and if not then we go with prescription diet and a more extensive blood work.

So I'm going to go ahead and try this one, but does anyone have any idea why all the brands with sensitive stomach diets (science diet, eukaneuba, 3 purina kinds, etc) have this ingredient? I didn't find any of the higher end diets with sensitive system specific diets.

[Ellie May]

Originally Posted by Lolli_lah

So I had just been doing some searching at the pet stores around to compare prices and brands. Basically all had the same things, just some places had less options than PetsMart ended up having.

So I originally thought, as I posted before, that Science Diet would be a good choice because hey, they make the prescription Hill's diet so they should be pretty trust worthy. So I went to go purchase a bag, and as always I took a look at the ingredients, and what do you know? There's 2 or 3 types of corn ingredients! I am soooo confused! My vet told me specifically to try to avoid any corn ingredients. I know there are tons of diets with no corn, as I had been feeding them to her before. But then I thought well what do other sensitive stomach diets have in their ingredients list? ALL HAVE CORN?! The only one that had the lesser evils was Purina One, with corn gluten meal, as I understand this to be a type of corn flour. I could be wrong on that, though.

So I went ahead with that, as the vet said she could be okay and if not then we go with prescription diet and a more extensive blood work.

So I'm going to go ahead and try this one, but does anyone have any idea why all the brands with sensitive stomach diets (science diet, eukaneuba, 3 purina kinds, etc) have this ingredient? I didn't find any of the higher end diets with sensitive system specific diets.

B/c corn is blamed a bit too often as the biggest problem with dog food. A very large number of dogs do just fine with it and it does not necessarily cause somach upset. If you need to avoid corn, then you will likely need to go with a smaller company that uses novel ingredients. It is generally the fiber %, soluble vs. insoluble, etc. that goes into making an intestinal formula. It isn't necessarily ingredients that are looked at.

[hugz4all4]

I have a pup with senstive stomach also and its been a challenge to find him something he can eat that wont cause him to throw up. We have pretty much ruled out any food high in protein/fat. He does best on a protien level between 26 and 28 precent and no higher. I had him on SD I/D for awhile and he did good but didnt seem like he was getting enough to eat, he wanted to eat all the time so I started looking around and asking for suggestions on here. We tried Natural balance and Wellness solutions and he wouldnt touch it. It was also recommended to me try a food that is fish based, because it is low in fat and protein but I couldnt get any of my dogs to eat anything that was mostly fished based. So at my wits end I decided to try Life's Abundance (again), and all of my dogs have been eating it for almost 2 weeks with out any troubles at all. Im not recommending this food to you.. .. just telling you what worked for us. On your list I would of suggestions I would try Nature's recipe or the SD..good luck, I know how frustrating it can be..

[Lolli_lah]

Well, I know that esp with a dog with a sensitivity and you don't know what it is to exactly yet, that something like corn could very well not be the problem. I think what my vet was telling me with just a plain corn ingredient (other than meal or gluten) that the skins on the corn could be kind of a hard to digest thing but he didn't say an exact reason why to try to avoid corn, it's just what I'm guessing. I have read that about corn skins being hard to digest but like I said, we don't know what she is having an issue with.

When we first adopted Lolli she was eating Purina One puppy chow, because she was a breeder dog I am assuming that is why the breeder had her on that diet. I am not sure. She did fine on it but I switched her to another food, after reading about all the horrible bad things that bad ingredients can do.

Now I am really wondering why there is such a huge hype about certain ingredients. Sure, maybe some dogs had bad reactions to certain things but does that necessarily mean that it's bad for all? That's like saying if I'm lactose intolerant, that my whole family shouldn't eat dairy even if they are fine with it.

So Purina One does have what is listed as 'corn gluten meal'. I am not too sure what that is, but I decided that if I'm going to try a food for sensitive doggies then at least Purina One brand is something we knew at least prior to her spay she did OK with. Even if corn isn't entirely bad, I don't think 2+ types of it in the science diet food is good if my vet recommended against it.

Now I'm just wondering what does the prescription science diet has ingredients-wise, the same corn stuff? Because that's the prescription diet they support at the vet office. All of this is sooo confusing. I hope this is the one.