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Welcome to the official podcast of the World Small Animal Veterinary Association, where we bring you conversations with leading veterinary experts from around the globe. Each season spotlights one WSAVA committee, sharing their knowledge, research, and insights through short, accessible interviews.
Every fortnight, we speak with two experts on a shared theme, offering concise, engaging discussions designed to spark curiosity and guide you toward WSAVA’s extensive library of educational resources, webinars, and events. Hosted by WSAVA President Jim Berry, the podcast delivers focused conversations that connect you with the latest thinking in small animal medicine worldwide.
You can find more educational resources from WSAVA here: https://wsava.org/education/
Jim Berry: Welcome to the WSAVA podcast. Today's discussion tackles common diet challenges, from deciphering pet food labels to supporting owners who want to home cook. Consider this, how do we bridge the gap between complex nutritional science and the practical reality of the owner's kitchen? Our interviewer, Dr Shalom Phiri speaks first with Peter Higgins and later with Inês Carvalho. Let's listen in.
Shalom: So today we're going to focusing on pet food ingredients and what these ingredients mean on the label Let's start with the protein sources that are available in pet food. We have protein sources from animal origins and from plants.
Peter Higgins: So in terms of animal origins, they come from meats and meat byproducts, it can also include fish and fish byproducts that can be a good source of Omega-3 fatty acids. So meat, fish, egg and egg products also provide a great source of protein. In terms of plant origin, soya meals is one type of meal, they all provide protein, as well as fibre and fatty acids. Cereal proteins are other plant origin proteins This could include legumes and protein concentrates and they also provide starch and fibre as well. So let's talk about protein quality because if you look at a pet food label, it will say the percentage of protein but it doesn't often talk about the quality of protein. The quality of protein varies, for example, a chicken egg is arbitrarily given the value of 100% protein quality. It might be that a prime piece of steak could be 90%. Some cereals could be lower than that. To put this in another way, if you think about one kilogram or one pound of prime rump steak and one kilogram of leather. So they'll both weigh the same amount, but obviously the quality of the rump steak is better than the leather. Generally speaking, animal-based protein is a better quality, but you can still get good quality protein from cereals and plant-based. In some cases where they produce artificial pieces within a pet food they can be as high a quality. when we talk about protein, we talk about two things. One is the amount of protein and the quality of the protein and then, of course, the sources of the protein Protein is an important macronutrient for all animals.
Shalom: So, I've heard that fish is a really good protein source for cats. However, fish is also quite high in fat and they say it's all good fats. I want to know, are there specific protein sources that we should look out for for specific species?
Peter Higgins: Yes, there things you should be thinking about when it comes to protein sources for specific pets. A lot of this comes back to the building blocks of proteins, the amino acids. In terms of amino acids, there are essential amino acids that cannot be synthesised by the body and so they've got to be provided in the diet. We've already discussed the amount of protein, the quality of the protein. Now we're going down to the next level and looking at the amino acids can either be essential which the body can't make, or amino acids that the body can make. So, for example, cats are slightly different here. An essential amino acid for cats, for example, is taurine and taurine can cause ophthalmological problems, even blindness, if there's deficiency of taurine and that's because the cat cannot synthesise it themselves. The most common source of taurine is animal protein, particularly muscle meat. A cat's not a mini version of a dog and a dog's not a mini version of a human being. They have different requirements, Fish is a good source of fat, particularly some of the more oilier type fishes. A good source of fat and essential Omega-3 and Omega-6 fatty acids
Shalom: Every pet owner, from a layman's perspective, would know cats to be carnivores, so most pet owners would drift more towards high protein foods even though those foods neglect carbohydrates. Please talk a little bit about carbohydrates, the different types that we get and how they can be important in a pet's diet.
