E336: 제니퍼 서머필드(Jennifer Summerfield, DVM) - 장 건강과 반려견

2:50

There's also a cat and a snake, but they don't do any sports. They just kind of hang out. Why not? Well, that's a good question. I don't think the snake would be fast enough for things like agility. And probably the jumps would be hard. The cat could do it, but she's not inclined to. Fair enough. So as I mentioned in the intro, we're going to chat mostly about gut health today. So for anybody not in the know, can you share a little about why this has become such a hot topic recently? Yeah, that's kind of a good question. It definitely is a hot topic for sure. It's something that's, you know, getting a lot of attention on the human side of things. And I know many of my clients and people in, you know, the dog related groups I'm on on social media and all that are very interested in, you know, all the kind of the buzz around gut health and probiotics and, you know, things that can be done with diet and all that kind of thing. I think that, you know, partly it's, you know, people are always interested in, you know, hey, are there things we could do that would either, you know, help treat disease processes that are present or just kind of make our dogs healthier, you know, more resistant to problems that don't necessarily involve like medications and things, right? You know, it definitely has an appeal to it because it's like, well, this seems more natural. And like, there's probably not a lot of downside to, you know, trying to manipulate this as opposed to like taking, you know, drugs, which is, you know, I totally get that. And I think that's reasonable to a point. I also think some of it probably has to do with the fact that we're learning more, you know, we know more about it than we used to. Part of the reason for that is that in the last, gosh, I don't know, probably 10 to 20 years, I would say, are the techniques that are available for like genetic sequencing. And, you know, the testing that's related to that has gotten has kind of become a thing. So it used to be that, you know, we were vastly underestimating the number and the type and the like, you know, sheer diversity of microbes living in the gastrointestinal tract in humans, but also in dogs and other animals. Because the main way that was studied was, you know, you could take some poop and you could culture it, right, and see what grows and like, yeah, a lot of stuff grows. But it turns out only about 10% of the stuff that lives in the intestinal tract is even culturable under like normal, you know, environmental circumstances. Interesting. Yeah.

5:14

So the vast majority of stuff that lives there is not stuff that's going to grow on a petri dish in the lab. So we, for a long time, didn't even know it was there. So then once these newer techniques became available, where now they can take samples and, you know, put them in a fancy little machine that like sequences the, you know, bacterial DNA of all the little things that are in there and can amplify that to study it better and all kinds of cool things. Turns out there are way more things living in there than we used to realize. So I think that's part of it that we have a much bigger, sort of more comprehensive picture of what the gut microbiome is, you know, what kind of stuff live in the intestines. And we've also started to have more research come out really showing some of the surprising ways that that can impact stuff besides just what's going on in the GI tract. So I think all of those things together have kind of been building over the last several years. And we're realizing like, hey, this is really cool. It seems like it's really complex. There's a lot we don't understand about it, but it seems like it has the potential to be, you know, really useful in maybe trying to address certain types of disease processes or, you know, trying to, you know, boost the immune system, whatever that might mean, right, for an individual or trying to just kind of, even in healthy animals, maybe do some things that could perhaps make them less likely to get diseases or things like that. So, but yeah, very hot topic, very cool stuff. And I am always excited to see like what's going to be coming out with that over the next several years or so because there's, we're still kind of very early on in that process. Yeah. I know. Maybe it was a year or two ago. I just started hearing about it on NPR super regularly. Yes. Yeah. All the time. Everything. Yeah. Everything. Yeah. Something new this week, something new next week. And yes, it's very trendy, very trendy in the science world right now. So when it comes to dogs, what do we know? What don't we know? Yeah. So that's always tricky because, of course, most of the initial research on things like this is not done in dogs, right? So a lot of the research that, you know, has kind of triggered other research, I guess, has been done on rodents, like in laboratories. And in fact, a lot of the interest originally came from, there are studies involving what are called germ-free strains of mice, which basically means these are mice that have been bred and raised in such a way that they're in a sterile environment the entire time.

