Diabetes in humans and dogs
A person who has diabetes won’t be able to produce or utilize insulin efficiently. Insulin is a hormone that is needed for the glucose management. An obvious sign would be increased levels of sugar, dizziness, and thirst. Another symptom would include “sweetness in breath”. Some may find that to be a good thing but it’s no laughing matter. If the person in this condition doesn’t avail treatment immediately, the condition can lead to numerous health problems such as unconsciousness, blindness, the falling off of fingers and toes, and eventually death. Sad to say diabetes is a chronic disease, meaning it cannot be cured.
Once someone develops it, they’ll be stuck with it for the rest of their lives. Therefore maintenance will be required in order to ensure survive. Maintenance would be insulin shots, which will balance and utilize glucose. Diabetes doesn’t just occur in humans, but in dogs as well. There isn’t much difference when it happens to a pooch as compared to a human. It too can lose toes and have a slight sweet-smelling breath. Treatment of the disorder will be the same, which is usually daily insulin shots. It can be hard on your pet, and it will most definitely not like it.
You won’t like the feeling of guilt; that you could have prevented all of this from happening to your beloved dog. And I’m sure you won’t like having additional daily expenses either. It can be tough for the both of you, emotionally, physically, and financially. To prevent this from happening to your doggy, start taking control over its diet. Some commercial foods can increase sugar levels to the danger zone. Read the labels of what your buying so you’ll know what your feeding your pooch. Some foods with not enough sugar is also bad. Not enough of this can put your dog into shock.
Balance is but of the utmost importance here. If you feed your dog table scraps, now would be the best time to reconsider a new method of dog food preparation. You may try the homemade food method, where you will choose the ingredients and have total control over your pets diet. Research on how to go about this, don’t try to make something for your dog if you don’t know its daily nutritional needs. Remember that if your pooch is diabetic, it will need food preparation suited for its condition. This is different from the needs of normal dogs. Have your animal exercise daily.
This can help with its condition. Keep in mind the importance of your dogs balance diet. When (God forbid) your dog starts showing some of the symptoms stated above, sleeps longer and more often, and drinks way too much water, than your pet may have diabetes. If you are not sure if your pet has the disease or not, do not hesitate to bring it to a veterinarian for a check-up. Dealing with it in its early stages will be much easier. Do not wait for toes to start falling off or it going blind before you decide to act.