A Natural Vet Breaks Down What Actually Works for Dog Arthritis, Longevity, and Gut Health

Your dog’s health advice no longer comes from your veterinarian alone—it comes from your social media feed.

Longevity chews. “Stem cell” drops. CBD everything. Miracle arthritis injections. PEMF mats. Laser wands. Every ad promising “10 more years” with your dog.
But how much of it is real… and how much is just marketing wrapped in hope?

In this episode, we do something rare in modern pet health conversations: we slow down, remove the hype, and look at the evidence.

To help cut through the noise, we’re joined by Dr. Sonja Friedbauer, a highly respected veterinarian known for blending natural medicine, clinical experience, and evidence-based decision making. Dr. Friedbauer returns to help pet owners understand what actually works, what’s overpromised, and where caution is warranted.

We dig into some of the most controversial and misunderstood topics in canine health today, including:

• How to spot red flags when a product claims to be “clinically proven” to reverse arthritis or extend lifespan
• What real evidence looks like in veterinary medicine—and what doesn’t qualify
• The truth about Librela: when it can be a powerful option, what’s still unknown, and how owners should monitor dogs month to month
• How Librela compares to NSAIDs, weight loss, rehab, and supplements
• If you want a natural-first approach, which supplement ingredients actually have meaningful evidence in dogs—and which ones don’t
• Omega-3 dosing that matters, how long it takes to see change, and why most owners underdose
• UC-II vs glucosamine and chondroitin—explained simply and practically
• How to avoid junk supplements by understanding sourcing, testing, and quality control

We also explore the growing obsession with dog longevity, including the buzz around rapamycin and other anti-aging candidates—what we truly know today, and what pet owners should not assume yet.

Gut health is another major focus. With probiotics, postbiotics, and microbiome testing flooding the market, we discuss what’s promising, what’s premature, and how gut and immune inflammation often show up as joint pain, skin issues, and accelerated aging.

As veterinary costs rise faster than inflation, we also tackle a difficult but necessary conversation: how pet parents and clinicians can work together to create care plans that are financially realistic and medically responsible—without sacrificing long-term health.

And for new and future dog owners, we shift gears to puppies:

• What the latest research says about puppy nutrition from 8 weeks through adolescence
• The science behind puppy food vs adult food and feeding frequency
• Why early gut health can shape lifelong wellness
• The behavioral and developmental milestones that matter more than most people realize
• How early socialization and structured learning influence confidence, resilience, and long-term behavior

This episode is for dog owners who love deeply, think critically, and want to make decisions based on clarity—not fear or marketing.

If you’ve ever felt overwhelmed by pet health trends, confused by conflicting advice, or unsure where to spend your money wisely, this conversation will change how you look at your dog’s care.

We are two sports chiropractors, seeking knowledge from some of the best resources in the world of health. From our perspective, health is more than just “Crackin Backs” but a deep dive into physical, mental, and nutritional well-being philosophies.

Join us as we talk to some of the greatest minds and discover some of the most incredible gems you can use to maintain a higher level of health. Crackin Backs Podcast

Transcript

Dr. Spencer Baron: 0:01

Your dogs need to have become some social media feed or longevity chews, or, you know, stem cell drops, CBD, everything. And you know, there's these miracle arthritis shots now and then, these PMF mats and laser wands and every ad promises 10 more years. So today we're going to do something different, something rare, what's real, what's hype, and what's actually worth your money. So based on evidence, we bring back Dr Sonia freebauer, my longtime friend and extraordinary vet that we have we refer to for everything, and she's highly respected and been doing this for about 35 years. Oh, wait, was I not supposed to say that? I look at her as more of a natural vet, maybe trained in more traditional approaches, so she can talk in a very versatile way. Welcome to the show again. Dr, Sonia,

Dr. Sonja Friedbauer: 1:03

I love to be here. It was a lot of fun last time, and I appreciate you asking me to come again. It's really nice. And the things you're bringing up are very, very familiar to me, actually, because my dog recently needed it. So yeah, I do think they work. But I think you have to pick who you use the different things for. And the mat is, can I go on with that? Or you want to ask questions first, or start your way the PMs mats,

Dr. Spencer Baron: 1:32

yeah, yeah. You can start with that. I was, you know, give you the general term about arthritis. So reversing arthritis and extending lifespan. What are you thinking about? Some of the like, some of the red flags that that, yes, the consumer might need to be more aware of.

Dr. Sonja Friedbauer: 1:48

So one of the big things is the pet suddenly can't go up the steps anymore, can't jump on the bed anymore, starts to stumble a little bit, especially in the rear legs, falling down. That's, you know, very un Well, it's abnormal. So like, if you were suddenly starting to stumble or couldn't go up the steps, you'd go see a doctor right away. But a lot of times, these things creep up slowly, so people don't really notice. Or suddenly the dog kind of doesn't like when you touch a certain spot, you know, on the back or on the hips, and they're sore and or they're limping on one leg, maybe, or people will notice they're there. They have like a hop, like a bunny hop. We call it when dogs have hip dysplasia, they they walk with the two back legs together, rather than a normal stride. And so some of those things are kind of clues, but I do think sometimes they're just more mopey. They seem to be on their own. They don't want to eat as well. That's usually when it's getting a little worse, when you know you have those kinds of things and they're in pain. So I have clients that don't like to give medication, and I don't love to give medication to my dog either. I'm one of the, you know, ones that wants to definitely stay away from whatever I can for her, but pain will kill you, you know, and you know, I don't like to see my dog just laying in the corner, not wanting to do anything or be touched, because that's how much pain. If you have a back issue with your disc, it's horrible. So I just want to tell you a little story real quick. One of my clients had a dog had been hit by a car as a puppy. She got it as a rescue, a shepherd, so one leg had to be removed. So he was a three legged dog. He had a very hard time with his other leg. Only six years old, so arthritis. So we were doing acupuncture, laser. He had been on every kind of non steroidal, anti inflammatory glucosamine, you know, she she was a good client. She did everything she could for him, and he was still not that comfortable, and she could see it. So she bought one of those mats. And I didn't realize I hadn't seen her in a while. She came in with her other dog for something, and she brought him along for the ride. And I said, Where have you guys been? You know, what are you doing? I haven't seen you in a while. She said, You wouldn't believe it. I got one of these PEMF mats, and he's been amazing. So yes, I 100% believe in that for certain animals. I don't know if it will work for everybody, but I definitely bought one for my dog. She's 11 years old. She seems to like it even when it's not turned on, she goes on there. There's nothing it can do in a damaging way. You don't feel anything. Actually, my brother in law was here. He had had some surgery on his neck, and he was still having some discomfort from it, long time ago, from a disc problem. He laid back on her mat, the PMF mat, and I said, Do you feel anything? And he said, Yeah, it doesn't hurt as much. Within five minutes,

Dr. Adria Kiloze: 4:42

I want to arrest something for a second, because my dog, he's he's approaching. I love it, and he has arthritis in his front legs and but ever since I looked up one thing on social media, now I'm bombarded with stuff. And. And it's all related to a dog, you know? And it's all AI generated where the dog can barely move and, oh, try this miracle cure. Try this miracle cure. Try this thing. Yeah, I am bombarded with, I mean, every other slide on Instagram is something to do with arthritic dogs, and it's a miracle cure, just like humans. And there's so many fake trainers out there, so many fake nutritionists. How does the consumer weed through this? The weeds and know what is right and what's not right?