7:40

You know, so that they, because of course, normally with animals, you know, there are bacteria all around and inside you from the time you're a fetus, you know. And it turns out that germ-free mice have a lot of really interesting differences from, you know, mice that are not germ-free. And that some of those differences resolve once normal microbiota are kind of introduced back into their GI tract, which is super interesting. Yeah. Like some behavioral differences and like we know there are differences in the way that their immune system develops and, you know, a lot of other interesting things that, again, are not directly related to GI stuff, you wouldn't think. So it's kind of surprising. And so from there, there's, you know, been a lot of interest in looking closer at various aspects of that and other species. And of course, a lot of studies are still done on lab animals, you know, because that's kind of what's easier to study in a lot of ways. You control all the variables. Right. And it is really interesting being able to do those studies with the germ-free strains of mice because that gives you such an interesting point of comparison. And then that's not really something we can do, obviously, with humans or even very easily with dogs or other species. So as things have, you know, evolved a bit and there's been more interest in research, of course, a ton of it is in humans, you know, because that's, you know, it's easier probably to get funding for that, I'm assuming. Probably. So lots of studies in people, probably, right? And lots of studies in lab animals, fewer, much fewer in veterinary species. There are some. So that is one of the things we're going to be talking about some in the webinar is some of the recent stuff that's out there specifically in dogs, because there is some, even though it's not a ton. And, yeah, beyond that, it is sort of hard to answer, like, how much can we extrapolate some of these results in other species to dogs? Probably some of it, right? Like, we know there definitely are similarities, but also there are species differences, right, with a lot of things. So that's a little bit of a question mark in some cases, like, well, this was an interesting study finding in humans or in mice. Does that necessarily mean that it's going to hold true in dogs? Maybe, maybe not. We don't really know until we do the research. So until then, we kind of, you know, just have anecdotal sort of case reports and anecdotal reports to go on. So that is one of the challenges with veterinary medicine as a whole.

10:02

Like, so much of what we do is, you know, based on, at least initially, you know, tends to be based on research in humans. And then if we're lucky, maybe they'll do some studies with dogs. But a lot of it is extrapolated from people. And then we kind of figure out as we go what works with that and what idiosyncratic species differences there are, which is just kind of a fun and challenging thing about the field. And so, of course, the gut health stuff is no different. Right. So kind of to dig into that just a little bit more, when we're thinking about the digestive system, how do we know that canine digestive systems kind of differ from like a human one? Yeah. So there definitely are some differences. There are a lot of similarities in that, of course, dogs and humans are, you know, both mammals, both put together more or less the same way. And both omnivores, which is a biggie. You know, the digestive tract of something like a horse or a cow or a rabbit is really different from a human digestive tract. But dogs are fairly similar because they are like us and that they can eat a lot of different things and that digest them more or less the same way. I would say probably the most relevant differences would be we know that. So one interesting difference is that in humans, the digestion process starts in the mouth when you're first kind of chewing things up and the saliva is getting involved in there. And you do have digestive enzymes in your saliva that kind of start that process even before your food gets swallowed. Dogs, not so much as, you know, if you've had a Labrador, right, you know that. And partly that's because their jaws really aren't designed for that, right? Their jaws aren't designed for chewing things up super well like ours are. They, you know, they don't have flat molars as much, you know, things like we do. They're more designed to just sort of crush things and tear off pieces and swallow them. So their saliva actually doesn't really have the same digestive enzymes and things that ours do. It's more like the function of the mouth and the teeth is just to like tear off pieces of food and get it moving, you know, lubricate it a little bit. And then send it down, down the esophagus on its way. So that's kind of an interesting difference. I would say functionally, you know, probably the biggest thing that's a bit different that we all sort of know is dogs are much more tolerant of eating gross things and not getting sick from them, right, than we would be.