Peter Higgins: It's a good question because protein is certainly one of the major factors of constructing a diet for a dog or cat. Carbohydrate is also an important factor as well. For example, cereals are one source of carbohydrates and probably the most common source in many cases. That would include corn, wheat, barley, et cetera. They also provide fibre which is an important factor here. As well as cereals, root vegetables can also be used, that's another good carbohydrate source that could include sweet potatoes or even normal potatoes. Of course, when we talk about carbohydrates we have to be clear it's a good source of energy and remembering that dogs and cats eat for energy requirements. their main reason for eating is to satisfy their energy requirements. So carbohydrates is a good source of energy. The best source is fat but fat has other problems and so carbohydrates are quite good for that middle ground. Then you have digestible carbohydrate, which is mainly starch, and that often comes from plant protein and that's broken down by enzymes into absorbable carbohydrates. There's also fermentable carbohydrates which is utilised by bacteria in the gut and can be broken down into a form usable by the body. Sometimes you might hear the term prebiotic and if they're specifically used by gut bacteria, beneficial to the host. Fibre will be listed on a pet food label so you can see what the amount is. It’s an important part of constructing a diet and comes as one of our macro nutrients.
Shalom: Let's talk about fat sources, their origins, what fats are good, what fats are not?
Peter Higgins: fat is another macronutrient. The building blocks of fats are fatty acids and, like proteins, there are essential fatty acids which the body cannot produce and therefore has to be provided in the diet and obviously non-essential fatty acids. Too much fat will eventually cause an overweight animal and lead to obesity so it is a balance. Fat sources can include terrestrial animal origin and these can be obtained by rendering things like chicken, pork, beef, lamb, other sources like that. There are concentrated form of energy often used to increase palatability. Animal fat can increase palatability of diets. Animal fat particularly is a good source of arachidonic acid Going back to the sources for fat, you can also have marine sources. Fish is main one there. That can be a palatable source of energy. Plant origin is also the other place where you can get fatty acids. From plant origins, corn, sunflower, safflower, canola, they all provide a concentrated energy source rich in Omega-6 particularly. Fatty acids are the building blocks of fat. An animal does need fat as part of their normal growth. It's needed for functioning of cells, muscles, nerves, organs, production of prostaglandins and other hormones. The Omega-6 fatty acids, commonly found in corn, soya, canola, safflower. Arachidonic acid, most commonly found in animal-based sources, also egg yolks. And then lennic [Linolenic] () acid, commonly seen as flaxseed oil, lesser extent canola, soy, walnut oil. The fats that we have are readily available. The essential fatty acids, which are linoleic and linolenic in dogs. The dogs can synthesise arachidonic acid from linoleic but cats can't do that. A cat also needs arachidonic acid in their diet. The most common source of that is animal-based sources.
Shalom: What would you say constitutes quality ingredients? When we say our pets should have a quality meal, what does this look like with regards to a pet food label?
Peter Higgins: So a good quality diet for a pet needs to do two things. It needs to satisfy their nutritional requirements, but also it needs to be palatable. It's important that both of those things are covered. The other thing that's important to cover is the life stage of the animal, for example, a puppy has more requirements to an adult dog with the same weight. When we look at diets, we look at their energy requirement, That will vary according to their life stage requirements. When we look at a pet food label, we need to not only look at the ingredients that are there, but also what label says about the life stage that the animal's at. If we look at the ingredients, keep in mind ingredients are just vehicles. They provide the nutrients, for example, rice flour is an ingredient that provides carbohydrates and protein. Offal meat is an ingredient that provides protein. So that will be on the label in what is called a analysis, but could vary a little bit.
Shalom: Okay, let's zoom in on how useful is the ingredient list, assuming it has followed all the legislation and everything that they say is in the jar or in the bag is actually there, what other knowledge can we draw from paying attention to the food labels and reading them?