Dr. Sonja Friedbauer: 5:30

It's really hard, honestly. So first of all, there are rehab veterinarians. I am not one, but I know down here in South Florida, there's at least a couple places where you can actually go to some place where they will do certain exercises to try to strengthen other muscles so that certain things don't hurt as much. So that's one thing people don't often know about, and they might be really, really well versed in whatever the specific problem is, what drugs would work better? I know I have my little arsenal, and we do use librella A little bit cautiously. Okay, so it is an injection that is supposed to be like a vaccine against arthritis. First of all, I don't love the idea of vaccines. I don't love the idea of vaccines very frequently. I think we get them as children, and then we don't get them again for many years, and some people aren't giving them to their children, and I don't see a lot of people I don't see a lot of people dying from these diseases. That used to be a very big problem, right? So there's, like, lot of controversy around that, so, but we do have it, and I have seen it be a miracle for certain dogs, and for those certain dogs, they get it every month religiously. There are some animals that have had some very severe bad reactions to it, really bad necrosis of the bone. I gave it to my dog twice as a vaccine. So in other words, I won't give it to her again unless I muscle test, which, you know, we do a little kinesiology and see if she needs it again. Right now, what she has is intervertebral disc disease. So I'm working with acupuncture, laser, the PEMF mat, and I do have to give her non steroidal, anti inflammatory. Once in a while I have had her on Gabapentin. I think it knocks her out too much. So, you know, then you have other layers of pain control, because controlling their pain is super important. I get a little sad when I have someone come in and we know the dog has an acute onset of disc problem or something like that, and the owner doesn't want to give them any meds, and I'm like, but you just have to get them over this hump so they can feel better, feel good enough to want to eat, feel good enough to want to you know, and then sometimes they're not going to get better. Sometimes, no matter what you do, all of those wonderful modalities, and if they have hip dysplasia, injectable adequan is amazing. It's been a miracle drug for, I don't know, as long as I'm out of school at least 35 years. So it's really a miracle for those dogs, for the front end and arthritis, there's a nice non steroid, anti inflammatory that does not seem to have bad side effects on the liver or kidneys. It's called galoprant, and that has helped a lot of our patients. So between that glucosamine, some laser, you know, massage is amazing. There's no end there are veterinary chiropractors. So I don't know enough about that, but I am sure, and I've actually saw Dr Joyce loescher. She's down in Davey. I saw her after hours. She kept a dog after hours, stretching that dog. Her whole body was against the dog's back, and she was just gently stretching this ancient dog, 15 year old dog. He was staying there over a week. The dog was much more flexible and everything. By the time she finished, he wasn't walking so stiff. It's pretty cool. So it has, yeah, a lot of merit, a lot of merit. So the thing is, you know, what's the person's budget? What's their time availability to be going back and forth to, you know, rehab and all these kinds of things. Acupuncture, one of our clients drives about an hour because they didn't know of an acupuncturist near them in Boynton Beach, but there's a website for the tea Institute, which is in Reddick, Florida, and they train about half the acupuncture that's in the United States. The other half go to something called ivis, so you can look on their websites and see who's near you. And so that's a pretty cool thing to know. You don't have to drive so far away. Usually you have two or three in your area. You just, they don't advertise like I don't have, I have it on my window acupuncture. But, you know, even the vets in the area don't really know that we do it, so we're not really put shouting it out there too much. But yeah, these things, it's layers, and then, you know, I don't know if you have specific questions about other specific drugs, but the injection, you know, that's the vaccine. I don't think it. Helps everybody. We've had a few people try it on their dogs. It didn't work. I definitely think it helped my dog when something was bothering her around her knees or her hips. I'm not going to give it to her for her back. It's not arthritis, it's intervertebral disc disease that she's suffering from now. So I have to do the other stuff. You know, the acupuncture, the mat, massage, laser and down the line, surgery is an option. If I can't get her better, I'm not going to let her live in pain so, and she's only 11, so I'm not going to, you know, give up on her.

Dr. Spencer Baron: 10:33

So, you know, I got, I just have to add the fact that you took care of my dog when it had a impinged nerve in the neck, and it's like Dr Terry and I treat this stuff all day long on humans. I didn't know what to do with my dog using she tested him. He had, she had paw drop, which is our version of foot drop, and that's not a good I remember checking the reflex, and, and the paw landed, you know, the wrong way. And I go, Oh, gosh. So what did she do? Dr Freeman did acupuncture, Herb, tested for herbs and things like that, and completely avoided surgery and anything like that. And, and he was perfectly she was perfectly fine after about two weeks.

Dr. Sonja Friedbauer: 11:20

I mean, she did have you, and you were probably doing massage. And I think I sent Spencer home with Dr Spencer home with some needles, and said, he'll put it here. And he did, you know, if you have people that aren't squeamish, even the veterinarians are the only ones that are supposed to do acupuncture on dogs. You know, if a client's not afraid, they can ask for a few needles and do it in between. And I forgot, I'm glad you brought up Chinese herbs. They're pretty powerful, actually pretty powerful. So you can use those in addition, or maybe instead of the Western meds. But they don't come they don't work as fast. You know, right away, it's going to take a couple weeks to kind of gradually build up in the body. But they're, they're pretty good. And I don't take my dog off of that. She's stays on it. I'm sure she would have been paralyzed without that and acupuncture and all that stuff. She was paralyzed, actually two and a half months ago, and she's been walking since, but

Dr. Spencer Baron: 12:11

we're still working on it. Side note, I do acupuncture on humans, so when she showed me, it was pretty like consistent to do it on my dog. I go, What the heck? I'll just try. It was really cool. But another anecdotal piece was I had a friend of mine call me say that her Frenchy jumped off the couch and the both legs paralyzed, yeah, back legs. She was desperate. What does she do? She brings them to the animal hospital. She's out in coral, coral right above Naples, whatever that is. And so she drove an hour as an emergency. No, no, no, I'm sorry. She went to the hospital. The hospital, they injected him with cortisone and said that was on a Friday, if dogs not not walking by Monday, we're doing spine surgery. No, lie, I go. No, no, no. Go to go. Go to Dr freebauer, so she did her acupuncture and gave the herbs and the dog within, within about a month, the dog jumped, was able to jump off the couch and run and everything was pretty phenomenal,

Dr. Sonja Friedbauer: 13:17

yeah, actually, I remember you sent that patient, and I'm glad you brought that up that that lady had the dog in a stroller, baby stroller, because the dog couldn't walk, and she did everything I asked her to do. She did a lot of work too, but yeah, that dog did make it. I have to say. You know, there's certain breeds that they are talking about making it illegal to breed, and the Frenchies are one of them. As cute as they are, as awesome as the personality and everything, but they, all of them, have a messed up back. Yeah, they have vertebrae that are malformed, and they get a lot of problems with their back. I had a lady bring two new Frenchies in yesterday because her other one had to be put to sleep. It got the back injury, but it wound up being one of those where it melted the spinal cord in both directions. And the dog, no matter what I did, you know, I saw it once. It was an excruciating pain. She went up to get an MRI, and it was thinking about surgery, and they said, We're not going to be able to help her. She's got, you know, whatever it is, some kind of Malaysia where the spinal cord was melting. So these are super, super painful, important things. And I try. I told this lady with the two new Frenchies, don't let them go up and down your stairs. Get little steps to get up and off the bed, because I'm not sure where the dog got hurt. They never saw anything. They didn't hear her cry. She just suddenly couldn't move and was in a lot of pain. So the Frenchies are one of those dogs. They have problems breathing. They have problems with their discs. They have. You know, they're beautiful, sweet dogs, but they were bred to be cute, not healthy, unfortunately.