12:26

That's why, you know, dogs can eat like disgusting things out of the trash and poop and dead things in the woods and, you know, raw meat and things like that, that if we ate, it's likely that we would get sick. And for the most part, dogs don't. Obviously, there are some exceptions to that. They can get things like salmonella and E. coli and things, but it's not nearly as common. And, you know, that has to do with a few different things. One factor is that their stomach acid is quite a bit, I guess the best way to say it would be that it's kind of stronger, you know, more concentrated than ours is. So it does a lot better at breaking down heavy-duty things like bones and kills a lot of the bacteria and things that come in to start with. And their GI tract is shorter than ours, so the transit time is less, and we think that's a factor as well that that stuff just doesn't sit in there as long, so there's not as much time for those types of things to be absorbed. It just kind of, you know, gets processed and then goes on down the track and hopefully gets out before it has time to cause major issues. So those are some, you know, kind of little differences, but really it's surprising how much of it is the same. They do have all the same parts that do basically all the same things, which is definitely not true of all animals. Many animals have really vastly, even mammals, have really vastly different GI tracts than humans. So I would say overall there are more similarities than differences, you know, as a big picture kind of thing between dogs and people and how we digest things. So probably the most obvious thing as owners, handlers, whatever you want to call it, when it comes to canindent digestion is when it comes out the other end, right? So dogs poop. Absolutely. So not to gross anybody out, but I do want to talk about that for a second. So what's normal, maybe what's not normal, what's kind of in the, you know, take your dog to the vet as soon as possible category or, you know, kind of just keep an eye on that? I mean, yeah, yeah, no, that's a great question. So, and it's a question we obviously get a lot on a daily basis, you know, on the phone at the clinic and then, you know, seeing animals in the office and what they're presented for. Variations in poop is a very common presenting complaint in one way or another, whether it's diarrhea or it's, you know, constipation or somebody saw some blood or something like that. So when it comes to poop, in general, it can be normal for there to be some variation, right?

14:50

Like, you know, I would say normal poop would be anywhere from pretty solid little log that you can pick up without really leaving residue on the ground or the floor to maybe even something a little closer to a soft serve on some days. If it's soft serve every day, that's probably not ideal and that might, you know, deserve a little bit of investigation. But, you know, it can vary. There are actually, you know, you can get fecal scoring charts that have like photographs of each score, you know, that kind of help you if you want to give your dogs poop a number. If you're inclined to do that, it's out there. I would say the things that would make me concerned, which has some overlap with the things that people bring their dogs in for, but not completely, would be I am generally concerned if we are having like significant diarrhea for more than like two or three days at a time. That's not getting better, right? I don't necessarily panic if the dog has one blowout explosion for some reason because like who knows, right? We know what they ate or what could have happened or, and it's kind of just like us, right? Like sometimes they just get an upset stomach for 24 hours and we don't know why, but you know, it goes away and things are back to normal. So that's cool. If it goes on for multiple days and it doesn't seem to be improving, then that's definitely a reason for a vet visit. If it is accompanied by the dog feeling really crummy, like laying around, not eating, then I'm a lot more concerned about that than I am. If the dog is acting fine, otherwise bright, alert, happy, just happens to have the runs. People get very concerned. So things that people often worry about a lot that I think probably are less of a problem than they might think, which, you know, might be reassuring to know, is we do have people who get very concerned sometimes about like the frequency of their dog's poop. Like, especially if it's not happening as often as they feel like maybe it should. And there is definitely individual variation in that too. Right. So I know I personally have had dogs that, you know, are pretty regular twice a day poopers. And I've had other dogs. My previous dog, Clint, who passed away last year, was like, he would poop like once every couple of days or so, usually. And like, that was just normal for him. Like, I don't know. When he pooped, it was a lot. But, you know, like, oh, that's a big one. But, you know, that was just kind of his normal frequency.

17:14

And we do see sometimes people getting really concerned about like, oh, my goodness, my dog, you know, it's been 24 hours or, you know, it's been two days and he hasn't pooped. And we say, well, I mean, how's he acting otherwise, right? Is he eating and drinking? Is he vomiting? Is he, like, straining to go, you know, acting uncomfortable? Like, no, everything else is normal. He's eating. He's not vomiting. He's not, like, going outside and trying to poop. Then normally that's not really a big concern. You know, like, well, he'll poop when he needs to poop, you know. Don't obsess about it. But I worry if they're not eating or if they're vomiting or obviously if they're straining and acting like they are actively trying to poop and nothing's happening, then that's different. But if it's just that it hasn't happened on the time schedule that you feel like it should have, usually by itself that's not a big concern. The other thing that I think people get super worried about sometimes that certainly is good to pay attention to but often is less dire than they might think is seeing small amounts of blood in the stool. So, especially if it's, like, a normal poop that just has a little bit of, like, blood or mucus on it, sometimes that can happen. Again, if it's happening, like, with some regularity, we would probably want to check and make sure we don't have, you know, parasites or we don't have some other issue going on that might be causing that. One of the reasons that in humans that's such a big red flag is humans get colon cancer a lot, right? And that's, like, the big thing in people, like, oh, if you see blood, you know, in your stool, definitely let your doctor know that's super concerning. You'd probably need a colonoscopy and all that kind of stuff. That's not really a disease process that we see in dogs in the same way. So they don't really get colon cancer like people do. And so because of that, like, I think that's where all the concern comes from on the human side. But, you know, dogs, that's not really a thing that they get. And sometimes we will see, like, a little bit of bright red blood in the stool for whatever reason. You can get bloody stool or bloody diarrhea if something is irritating your colon, you know, your large intestine, because that's usually where that is happening. And with dogs, again, who knows, like, what they might have eaten or what might be happening in there. So sometimes it might be a little irritated. But if it's an occasional thing, again, and the dog is acting fine otherwise, it might be worth mentioning to your vet.