Peter Higgins: The labels are accurate. They do provide what's there, but it's what is not on the label that we've got to ask questions about. It is very useful to the amount of protein that's available but it doesn’t provide anything about the quality of the protein you’ve got to ask those questions as a veterinary professional or as a pet owner. You got to convert what's available to a dry matter basis because wet food has a higher moisture content compared to dry food So if we saw on the dry food label that the crude protein, for example, was 40% and the crude protein on the wet food was 10%. It might be your immediate reaction is, there's more protein in that dry food, but you've got to see what's available to the animal. So the 40% in the example in the dry food is crude protein is based on a dry matter of 90%. Remember it's 10% water. So what you're actually providing when you take out the water is around about 44% protein. That's what the animal's getting. The canned food on the other hand, is about 20% of dry matter so I'm trying to keep this to basic figures, but when the dry matter is 20%, if the crude protein is 10, the actual availability, the crude protein that's available for digestion is 50%. So you have 44% protein available on a dry matter basis in kibble and 50% available on a dry matter basis in wet food. Now those numbers will vary, but the general trend is still there. I'm just trying to get the point across that we should be looking at what's available to the animal to digest and to do that, you've gotta look at it on a dry matter basis. The reality is that in this particular example there's actually more protein available in the wet food than the dry. So that's another important point. So the two issues here that are not on labels is the quality of the protein in particular, and also the fact that you've gotta think about it from a dry matter basis as to what is actually available to the animal to use. So the ingredient list, as you've said, are accurate, but it's also what's not there that needs to be asked about as well.
Shalom: I think pet food labels are really important and I just hope that through our conversation we can still drive that type of message that it's important to look at pet food labels. It's important for the veterinarian and it's important for the pet owner. I think it's necessary to reiterate again why it's so important that we pay attention to these food labels and don't just buy something because we've heard that it's the best, but we actually read these labels.
Peter Higgins: Pet food labels are vital. They're really important to pet owners and also the veterinary profession because they will provide information. In the time I've been a veterinarian, small animal nutrition has improved markedly. the average life of dogs and cats particularly has increased quite markedly in most countries, a lot of that has to do with better nutrition and that nutrition comes back to better education about nutrition. Veterinarians in practise focusing on nutrition more than what we did in the past. And pet owners understanding nutrition more than it happened historically. But importantly, the other thing that's changed is the science behind it has increased markedly as well. The science behind small animal nutrition has moved incredibly in 30, 35 years that I've been involved with being a practising vet It's improved a lot, and that's followed through to the longevity of life and the quality of life of our dogs and cats, and therefore the pet food label is an important aspect of understanding that, because that's the first port of call. The first thing that anybody will see is that label and you need to understand what's on it, but understand what's not on it, and what other questions you might want to ask. or you're a veterinary professional and you definitely want to find out more information then you should contact that pet food company to find out more about it because the label is the very tip of the iceberg, and the science and the sourcing of the ingredients are what's under the surface.
Jim Berry: After Peter Higgins, Dr Shalom Phiri, and Inês Carvalho share practical tips for supporting disease through home cooking.
Shalom Phiri: Inês, so more and more pet owners are trying to switch over to home cooked diets. What are some of the reasons that you've seen they have for this change in practice?
Inês Carvalho: Mostly from what I've seen in practice, it comes from an emotional point where they have read or seen something online that made them feel either guilty or scared that they're not giving the best care and the best diet possible for their pet, and that they're worried that it'll impact longevity somehow, or their pet's health somehow. So that's one part of the conversation. But then we have pet owners that have pets with some sort of disease that they want to support better, or that the pets are actually not eating commercial diet, so they're looking for other possibilities to feed them.
Shalom Phiri: I think from where I come from, the main reason why people would wanna switch to home cooked diet, it's mostly because of affordability. What are some of the reasons why a veterinarian would do to prescribe a homecooked diet for a pet as opposed to a prescription diet?
Inês Carvalho: I think the three most common reasons are kidney patients that are not eating, adverse reactions to food and also comorbidities that can be conflicting in terms of dietary needs and that the vets cannot find the right commercial diet to cover for these two different diseases.
Shalom Phiri: Risks, the kidney patient, these patients tend to be very critical. What are some of the risks that you've seen?