Dr. Spencer Baron: 14:50

Can you, could you mention to the listening and viewing audience when you when we talk about NSAIDs or and I've had, I've had. Friends of mine say, Oh, I was going to give the dog a leave or, Oh, no, you know, right. So could you elaborate on what?

Dr. Sonja Friedbauer: 15:07

What is safe? The difference? You know, we really used to give dogs regular Aspirin, Tylenol, a lot of different things, but we found that some of them would get ulcers in the stomach or small intestine and bleed and maybe die from that. So it's really important, and even with the veterinary drugs, to make sure you know what directions it says on there not to overdose. The ones that we think are safe for dogs, they're safer, but they're not totally safe. And when they first came out with these non sterile anti inflammatories, probably 25 years ago or so, it was like a miracle drug. Wow, all these dogs that couldn't walk were suddenly walking, but people didn't recognize if they stop eating, you have to stop giving it. Their kidneys or their liver are probably in trouble. And so it's not like, it's not like you just give it and not think about it at all. You still think about, Okay, does the dog still need it? Could I get away with a little bit of a lower dose without having to maintain or can I go every other day, and even especially the galliprint once they're on it for a little bit, even though it's really safe, it gets to a level where, when the longer they've been on it, the less they need. I don't know why or how that works, but they might still need a little but you never want to just keep giving that initial dose that someone put them on and just keep getting the refills and and not see if they need that. You know, because it's it is damaging sometimes, and a dog's died, usually it was labs. They're more sensitive to those NSAIDs like remedil And there's a few others. I don't use any of the others, but there, there are a few others. But also, you know, the AI is pretty amazing. Anyone can look online, Is this safe for my dog? And they're going to tell you now, but those are, you know, the two we use mainly are remedil, is also known as carprofen and galoprant. And if I think it's arthritis, they're getting galoprant. If I think it's something maybe something else or general pain, the rimadil has an anti inflammatory, whereas the galopran targets just arthritis, which is pretty cool, and the labrela is like that too. It's supposed to just target arthritis, but again, I don't think they. Most dogs need it every single month. I would give it like a vaccine. They get it once. They might get a booster. And if you can find a way to find a vet or even a human person that does kinesiology and see if they're sensitive to it before you give it every time, because if they become develop an allergy to it. That's when you get these terrible reactions, which are rare, but of course, they make the news, and then there's a class action suit against the company. And that doesn't mean you throw away the drug, you know, because it does save lives, it does have value.

Dr. Spencer Baron: 17:55

Were you talking about the injection? Adequate?

Dr. Sonja Friedbauer: 17:59

Adequate? Yeah. So glucosamine, yeah, that's an injectable glucosamine. Like I said, that was like a miracle drug when it came out for all these dogs with the hip problems, mainly, that's, that's when I reach for it. It might be good for other things too. Arthritis. You can give glucosamine, the oral one, the chewable one, for any arthritis, and that's probably going to help. But the injectable glucosamine, I think is for, in my opinion, mainly, I use it if it's hip dysplasia. And I do think it's like a miracle, pretty, pretty awesome.

Dr. Spencer Baron: 18:30

I mean, as a personal testimonial, my former dog, that was a, she would have been 17 in January 2024, you know who that is, Coco. And she interesting that she started having the arthritis and all that at at 16, at 15 and 16. And you suggested the adequan, adequan, and I would do the injection, and then I would not do it for a while, and it worked well. And even the galliprint, when it started getting worse, gallop ran, yeah, yeah. And, and that was fantastic. And until, you know, at 17, now, that dog was only supposed to have a life expectancy of 910, years old, so

Dr. Sonja Friedbauer: 19:18

you have to have an owner who's a chiropractor. That's why, there you go.

Dr. Spencer Baron: 19:24

So let's talk about, we're on the roll here with supplements and different ingredients that actually have meaningful evidence and dogs and and want to go over some like ideas of doses and forms. Like, let's take omega threes, for example. What you know? What? How do you feel about omega threes?

Dr. Sonja Friedbauer: 19:41

For amazing, they're amazing for a little while. That was my what is it? My computer, you know, how you put in so and so@gmail.com mine was omega vet. Because when it when I first learned, I was like, wow. It helps the kidneys, it helps the skin, it helps the joints. Okay? So why wouldn't you have your dog on omega threes? Well, so now they have one supplement that has, well, there may be multiple, but I know of one that has the glucosamine and the Omega threes in it. It's called you move y, u, M, O, v, e, and they usually like it. It's a chewable treat. The dogs that won't eat it, they're not going to like any glucosamine treat you try to give them, so you may as well, you know, just stuff the little capsule down their throat or whatever, because, but I do, I really feel it's super amazing, yes, and all these dogs that are getting older, it wouldn't hurt. And then there's another supplement I think people should know about that is a little off the subject, because it's not about arthritis, but it's super important, and it's a supplement for the eyes, and it's like occu vite in people, but it's called oculo for the dog. You know the dog mainly. I don't even know if they have anything for the cat, but a lot of dogs get cataracts as they age. You just start to see that little haziness in the eyes, and then later, if it becomes a mature cataract, you can go to the ophthalmologist and have it removed for three grand per eye, and then, yeah, and then you're going to do drops for the rest of their life. And I just think if people knew about it, because if you send them to the ophthalmologist for any other problem, and they have that thickening of the lens that's starting, they put them on that, it slows it down, so it comes like, in two treats and capsules, and, you know,

Dr. Spencer Baron: 21:25

start like the Omega threes. And when would you start the

Dr. Sonja Friedbauer: 21:30

OCU glow for the animals, OC for humans? That's okay, same thing, though. It's got, you know, lutein and vitamin A. So I think that, you know, it can't hurt them to start them on glucosamine when you think they're a senior, age seven. I wouldn't do it as a puppy, but they're gonna have some arthritis. It's kind of normal. You know, joints kind of wear out over time. If you feel like they're perfectly great, you don't want to put them on any supplements, fine, but I wouldn't put them on the eye supplement unless I started to notice that cloudiness, there's no harm. It's a vitamin. It's just a bit expensive for if you don't need it yet. So like, my dog's got a little bit of cloudiness, I bought her the capsules. They're huge. There's no way I'm getting those down her throat, so I'm going to give them away. And I think I tried the two one before, and she won't eat it, so I have to find a way to hide it in something, because I definitely don't want her to have cataract surgery later. So, yeah, I'm in the same boat as everyone else. I you know, I don't want my dog to hate me. I don't want to have to do things to her all the time. But, you know, I also don't want to have eye surgery. That's no fun. That's so smart, yeah.