19:24

It might be worth, you know, taking a sample in for them to check for parasites, maybe, like, have their anal glands checked. Sometimes we can see some blood on the stool if they have an issue there. So I'm not saying it's, you know, like, oh, ignore it. It's completely fine. But usually it's not a dire emergency or anything to be super, super concerned about. If it's occasional. Kind of the same thing with diarrhea. It is not uncommon for dogs who come into us with diarrhea to sometimes have some blood in it. And I know, again, on the human side of things, that would certainly be, like, cause for huge concern. Right? Be like, oh, my gosh, this is a huge problem. In dogs, it's like, eh, yeah, that happens kind of frequently. You know, we definitely are more concerned about bloody diarrhea than diarrhea that's not bloody. And there's also a difference between, like, oh, he had diarrhea that had some little red streaks in it versus he had diarrhea that looked like it came out of a blood vessel. You know, like, that's much more concerning. If they're basically pooping Frank blood, that's, you know, that is an emergency. Yes, please bring them. I mean, please bring them for anything. But bring them sooner for that. For that. But, you know, the diarrhea that has a little bit of blood in it is a common thing that I find people get really super concerned about and bring their dogs in. And usually I can reassure them, like, hey, good news, you know, your dog's acting pretty normal. Otherwise, physical exam is pretty normal. Yeah, they have some diarrhea with some blood in it. We can treat that with medication and it's probably going to be just fine. Um, so those are, those are some of the big things I would say. But, um, yeah, in general with poop, don't get too concerned about occasional variations. Um, but yeah, if you see, you know, that your dog is straining to poop and nothing's coming out or, um, you know, if they've had diarrhea for days on end, that's not getting better. Or especially if they're acting sick, that's the big thing for me. Like, if they're acting like their normal selves, then most things you can give it a couple of days and see how it goes. Um, if they're laying around, not eating, vomiting, then bring them the sooner the better. Are there, um, other symptoms? You know, what other symptoms might we see, uh, when something isn't working properly in our dog's gut? Or what other common issues might people kind of come across?

21:35

I would say some of the things other than kind of the obvious, right, you know, the, the poop issues would be sometimes we see dogs who are kind of picky eaters, you know, and who always have been. Or sometimes that it's new, right, that they weren't before and now they are. And for me, the big thing that kind of helps me parse out whether I think that's a concern or not is the dog's body condition. So I see a lot of people who say their dogs are picky eaters and their, their dog is, um, chunky. We'll say, right, you know, their dog is a little thick through the midsection. Um, it doesn't look like if that dog missed a meal or two, it would be the worst thing in the world. And we think that, you know, with a lot of those dogs, the issue is probably that the dog's getting plenty of calories, obviously. So, you know, it's, they, they may just be full, right? Or they may just like not be eating as much in a day as the person feels like they should. Because sometimes, especially with small dogs, you know, it's kind of surprising what a small amount they actually need in a day. And people kind of feel like, oh, but that's not enough food. They should eat more. Um, so if the dog's body condition says that they are getting plenty of calories, then I tend to be not particularly concerned about a dog being a picky eater. But if I have a dog come in who is on the thin side and the owner says, yeah, he's really picky. You know, it's really hard to get him to eat. Like some days he'll eat, some days he won't. Sometimes like he'll eat a food for a week or two and then he won't eat it anymore and we have to get something else. Then I'm much more concerned that something's going on there because it's not really normal for a dog that's on the thin side to be that picky. So usually that means that there is an underlying medical problem. Um, it doesn't necessarily have to be specifically GI related. There are other things that can cause that. But certainly if you have a dog that's having chronic issues with like off and on nausea or, you know, sometimes after they eat, they, you know, their stomach hurts and they've learned that. And that kind of puts them off food in the future, that kind of thing. Um, that can definitely happen. And just like us, dogs can be nauseous, but not necessarily actually vomit. Right? So if they're vomiting, that's a big tip off. Like, oh, I bet he's nauseous. But, you know, sometimes they just kind of are feeling queasy or not great. And it's not to the point where they're actually throwing up, but it's enough to affect their behavior and their appetite.