Inês Carvalho: Most of the times when we get patients that are dealing with some sort of disease and have started home-cooked diet on their own first they're not balanced and for kidney patients, that's critical, especially the phosphorus, the calcium, the protein content, the fat content. So the B vitamins are usually very low, so we need to balance it. If people do not understand that this is not just cooking, it's a precision diet tailor made for their pet taking into consideration their specific needs, their life stage, the disease that they're dealing with. If they understand that it's a prescription and that they cannot change it without talking with their vet, then we can manage, but we should control these pets like every three months at least. If they're dealing with disease and even if they're healthy, we should do a full nutritional assessment every six months if they're on a home-cooked diet because we can then detect earlier if something is not right, if the owners are switching ingredients and not following through with the diet, or if they stopped giving the supplements because their pet is not taking them very well, or they feel like they're not very palatable and it's one of the more underrated risks of homecooked diets is that there's quite a proportion of clients that will not follow them correctly over time. So even if they're compliant in the beginning, over time a lot of them tend to either switch ingredients or start tweaking the diet, or not using the supplements or substituting the supplements for something else and then in the end, you can get a completely different nutritional profile that does not fit that animal.
Shalom Phiri: So I think that's a worry for many of vets, non-compliance from owners and how that can get messed up. It can be quite difficult. What does nutritional profiling look like in a clinic setting? So you have this patient that you prescribe the diet and they come in for their follow up. From the vet's perspective, what should we be looking for?
Inês Carvalho: It really depends on the disease that you're fighting against. Electrolyte balance in CKD patients, for example, or albumin in dogs that have chronic enteropathy. These are just some examples, but it depends on what you're encountering. I think that actually relies more on getting a thorough nutritionalist history. Read between the lines of what the client is telling you because sometimes either from shame of not being able to follow or because they don't know it's relevant, if you go around questions like, so what has been your dog eating lately? Tell me every snack that you give him after you go for walks, what you do in the morning when he's begging for food at the table? Questions like this will help you engage in a conversation where the owners feel comfortable sharing and they feel like it's not judgmental, because if they feel like they're being assessed on how well they're performing, they will more likely give you not the full picture. If you keep asking and keep curious, you will detect these little things like, oh, I didn't find rabbit's meat the other day at the butchers, so I just bought lamb instead and he has been liking it so I continued giving lamb and it's completely different, huh? In terms of nutritional profile. But if you said, so you're following the diet, they would probably say just yes, yes, because they're giving the same amount and they just switched one ingredient and they don't think that's relevant. So the way that you are a detective and try to find these things out during conversation is really important.
Shalom Phiri: For clients that tell you that they're really busy, but they do wanna try home cooked meals for their pet. What are some sustainable ways that they can carry on doing this long term?
Inês Carvalho: I think we need to be really honest in that conversation when we are talking about cost, time, and about storage space. It's different if you're home cooking for a two kilogram chihuahua or for a 30 kilogram labrador, it's completely different. The amount of food that they eat each day and the amount of food that you have to store to keep doing it long term, if it's someone that's travelling often and the pet gets to stay at a hotel or with family members, will they be able to keep that diet or not? That's really important, honest open conversation to set the expectations for the clients. More than once I've had clients rethink like, actually this does not fit into our family life actually. We cannot be cooking this amount of food and we don't have storage space for this amount of food. So I kind of try and get to a compromise situation, for example, if they stick to 90% of the caloric needs from a commercial diet, then we can leave like 10% for them to home cook. For elderly owners, usually they have a lot of time available and they treat their pets like family members, like kids, and they like to bake for them and cook for them, and also bonding activity for them to be doing. So if you leave 10% of the caloric daily needs for home cooking, they can switch. They have more freedom, they have more flexibility because it'll not interfere with the general balance of the pet's diet and again, they don't have to have so much storing space. The pet continues to have a commercial diet option so if they're staying with someone else, they can just take their food and it's easier than to manage a complete home cooked diet. So that's usually one of the things we go to.
Shalom Phiri: It's such an emerging, popular topic. You get all these people online and they have all these diets that they're sharing, and everybody want to feed their dog in that way because it's popular and it makes them feel good as owner. Do you have a lot of people who will consult with a vet before switching to homecooked diet or do a lot more people switch over because they become more of a popular thing these days?