Dr. Spencer Baron: 22:41

So like, like, Dr Terry mentioned earlier that we get, you know, even as professionals that deal with healthcare, we get hit up with more stuff. If you, you know, queue up in Google or something a supplement, then all of a sudden, you get tagged everywhere. So how do owners avoid, you know, junk supplements. How do you know? Yeah, how do you know what's what?

Dr. Sonja Friedbauer: 23:07

Right, what's okay? I'll tell you. I have people that will bring me bags of what they're giving their dog. They've got something for the skin and something for the eyes and something for this and something for the teeth. And I think that teeth are really important not to neglect like some kind of two treat every day, every day. People are, oh yeah, my groomer does the teeth every six weeks. Little dogs, especially, you know, big dogs, they're going to have pretty good teeth most of the time. But you know, the little dogs, they really do need something, unless you're going to do a little gauze wipe on their teeth every day with water every day, not once every six weeks, you're going to be paying me $500 to$1,000 to clean the teeth and extract the bad ones, and I don't want to do that to the dog. So, you know, I think it's, you know, I might have gotten off topic a little, but I think asking the vet is a good idea if you trust your veterinarian, and most of us are happy to get on the phone or send you an email. You know, Hey, should I use this product? And I get that all the time. But, you know, some people are bringing me so much stuff, and actually some of the time it's the cause of their dog's problems, their ear infections or skin infections. They're giving them so many things they're allergic to they're full of stuff that I don't know why these companies are putting it in there. What's in there? And, you know, I don't know if everyone's familiar or not, but they don't have to list everything on the label that they put in these products, even our food. The FDA is a little loose about that, so we don't always know what we're eating. So I wouldn't just put them on all kinds of stuff. You see, they need something for the teeth. If they have a problem, they need something for that. If you want to try to prevent things, you know, protect them from injury. I can't tell you how many people they'll come to the office and their dog's not on a leash. We're in a busy city. See there's cars going and they're like, oh, he just follows me. And I'm like, Yeah, well, until something's there that he wants to chase or somebody goes too fast when you're walking across and he's three feet behind you, I see people do that with their children too. They're like, walking ahead of their kid and the kids behind them. And I'm like, Oh, my God, you know? Like, yeah, so I don't know. It's a little common sense, maybe, but a little also, why? Why I, you know, I had to take care of a dog that got hit by a car because the guy was like, that, Oh, my dog never needed a leash. And then one day, the dog ran in front of the car, and so I don't get that. And my brother's one of those people, every time he comes to the office with his three little chihuahuas, they're off the leash. And I'm like, Joe, like you're trying to give me a headache this day. I can't. I don't know what to say to him.

Dr. Spencer Baron: 25:47

Hey, I gotta. Oh, sorry, Terry. I just on the same subject. I just wanted to ask Dr freebauer, but we were talking about supplements, but dog shampoos. There's 10,000 different dog shampoos. Yeah. Now, how do you pick the right shampoo? We're talking about supplements. But what about on the outside in?

Dr. Sonja Friedbauer: 26:09

Yeah, outside in so. So recently, I saw Dr Spencer's new puppy, and he had a little mic that happens in puppies sometimes. And one of the treatments that we've learned for whatever 100 years is you want to flush the hair follicles, so you use a benzoyl peroxide shampoo, which sounds weird, right? The Acne stuff that we used as teenagers, and it, and it can really decrease the mites. And I don't know exactly why, but I guess they like the sebum and the, you know, oils, and so you're basically getting rid of that, and you're sterilizing the skin a little bit, so you're reducing the bacteria that contributes to the whole thing, you know, the whole problem. So I am not a Decra is a really good company. I not. I'm not trying to advertise for one company. But if you're getting prescription products, they have some good products out there you can get like, you know, on the online pharmacies, and it depends what the problem is, you know, if they have dry skin, you know, you might want something with omega threes, internally and externally, flaky skin. You know, got to be careful you don't have external parasites, like fleas. So you could give them all the supplements you want and nice shampoos you want, and if they've got fleas, they're going to have bad skin. Food Allergy will cause, you know, bad skin. So sometimes the shampoo isn't going to matter if you don't address the cause. But I think you got to find, you know, if there's no problem, you can use an oatmeal shampoo, pretty much any kind, and you just want something that smells nice, you know, easy.

Dr. Adria Kiloze: 27:47

On that same note, I have, well, you know, I'm biased. I have the best dog breed on the planet. I have a golden retrievers and and gold retriever they get a lot of allergies, and they get a lot of bumps on their skin, and we'll wash them, and sometimes the shampoos will make it worse and we change another shampoo. What about the Dawson get these allergy bumps, or a lot of the skin issues? Would you recommend for that?

Dr. Sonja Friedbauer: 28:12

Yeah, so, okay, it's really hard to figure out sometimes what is causing that. But one very easy thing that anyone can do, okay, is, you know, I do nambuja pod Allergy Elimination Technique on my patients a lot for their allergies. We do kinesiology to figure out, what are they allergic to? Is it fabric? Is it wood? Is it the floor cleaner they're using? Is it the grass, whatever. But you can just very easily, basically take four fingers, and if this is the dog's back, tap down the back, very close together. Many, many times, okay, two fingers on each side of the spine. Many times like that. Like 35 times, wherever your dog is, okay, do it when you're outside. Do it every day. Do it when you're inside your house, whatever's in the environment that is bothering your dog. If it's environmental, you're going to be stopping the reaction. So that's an N, A, E T. It would be really nice if you knew what the thing was, because you had a vet that did na e t in your area, and a lot of human practitioners will treat animals because they know there's not any vets that do it, really, very few So, but you know, that's the technique. Once you figure it out, you tap on the back many, many times, from the shoulder area to the hips. They love it. It's a bonding okay, if they have a back problem, they might not love it, but most dogs are going to like it. And then you don't worry about what was it? And I don't tell my clients to do that, because in my office, I try to figure out, because maybe they could get rid of it, is it your candles, your diffusers, your plugins, your Febreze, your Fabuloso, your, you know, floor cleaner for your wood, get rid of all that crap and see if the bumps go away. Then you could add back one at a time, and if. The bumps come back. You figured it out. You don't need me. But if they come and they bring all their perfumes and all their cleaners, and I ask, what kind of flooring Do you have? And I'll have them bring some of the fibers from the dog's bed and laundry soap, but you can get the free and clear laundry soap. You can get dust mite covers on your bed and their bed, and then put a blanket over the top of that that you wash. If dust mites are a factor, the bed is the worst. You know thing for that, there's so much you can do, and I'm not saying you're going to do that twice. No, if it's a dust mite allergy, you're going to treat them for a whole year, every single day for a whole year, and your dog's going to gradually, gradually get better. And you're not going to know what caused it. Who cares? But, yeah, I'm sorry,

Dr. Spencer Baron: 30:43

no, I was gonna say that people might relate to the fact that when I brought the my my puppy in my Doberman, he was six weeks old, and you, you determined that there were mites. These were not a threat to humans, but you had mites and these bumps all over and itching and stuff like that. And you did. You knew that I didn't want to do the antibiotic route, so you suggested the antibiotic ointment and shampoo ointment every day at the top of the head, in hot areas, and then also the shampoo twice, the medicated twice a week. It took three weeks and you would never know that he had the problem. Your rare system got strong.