23:52

That can be a lot harder for us to pin down because they can't tell us that. So it does make it challenging. But, um, but yeah, I would say inappetence or, you know, kind of picky eating in a dog who doesn't look like they should be a picky eater is a tip off for me that there could be a GI issue. Um, we also have people sometimes report things like their dog's stomach just making a lot of noise, you know, like more than would be typical for a normal dog or sometimes dogs that are very gassy, um, especially in breeds that maybe aren't really known for that. Right? Um, so that can be a tip off. But yeah, some of the more subtle GI things can be really hard to put your finger on because the symptoms can be so vague and they can overlap with so many other things. So that's where often our diagnostics have to come in some since we can't just ask the dogs to tell us how they're feeling. So speaking of that, um, what can we do about these types of issues? What does diagnosing that kind of stuff and treating that type of stuff kind of typically look like? Yeah, it can be tricky. So if we have obvious overt symptoms like vomiting or diarrhea or constipation, then that's, um, that's definitely helpful, right? It gives us a place to start and, and something targeted that we can do. With dogs who are having more vague symptoms, usually we tend to start, you know, if we're not finding anything obvious on our physical exam, then oftentimes we'll start with something like, uh, you know, some general blood work and some x-rays, right? Of their abdomen and their chest, just to see if anything pops out at us. And a lot of times we'll get at least something there that might point us in one direction or another. Um, we might not get a definite answer from it, but at least it's a good starting point. There are some other more specialized tests that can be done too. If, if either we don't find much on that initial testing or if we do and it's like, ah, it seems like maybe something's going on with their GI tract, but that's about all we can tell. Then things like abdominal ultrasound can sometimes be really helpful to actually evaluate like what the intestinal walls look like and what the stomach walls look like and all the other stuff. What's our liver? What's our, you know, pancreas look like? Cause you know, sometimes we can see, you know, pancreatitis type issues and things that may not have super overt symptoms. There's also some blood work that can be done that looks more specifically at some of the GI stuff. Um, but that is usually like a panel that you'd have to send off specially.

26:16

It's not stuff that would just pop up on a regular, you know, sort of the general blood work that your vet does in the office. So, but yeah, sometimes it ends up being, we have to go pretty far down the rabbit hole to find the problem. And then is it usually about changing food? Is it usually medication? Is it like, what is the kind of range there? Yeah, it, it depends a lot, of course, on what the problem is. Interestingly, a large percentage of what we call chronic, chronic enteropathies. So like basically dogs that have like chronic, um, it's usually diarrhea of some kind, but you know, some sort of chronic GI disturbance, quite a high percentage of those actually will respond to a diet change, which is interesting. Right. I'm like more than you might think. And it does depend, right? Because obviously if there's some kind of specific underlying disease process there, then like, no, probably, you know, you're going to have to find that and treat it before it's going to get better. But in cases where like, man, we're really not finding anything. Um, a lot of these guys either by switching them to, it depends a little bit on what the specifics of the symptoms are that they're having or like what other information we have. But some of these guys will do really well with a prescription GI diet, which usually means either like kind of a lowish fat, uh, very highly digestible diet. Or sometimes there are versions of GI diets that are like higher in fiber that we might use for like a dog with, you know, constipation issues or, um, issues with diarrhea that we think are originating more in the large intestine. So some of them respond really well to a diet like that. Some of them respond really well to a hypoallergenic diet, interestingly. And we think that what's happening in those cases is basically there's something in the food that the dog is eating that is triggering an inflammatory response, you know, in the GI tract. So if we can eliminate that by, you know, switching to a food that doesn't contain whatever that is, which if we're just picking different over the counter diets, we're kind of shooting in the dark because we don't know what we're trying to avoid. So the advantage of doing a prescription diet that's designed for that is those diets are basically designed so that like the proteins in them have been processed at the molecular level in such a way that the pieces are too small to trigger an inflammatory response, if that makes sense. So that's kind of how they work, like the hydrolyzed protein diets.