Inês Carvalho: I think in my region, people are looking for their vets to give advice and sometimes I feel like the general practitioners do not feel comfortable referring. That is still one hurdle. They sometimes do not feel comfortable referring, but they also do not feel comfortable formulating the diet. So instead of bridging the gap between internet information scattered around and seen by owners and science, they shut down the conversation. So as general practitioners, I think we should bridge the gap. So we should try and give our clients some sort of guidance because they want their vets to talk about nutrition and to tell them how can they feed their pets best. A lot of people will, especially when they have pets that are not doing well on commercial diets, they have allergies or food related gastroenteropathies, and they have gone through multiple diets and nothing seems to work, and then all of a sudden they see something online about this magic diet that will solve all their pet's problems, and they go and they try, and sometimes the pet actually does better. Because you remove a lot of the ingredients that are causing the problems, or you go to a completely different fibre profile that actually fits that pet better. And so I think if you see your pet or your patient is doing better on a home-cooked diet, then okay, let's either refer to a board certified nutritionist or try to somehow balance it the best that we can to avoid long-term deficiencies or excesses.
Shalom Phiri: I'm sure you'd agree with me by saying that no one diet can ever fit every patient. I think even if you have a multiple pet household, you'd probably have the different pets on different diets because it's not just as simple as everybody eats the same thing, and that will be balanced for every pet.
Inês Carvalho: That's where home cooked nutrition has an advantage over commercial diets because you can tailor it to every detail of every pet's needs. You can tweak it and you can completely change the nutritional profile and adapt it to what that's specific individual needs at that moment in their life. Whereas with commercial diets, there's a limit to this. You have thousands of options in commercial diets, and sometimes that does not take into account the full picture of the individual. So home cooked diets are superior in that being tailored to specific needs. Diet needs to accompany the pet's life. If the life stage is changing, if the activity level is changing, if all of a sudden there's some disease that needs to be taken care of, or an orthopaedic problem or obesity problem, all of that goes into the nutritional assessment, and I cannot stress how important it is for every vet practitioner to perform a nutritional assessment at every visit, to be curious about what the pet is eating, how much it's eating, the treats, the table foods that they're getting because in the end, we can find the reason for some changes in their health just by looking at the diet and what they're eating throughout the day and sometimes they might even be eating toxic foods that over time will cause trouble and people don't know.
Shalom Phiri: Yeah I really appreciate this conversation because it's making me realise that animal nutrition is very important even when it comes to animal welfare. I don't know if you have any key take home messages to veterinarians who are looking to start the journey of helping their client move to Homecooked meal?
Inês Carvalho: I think take home messages are that home cooking is not inherently unsafe, but it's more complex than commercial diet and we need to take into account that diet drift can happen. So clients that are really compliant in the beginning can start switching ingredients or abandoning some supplements that can have a huge impact on the nutritional profile of the diet and make it inadequate for that pet. We need to keep engaging into the diet conversation with our clients. We cannot dismiss it. We cannot shut it down. We need to be curious, non-judgmental, and keep asking questions. That's the only way that we are going to know more about what their pet's eating and remember that there are a lot of resources online that you can reach out to. On the WSAVA Nutrition Committee, you have a nutritional toolkit where you have the body condition score charts, muscle condition, score charts, forms that will help you do a complete nutritional assessment at every visit. This is really important and you have tools like Balance It that can help you get a more complete and balanced diet, even if not perfect, but at least better than what they're doing on their own or guided only by the internet and in the end, the gold standard, you have board certified veterinary nutritionists that can help either the clients directly or the veterinarians through consulting and it's a matter of looking at the directory of the American and the European College to find out who can help you in your area.
Jim Berry: That's a wrap on season three of the WSAVA podcast. Our thanks to the nutrition committee for leading this series. We would love to hear your feedback. Please rate and review the podcast in your app and share it with a colleague. It truly helps us shape the future of the show. Stay subscribed to be the first to hear when our next season launches.
Thanks for listening.