Dr. Adria Kiloze: 31:40

Oh, we all know that,

Dr. Sonja Friedbauer: 31:43

yes, because you're rare, not that the puppy is it wouldn't another dog wouldn't do the same thing. But people are scared. They see this rash and bald spots and they're itchy, and they're like, Oh, my dog looks like this right now. Yes, give me those antibiotics right this second, and give me everything you can. And Spencer's like, Nah, I don't want to do that. I'll, I'm patient. I'll take whatever topical you give me and the shampoo, and I will work on it. And we agreed that if it's not getting better, we'll, we'll do the antibiotics. There's no rush. It's not going to hopefully turn into something terrible, you know? And, yeah, that was the Demodex. Might, might. Those are common in puppies. They're common in that breed. You know, for some reason that genetically and they, you know, they can make the dog look terrible, and they and pretty uncomfortable. He was itchy. Yeah, that Spencer took care of him without doing that. And I'm proud of you, because not everyone has that patience, you know, and and I

Dr. Spencer Baron: 32:41

almost caved, though. I almost got so close to calling I go, all right, just send a prescription for Android. All of a sudden it started clear up. But the reason why I asked about the shampoo is because it, it's, it's drying out his skin. I'm not using it anymore, but it's

Dr. Sonja Friedbauer: 32:57

about something. He doesn't need it anymore. He only needed it while you were flushing out his hair follicles, and now you can give it away. Sorry about that.

Dr. Adria Kiloze: 33:08

I kind of get want to get back to get some really good information of how to get how to filter out the good and the bad on social media. And the example I want to use is all these people talk about how to become a millionaire, and they show them in front of a jet. And a friend of mine owns a jet. He says, If you ever see the guy in front of a set of stairs, but you never see the tail number or inside a jet, he doesn't own it, wow. So he goes, I get called every day to rent my jet for photos, for for influence and the and the way we know it's if it's an influencer versus they own the jet, is, if you're in the jet, they own it. If they see a tail number, they own it. If you don't, it's it's fake. So then we see this. We've talked to trainers, and you see his trainers advising these exercises that, as doctors, we know if you do that, you're going to get hurt. In fact, we see patients. I did this exercise and I killed myself. I have a 75 year old man that wants to do squats on a slant board, and he's never done squats before, and he wonder why it blew out his knee. So how, as a vet, when you see these commercials, is there anything tips you can give the consumer of what's what to pay attention to and that what not to pay attention to?

Dr. Sonja Friedbauer: 34:29

Yeah, this is very hard, honestly, because, I mean, first of all, I don't watch TV. I'm gonna just say it. I if my husband's watching a hockey game, I have to watch with him sometimes, or rarely, we watch reruns of the honeymooners or something.

Dr. Adria Kiloze: 34:43

But I think it's worse on social media. TV is least, you have some regulations, but social media, especially Instagram and Tiktok, there is none.

Dr. Sonja Friedbauer: 34:51

I'm sorry that people, people are so addicted to all that stuff and believe too much. You know, gullibility is still, unfortunately. You know, if they said it, that must be right, right? Well, it's not. And I wish I could tell you how to weed stuff out, but I would say ask your vet. If you see something online and it looks like maybe it's going to work for your dog, call your vet. They're going to try to give you better advice. Don't just spend, waste all your money. I have people, they'll come in with the 80 products they bought online, but they don't have $50 for a treatment for their dog. And I'm like, you guys, man, you're you're doing this all wrong. Get advice from the professionals. I'm not. You don't even have to go to the vet most of the time. Their receptionist can ask the vet a question, hey, is this a good product? And we try to look i I'll tell people, I'll look it up. And, you know, I have clients all the time, is this a good food? Is this a good that? And I'll try to look it up. I can't know about everything, but we, you know, we try to help. You don't always have to see the patient to answer those questions. So people feel like they can't ask questions. But that's why we're there. There are days when we're not swamped, and we can answer the question, it might take a couple days to get back, but, you know,

Dr. Adria Kiloze: 36:06

yeah, I want to change topics a little bit to another hot topic is on the internet, besides supplements and all that, and longevity every we all want our dogs to live longer. And one of the hot topics I've been following for about three or four years, and it was even written in a book by a very famous longevity doctor who's been on TV, and he researched rapamycin and and he went to where rapamycin was came, how they found it, and talking about such, it's a great drug for humans, and now you're starting to see it in animals. What do you know anything about that?

Dr. Sonja Friedbauer: 36:39

So I'm thinking, and I could be a little wrong, that that is a drug recently that they're thinking of using for cats with cardiomyopathy. And so cats with cardiomyopathy, certain types of heart disease, didn't have a very good outlook in the past, and that, I believe, is the one drug that recently is possibly going to be helpful. So if it's the one I'm thinking, and I'm pretty sure that is, that's the only thing I know of right now, like a definite reason for it that might be up and coming. And like I had a couple of patients that have these thickened heart muscles or cats, and I called the cardiologist and said, Why aren't you trying this drug now, since it's out and but I guess it's like on a limited, you know, license to use it, and they're kind of scared. But if I had a cat with that disease, I would be trying it, so I don't know about using it randomly for everybody to prevent aging that at least for that one thing. I do think it's got, if I'm thinking of the right drug, I'm pretty sure that's it. It might have good potential for that, and that's so important. If I had a cat with that disease, I'd say the cardiologist, I want to try it. They can give it, but they're kind of holding back because they want to see what's happening with the other cats before they go for it, but it seems it reverses the disease. That's incredible.

Dr. Adria Kiloze: 38:10

Yeah, another thing that you know Spencer and I talked about is gut health, right? And we know gut talks to the brain, and we know gut can control the immune system, and we know that gut can cause skin stuff and all that kind of stuff, and we're seeing this surge on, you know, gut health. And I even had a patient that said they're using ivermectin for their dog for gut health, you know, so, so because it worked for them. And I'm like, okay, the dog is not human. So let's back off a little bit about that, but where are some of the your tips for the patient to have the dog or their pet have their gut health, healthy.