28:38

And so by switching to something like that, we have removed the thing that's causing the inflammatory response and then hopefully therefore the symptoms resolve. Definitely doesn't always happen, but in a surprising percentage of them, it does. So for me personally, I always give my clients, you know, kind of different options because it depends what people think is going to be the most doable for them. But if I have a dog that's got some sort of chronic GI issue and we've kind of done the basic testing, we're not turning anything up, they seem to be pretty systemically healthy. My preference is usually to try them on a diet trial first, either a GI diet or hypoallergenic diet. And if the first one doesn't work, often we'll try the other before we go down the road of medications and things, simply because if it's something that we can control with diet, right, that's always going to be preferable. Like we would always rather, you know, be able to manage it by just feeding the dog something different rather than have to, you know, add in medications on top of like whatever else is going on. So it does depend on the owner. I do have some people who are very, like it may be logistically really difficult for them to do a prescription diet in their household for whatever reason. So, you know, we don't always get to do that, but just in a vacuum from a medical standpoint, that's usually my preference. But then if that doesn't work, there are definitely, you know, medication trials we can do. And some of these guys will respond to steroids. Some of them will respond to certain types of antibiotics, things like that. So definitely lots of options. Yeah. I think most people these days kind of recognize when it comes to health issues that prevention can often be easier than treatment. Cheaper, easier, whatever you want to. Are there things we can do to prevent gut and digestive issues in our dogs? That is a really great question. I wish there was more along those lines because I don't know that we have a lot of evidence that there's anything in particular that's going to have a big influence on whether your dog develops some kind of, you know, like chronic inflammatory bowel disease situation or a food allergy or intolerance or something like that. A lot of it seems to be kind of luck of the draw. Certainly some of it is probably genetic, you know, so that does come, you know, like so many of these issues, right? A lot of it comes back to breeding, right?

30:57

I don't know that I would be super excited to get a puppy from two parents who have struggled with, you know, chronic GI issues their whole life. So that kind of thing. You know, of course there's interest in probiotics and those types of products for things like this, which is something we're going to talk about in some depth in the webinar as far as what the actual evidence is there. What does it seem like they can be useful for? What kind of things are like, well, the jury's still out on this. I don't think at this point I would say we have much in the way of evidence to say that for a healthy dog doing something like, you know, putting them on a daily probiotic necessarily makes a difference one way or the other on, you know, whether they're likely to have issues or not. Now, the exception to that would be if there's like a predictable situation coming up where it's like, oh, this dog might get diarrhea, right? So I'm thinking of things like boarding, right? Or anesthetic episodes. Some dogs get diarrhea with anesthesia, things like that. Or, yeah, so some of the studies that have been done looking at that type of situation have been done with like dogs in shelters sometimes or dogs who are in some type of kennel housing for whatever reason. Or sled dogs who apparently get exercise induced diarrhea kind of frequently when they're training really heavily or like doing a race or something. So, yeah, and in those situations, actually, it does appear that there may be some benefit to probiotics, either in kind of preventing, like making it less likely that they're going to get diarrhea in the first place, or if they do kind of reducing the severity and the duration of it. So that's kind of interesting. So, you know, that's a place where like, hey, we might be able to do something kind of preventatively if we know that the situation is going to be coming up. I know with my dogs, again, my previous dog, Clint, always, if he was going to be under anesthesia for something, always had raging diarrhea for like 24 hours afterwards. And so after we figured that out, we would pre-treat him with metronidazole, which is a medication that we use a lot as kind of a symptomatic treatment for diarrhea, depending on the situation. And for him, that worked very well. As long as we started that ahead of time, he didn't have diarrhea. So there are some things we could potentially do preventatively if there's a specific situation coming up that we know of.