Dr. Sonja Friedbauer: 38:49

So okay, so first of all, let me touch on ivermectin. Ivermectin has been used for years for heartworm prevention in dogs, and so people have been giving it monthly, yeah, and for horses, for parasite control, it does kill hookworms and roundworms, and so it's a beautiful drug for a lot of things. And then you have some alternative vets now that are giving ivermectin and thin bendazole, which is a different kind of dewormer for cancer patients, because they seem to feel there's some evidence that it helps slow cancers down. Now I'm not yet doing that, although I have, because I've had people ask for it that knew a little about it already. And I said, I have no problem prescribing it. I don't see any downfall to it. And I think one of the persons was pretty knowledgeable. They're actually the people that are the makers of yummy combs, which is a chew treat for the teeth, like honeycomb, but it's yummy comb. But anyway, they the lady came in, her dog had cancer. They had been already giving fenbendazole for quite a while. And people who asked me about that, I think they're pretty smart, and they know something I don't know. Honestly, but all the holistic vets, because I'm on a little chat thing with some of them now, because of some other things I'm using, which I would like to tell you guys about, they're putting their cancer patients on these dewormers. They're basically dewormers. So I don't, I don't have any issue, but for gut health, the only thing I can think of is they're deworming them. And if you gave a heartworm medicine every month, like, heart guard is ivermectin, and most people are familiar with that one, and that's one of the older ones, and it doesn't protect them from tapeworms or whipworms. So some of us, like, went to other things that are like an all in one that also do fleas and ticks. And again, like, I don't give these things to my dog right now, if I feel she needs something because she's having a gut problem, I'll give her a dewormer, you know? I'll check her stool see if she's got worms. I'll check her for heartworm twice a year, and if she has it, I'm going to be one of those unfortunate people that has to treat her for heartworm. But she's so sensitive all these things, I can barely get her to take anything, and she doesn't do well on a lot of drugs. So I feel like people have to do what they think is best. If they live in a tick infested area and there's a lot of Lyme disease, please put them on tick prevention. You know, we have some ticks in South Florida, but my neighbors must spray the heck out of their yards, because, knock on wood, I've never seen a tick on my dog. I rarely see fleas. We don't spray our yard. I don't need to everyone else put a barrier around me, and I feel bad because they're polluting the whole environment, you know, but I don't do it. I stopped exterminator a long time ago. My husband had him coming for ants. I said, why? The ants aren't bothering me? I don't just leave him alone. So, I mean, it's poison, and then she's gonna walk out there in that, you know? So I some people, I feel bad because, like, I went to visit my sister and her husband uses Roundup. He's got a big piece of property for the fleas and ticks. He's got a dog. And I said, That's really bad stuff, you know. And he goes, Well, what am I going to do? Then I said, Just give your dog a little prevention. If you need to do something, you don't have to poison the whole environment. Like they have deer there and everything. You know, where they live, it's in Georgia, and they're just killing everything, you know. So I don't know. I'm a little against broad scale poison, you know, just, let's just kill everything, because we don't want a tick. Well, okay, I don't want ticks on your dog either. So protect your dog. If you've got to get a terrestrial collar, give them the monthly, you know, tick stuff. Take it off when they come in, when they're sleeping. They don't need it at night, but when they go out in the woods, yeah, put it on. I don't want them to get those diseases, you know. So anyway, I'm sorry. I don't know if that answered you.

Dr. Adria Kiloze: 42:47

Yeah, it did. Thank you. Okay,

Dr. Spencer Baron: 42:50

so while you were answering, I want to commend you on knowing what you know, because I looked up rapamycin and cats, and it's known as sirolimus. Sirolimus, it's used in veterinary medicine to manage hypertrophic cardiomyopathy in cats. It is additionally approved for the cats with subclinical hypertrophic cardiomyopathy showing potential to reduce heart wall thickness and improve heart health. Good job, doctor.

Dr. Sonja Friedbauer: 43:20

Thank you. So I want to, can I touch on that a little bit further, because it's a really important topic. People buy rag dolls and Siberian cats and all these beautiful big cats, okay, Maine Coons, almost all of them. The males are going to get cardiomyopathy, almost all of them. So there's a little blood test of that can do called a cardio Pro, BNP, and that'll tell you if there's changes happening, they should get it every year. They should get an echo when they're two, because what happens with these cats? They just drop dead. The owners come home. There was no warning. Yeah, they just dropped dead. And if you can figure it out first. And so I have one new client. They have, I believe they're ragdolls. I can't remember if they're Siberians or ragdolls, but anyway, they had one that that happened to they were completely devastated, in shock. Never even knew about it. The vet didn't really know to tell them about it. And they got two new kittens, and they did the pro BNP, and it's perfectly fine. Six months of age, and they're like, Okay, we're done. I said, Nope. Every year you're going to check that, because it doesn't necessarily happen as a baby, but by two, they're dying from it sometimes. So that's that's pretty significant, you know. And other breeds get it too, but all these big purebred cats are genetically prone to it. So whoever your audience is, if they have purebred cats that are big, they should get it checked, and then they might want to try that the rapid mice. And I definitely would do it if it supposedly reverses it. It's crazy. Absolutely, that's a fatal condition. You know, in cats. So I'm just blown away by that, that what, how medicine has changed since I got out of school, yeah, and what they can do now that they couldn't do before. We live in a really wonderful time for, I think, for animals, you know, I think better than it was anyway.

Unknown: 45:17

Great. Yeah, I remember

Dr. Spencer Baron: 45:20

40 years ago, there was a book that came out. Was the only book of its types, called Sea Spot Run of all the remember, and, and it went on to talk about the history of dog food. And, yeah, I was fascinated by, you know, dog food is has made this, you know, evolutionary change, into something so much more healthy. But on that same note, there's a phenomenon going on now where these uh, big investor companies are buying up veterinarians, uh, veterinarian clinics. And I would really like to discuss that, because it was just recently pointed out to me on a podcast that Tucker Carlson did with a person that was really exposing what's going on and how not You of all people, not you, but how sinister this whole veterinary approach has become, the costs are rising faster than inflation, and a lot of owners are hesitating to seek care for their animals. And you know, how can you do that? You know, but this is what's happening. And they the investors are looking at how it's a cash based business, and it's very emotionally charged, because anybody will do anything for their dog or cat or pet, for that matter. So what is, how do you how do you see you're

Dr. Adria Kiloze: 46:54

leather? Answer the question, different.

Dr. Sonja Friedbauer: 46:59

I appreciate the question, and I'll try to try to answer as honestly and non, you know, I don't know judgmentally as I can, but it is a huge problem in our industry that these large corporations come and when we're all aging out, which my husband and I are now in our, you know, Coming close to mid 60s, and they're, we're getting approached by companies, and they're looking the big ones are looking for people who gross over 2 million a year. We're not there yet, but the there are smaller ones that'll purchase you, if you're grossing a million a year, whatever, and they'll offer you a pretty nice deal. You have to stay on a few years. But what they do, they come in and they totally change your price fee. They change the labs you use. They change, you know, they'll fire people and make you work short staffed, is what I've heard from other places, so that they make more profit. It's really disgusting, honestly. So we know, like there was a big, beautiful hospital near us that had like 35 doctors, great internist surgeons, and we refer to them all the time. They're three blocks away. And if I've got a case that we can't manage or it needs all night care, 24 hour care, I send it over there. And actually, they got bought by corporate, and it was the saddest thing all, their doctors jumped ship. They left. Most of their staff left. They didn't want to be managed by a corporation, because people come in that don't really know that business, and they tell you what to do. And you know your clients. You know my husband. I have been almost 25 years in our practice, and we've watched people go through two sets of pets, you know, they aged out, and then they got their second set, and they're, I've watched my clients pass away, you know, we, we know they're like our family. And so just to have someone come in and say, now you're going to do this, and you're going to do that, and you're not going to be able to buy those three eye antibiotics, and before anymore, we like this one, you're going to use our lab, and actually that's a huge monopoly. VCA is one of those corporations. I'm not trying to talk bad about them, but they own the major lab in the United States that we use. They own the major pet food companies. They own. They own chewy. I believe VCA owns chewy. I'm not positive. I believe so. So now Chewie used to be privately owned by two guys that started it, and it was an amazing company. My my niece worked for them. They were amazing. And then they sold to somebody. I don't know if it was right away, VCA or whoever, but then they sold again. They sold again. So I don't know if it is VCA, but I think it is, and it's changed a lot, and it's not bad, it it's useful. It's great not to have to carry every single product in the world. It's great that people can get discounts. But what people don't realize they get the discount on something and then they buy the five other things, and they're spending more money, even though, you know they're they're paying less on the one, one thing they called for. That's the same thing. I go grocery shopping, so I think you asked me a different question, and I got off track. So about these, these corporations, when I want to sell my practice, it's going to be very sad. We had one individual come who was very interested, but he's offering us ridiculously low price, at least, if he was fair, we would have said, Sure, buy in and, you know, start getting people familiar. And, you know, eventually, when we age out, it's yours. But he wanted to low ball, and the corporations want you to stay on three years, but they're going to offer triple what an individual can afford to pay you. So unfortunately, it's the way it goes, because you want to retire and you want to be able to live now, as far as what veterinarians have to charge clients right now, I have to tell you, so you're supposed to keep your labor percentage at 20% so this is all about business right now, but I need to pay my employees enough to survive a livable working wage. It's very hard to do. So my prices have to go up a little so I can afford to pay them, pay the rent, pay the insurance costs, pay people have no idea what it costs to run a hospital. Most veterinarians are making 10% profit corporations when they take over, I'm sure they're doing better than that, because they know how to run a business, and they are going to jack it up if I do, if I have a cat that's blocked, can't pee, urinary block, obstruction, they're going to walk away probably with a $1,500 bill. But I'm going to be doing a lot of work on that cat and spending a lot of time. And if they go over to one of these 24 hour places, they're going to spend 5000 so it's a lot more money. But even what I charge is sort of hard for people sometimes, sometimes I wind up saying, okay, then what can you afford? I'll help you this time, you know. And your heart breaks because sometimes these are young cats. They had no idea about the disease at all, and all of a sudden they can't pee. So, you know, but it is. It's expensive to run an animal hospital, very expensive, and people don't realize sometimes, you know, they see only our front area with the little three exam rooms and the waiting area, but the place goes way back. You know, you have to have a lot of different sections to work on them, in the back, doing their teeth and doing surgery and whatever else they need. And anyway, people don't realize, you know, there's special lights, there's special monitors. There's, you know, paying for this radiologist to read our films. There's, you know, two texts with lead vests and gloves or sedation. And nobody wants to sedate their pets. So to get an x ray, and they're like, why is it so much money? Well, I don't know everything. Okay, I can look at an x ray. If there's an obvious fracture of a bone, I'll see it, but I might miss something. So I want to pay the radiologist's fee to look at your pet X rays, and I got to pay the two techs that held them and all the equipment that's going to get destroyed while we're trying to handle the cat that's trying to kill us, you know? And then, you know, that happens too. That happens too. We are in a kind of high risk job for injuries. I can't tell you how many techs have problems with their backs. I don't know if it's from being on the feet all day or from lifting dogs or whatever, bending all the time. But it's, it's a, you know, shouldn't they get something good out of it? Shouldn't they be able to live nicely and not, you know, be making minimum wage so we have to charge more. And I feel sad about it. I do. I wish I could do everything free. And we had this barter system in this country where, okay, I'll take care of your pet, give me some eggs, you know, whatever. It would be awesome, but we wouldn't be able to pay our light bill that way. You know. Well, I think

Dr. Spencer Baron: 53:52

the big concern is going to those companies that were those veterinarians, Corporation owned by venture capitalists, you know, company and that have been become very mechanized and pricey, and that's happening in the chiropractic world and definitely the medical world. So, yeah, we're not, we're not far into that. You know, what was interesting is a patient of mine told me that they did end up going to one of their vets that got bought out by a big company, and the new doctor, the new vet, was want to do all this elaborate testing and all this this surgery on whatever the ailment was. And she was smart enough to turn to the vet and go, You know what? Just, just go ahead and euthanize them. Oh, yeah, wait, wait, wait, she bluffed. You know what? They said they go. Well, there is an alternative approach, and suddenly the bill got

Unknown: 54:44

that much smaller. Yeah, so, yeah, no, totally. I was fascinated by that.

Dr. Adria Kiloze: 54:50

Yeah. Why would they? Why would they? So she said, euthanize them. And they all said that they came up with something different.

Dr. Spencer Baron: 54:58

Yep, totally. Because, and she deliberately bluffed because she knew that that that this was a sales interest it was selling.

Dr. Sonja Friedbauer: 55:12

So let me tell you something, what they what they teach us, okay, to cover your butts. You're supposed to offer this quality medicine. That means that if an MRI would be better for a spinal injury, you know, and every once in a while they need one, every once in a while, you better offer that, because if you didn't and the dog becomes paralyzed and you didn't say, hey, there's a neurologist down the street, it's going to cost you four grand for an MRI, but that's available if you don't tell them you're in trouble. And if you don't offer the best, okay, so your cat can't urinate, it would be nice to have an x ray. I'd like to see if there's a stone in there. Okay, but it we don't have to jump to that today. Let me do a sample. Let's see. You know, if he produces crystals, we can try a diet. We can try some medication for his discomfort. We can do this, but if he comes to a point where he can't urinate, I'm going to want blood work, and I'm going to want, you know, urine culture. I'm going to want an x ray, then it's very valid, because people tie your hands, you can't give them an answer, and you can't do the right medicine. It's kind of frustrating, because in human medicine, everybody's got health insurance, and in veteran name, almost Okay, the people who can't afford it, that's very sad. But you go to the doctor and you know it's going to be covered, and you pay your monthly bill and a little copay, and you're good. And you went for the, you know, to the hospital, and they charge you$25,000 for a pill, and it's okay, the insurance will cover it. It's really not okay. But this is what goes on with humans, but with animals, there's a lot of good health insurance options now, if people could afford it, I strongly recommend it, because one dog with a paralyzed back, they could do surgery and fix it. If you don't want to do the acupuncture and take the time and kind of go slow, they might get it done quicker. Okay? And maybe that's what some people need, because they don't have the time to go back and forth or whatever, but you're going to spend $13,000 the MRI is 4000 there's surgery, there's, you know, extra care, whatever drugs, IV catheter monitoring, pre op, blood work, you know, whatever follow ups. You're going to spend $13,000 and if you're not going to have that sitting in your bank. You should get insurance. You're going to pay 100 200 a month, but you got a pet. People don't realize it's a luxury, a big luxury, and I feel bad about that. We had all kinds of pets when I was growing up. We were pretty poor. When my our dog had something wrong, we went to the vet, and he took one look at us and said, um, no charge, because my mom was there with four kids, and you could tell she's not wearing diamonds, you know. So the guy was so nice, I mean, but most vets can't do that. They're working for somebody else who makes the rules.

Dr. Spencer Baron: 57:53

Speaking of insurance, and I hope you don't mind me mentioning but there's so many more insurance companies out there for pets that it's hard to pick and choose. You were kind enough to give me a list and mark off the good ones, because I wouldn't have known, yeah, you know. And there was actually one that out of like 10 of them, or 15 of them, that actually was worthy, nice, good.