33:17

But as far as like making it less likely that your dog is going to develop IBD or a food allergy or something like that, I don't know that we have any evidence to suggest that there's anything specific we can do along those lines, other than trying to, you know, breed dogs that don't have that propensity as much as we can. Good question, though. And maybe someday, right? As we said, research is ongoing with all of this. We can hope, right? Absolutely. We can hope for lots of things. So you've mentioned the webinar once or twice. So let's dig into that a little deeper. Can you talk a little more just about what you're kind of planning to cover and who might want to join us? Yeah. So the webinar that I am going to be doing is I'm definitely excited about it. We're going to be talking quite a bit about, you know, a few of these different things that we've touched on. So we're going to talk a fair amount about the gut microbiome, you know, what it is, all those little bacteria and things living in the intestinal tract, what kinds of things it does and why it's important. Because there is some stuff there that's pretty surprising as far as the things that it's involved in. We're going to talk some about how gut health impacts other body systems, which, again, is, you know, kind of along the same lines, kind of surprising where some of those relationships can be. We're going to talk a fair amount about, like, hey, what are prebiotics? What are probiotics? What's the difference? How do they work? What do we know? How do we go about, like, if you want to use something like that, choosing a good product, what does that even mean, right? And we're also going to talk a little bit about fecal analysis, which is something that's kind of new that I think a lot of people are interested in or have questions about, where basically you can send off a sample of your dog's poop and get a report back that says, like, hey, this is what's living in it. Is this normal? Is it not? You know, what levels are off? Or does it all look great? You know, how useful is that? What does it tell us? What do we do with that information? And kind of where things might be going in the future with that. Good stuff. Yeah. But any particular audience here that should definitely tune in? Yeah. You know, I would say, I think a lot of dog owners in general seem to be very interested in this. I definitely get a lot of questions about different aspects of this from clients, you know, just kind of on a daily basis at work.

35:30

I would say that anybody who's interested in kind of being proactive about, you know, what's going on in the research world with, you know, dog health, dog, you know, as it relates to the intestinal tract and what all that does in the body would probably find it really interesting. For sure, anybody who has struggled with any sort of chronic GI issue in their dog might find some interesting nuggets here. And certainly, if people have specific things they'd like to know more about, we can get into that more in the Q&A. One of the challenges with topics like this is figuring out how to kind of winnow it down into an hour. Because there's so much, right? So I had to make some choices about like, okay, we're just not really going to talk about that because we don't have time. But certain things if people, you know, who are at the webinar are like, oh, I'd like to know more about this. I'm happy to delve into that a bit more in the Q&A or try to dig up some resources that I can post on Facebook for everybody afterwards. So I think it'll be a really good talk. Most people who have dogs would probably get something interesting out of it, I think, because all of our dogs poop and all of our dogs have probably had times when their poop was not what we hoped it would be. And it's nice to have a little insight into what might be going on there when it happens. Yeah, absolutely. Any final thoughts or key points you maybe want to leave listeners with? I would say that, you know, the main thing is, of course, if you have questions about your specific dog situation, you know, always ask your veterinarian. They should be happy to kind of help point you in the right direction for what makes sense for your dog. But otherwise, yeah, you know, just kind of knowing what to watch for that might suggest there's a problem that you need to see a vet for versus what kinds of things are like, eh, dogs do that sometimes. It's good to kind of keep some perspective on. But, yeah, I'm very excited for the webinar. And hopefully we'll get to have some really good discussions related to that when it comes around. Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. Well, on that note, thank you so much for coming on the podcast, Dr. Jen. This has been excellent. Thanks very much for having me. It has been excellent. Always fun. Always. And thank you to all of our listeners for tuning in. We'll be back next week. Don't miss it. If you haven't already, subscribe to our podcast in iTunes or the podcast app of your choice to have our next episode automatically downloaded to your phone as soon as it becomes available.

37:52

Today's show is brought to you by the Fenzie Dog Sports Academy. Special thanks to Denise Fenzie for supporting this podcast. Music provided royalty-free by bensound.com. The track featured here is called Buddy. Audio editing provided by Chris Lang. Thanks again for tuning in and happy training.