Dr. Sonja Friedbauer: 58:20

So, so you know, those things, like, they kind of depend, like, they're going to charge more for certain breeds. If you have a Frenchie, you're paying more money because they know there's going to be a back problem at some point, and there's going to be an MRI most of the time, or there's going to be breathing problem, whatever. And if you have a main Coon, they're going to charge you more, you know, because they know there's going to be heart issues, and they're going to be seeing the cardiologist. So they do that for sure. I don't know what that's called, but I guess they probably do it in human medicine too. They have these underwriters that determine if your risk, you know, whatever, is worth having you your money. And then, yeah, there's a couple of companies, my clients actually told us they had not gotten paid by certain companies. They were with them. They were paying good money for that insurance. And when it when they needed them, they weren't there. So they told us which ones were good. And so I wish I could remember them all right now, because usually my receptionists are good about that. Spencer might have it. I don't want to. I don't want to. I don't want to give you the wrong information. I but some are better for certain pets than others, and some are better for certain owners. You know, if you want to have, like, a big deductible, but then they're going to cover the rest. That's, you know, maybe that's going to be the least expensive insurance. And you might pay$1,000 for a $10,000 deal. I think that's good, you know. Yeah, so,

Dr. Spencer Baron: 59:40

so I was, I'll pull up that information in just a second while you're answering one of the last questions that we have, and that is, and I know this varies from breed to breed, but let's take you know, puppies to adolescent dogs and new feeding and. Nutrition. You shared something with me that was that blew me away, because I was originally told to feed my

Unknown: 1:00:09

Doberman, you know, two,

Dr. Spencer Baron: 1:00:11

one to two cups, twice a day. And then I looked it up, and that was obviously he was eating things out in the street. And I go, No, no, you know. And then I looked it up. And even that was not enough. It was like one to two cups, three to four times. And then you shared with me three to four cups, three to four times a day. And man, he eats, he's he's almost 40 pounds. I got him like 1010, he was little. Yeah. So do you have any suggestions for the you know, maybe

Dr. Sonja Friedbauer: 1:00:41

different stages. Yeah, so puppies, you know, I have a lot of clients that gets get misinformed about how often to feed, and they come in, you should not see their ribs or feel their backbone or their hip bones. They they need to have a little fat cover. They're growing and they're active, and if they're just laying around sleeping and they're skinny, they're not getting enough nutrition to be active they need. And they might have parasites too, which you in which case you could feed them all you want, and they're going to be skinny and having diarrhea. It's not normal, but yeah, three times minimum. And I tell people, let them eat as much as they want. I'm not going to inhibit their food if they're getting, obviously, fats, okay, by six months, you want to go to twice a day, and then by a year, you could wean most dogs onto adult food. And not an abrupt change, but kind of a gradual thing, adult food, and I'm not a huge fan of just giving dry dog food that was supposedly developed during war times for convenience. People could just buy a bag and it lasted. And would you eat dry cereal only for every day, for every meal? I mean, is it healthy? No, come on, common sense. It's really not. But we're taught that it is, unfortunately. And they even brainwash us as vets. Oh, yeah, they do a lot of research. You should see their facilities, and these dogs grow and their coats are nice and their bones are good, but i don't know i I'm against it at this point in my career, and I think that if you can mix in a little bit of fresh meat, fresh vegetables, okay, I understand not everybody can cook their for their dog every day, and I wish I had it for you, and I might, I think I took a picture actually. I'll send it to you after I took a picture from our veterinary website. I think I'm not supposed to, like, actually share everything, but I'll send you the picture. But anyway, and it gave some nutrition websites, like, for people who want to try to cook for their dogs, there are veterinary nutritionists. You might have to pay a little bit of money, but if your dog only likes one meat and you're not sure how much to give and how much carbs and how much vitamins, you can consult a veterinary nutritionist and get the right answer, because most vets don't really know. You know, I could tell you there's a book. It's It's written by a veterinarian, and he co wrote it with a couple of doctors that were oncologists, and it's something like dog cancer care guides, something like that. And if you just look that up, you'll find it. And I forget the author, but he puts a recipe in chapter 14. My office will email it to you if you want to call our office. But I'm not trying to promote our office or anything, but it's I send it to people when they want to home cook, because he puts specifically a ratio of like meat to what other vegetables and not to give grains to dogs that have cancer, okay? And I am not a strict grain free dog food person, and it may have hurt some dogs specifically labs, okay? That they had a little study on that some were getting a dilated heart from when you have the one of the first ingredients as peas, for some reason, it's deficient in taurine. Okay, so when they're replacing the grains with peas, you gotta be careful with those foods. Okay, so I, you know, I don't know exactly why. I don't think anyone does yet, but I'm not a strict grain free person, but I will say, if they have cancer, I'm going to tell you I don't think you should give it based on some people's thought about it, and I might be wrong about that, but I anyway, can I tell you something about cancer that I learned that's new. Do you have a minute? Are you done?

Dr. Spencer Baron: 1:04:23

Let me just throw in the 25 pet insurances. And again, this isn't an advertisement. This is just truth and experience, and what you had told me true. Panion, t, r, u, p, a, n, i, o, n, was one of your your favorite. Nice there were, there were others, like pumpkin pets, best, healthy paws, and that was mainly, those are the ones that you checked off for me. So okay, tell me about No, no.

Dr. Sonja Friedbauer: 1:04:52

Cool, yeah. So I gotta tell you one thing about champion. They're pretty smart with their getting vets to work with them because they will pay. Right at that point of care. So when you're ready to check out, if you got that policy for 90% they'll pay it immediately, and you only have to pay your 10% right there at the desk. The vet does have to get the program they have or whatever, but it's pretty cool. I don't, I don't know of any other insurance company that does that for animals, so that's kind of nice, you know. Alright. So anyway, there's this product made from mistletoe, the plant that people kiss under at Christmas, okay? And it's called viscum, and we just recently started using it for dogs with cancer, after I went to a lecture and learned about it at an alternative meeting, and this doctor has been using it on dogs that had, like no hope, and I wish I knew about it sooner. I really do. And there's some cancers that nothing's going to cure, nothing's going to fix, but it's really nice. You know, when other things, whether or not you use chemo and regular medication or not, you can add it and it's an injectable, and the vet does have to sign up to order it, but then they can give the client a prescription and they can be ordering it. You teach them how to give the shot. It doesn't hurt, it's not painful. There's really no downside effect of it, unless you are starting too high of a dose. They might not feel good, but it's a pretty amazing tool to have, and so I just want to put it out there that if people are going to talk to their vets, if their dogs have cancer, this, this product is out there, and there's a company called Uriel, u r i e l, they carry it so they could tell their vets. They could sign up with that company, and they can write prescriptions, and they might have to learn about it a little. I bought a book called mistletoe by Claudia Costa, and she puts, she explains exactly how it works. And actually, they've been using it in Europe for human cancers for many years, in Germany, and it's not FDA approved here, of course, not yet. And it'll, they'll wait, I don't know, 100 years until a lot of other people have been using it, but it's working. And you could, you know, it actually helps lessen the side effects of chemo. They use it for breast cancer over there, and I don't know what else, but it's pretty incredible. And I just started, I can't really give you a lot of, you know, case studies or anything, but I'm just so hopeful because so I'll give you one, one, if you've got time for just one, sure. Okay, little dog. Little shit, Sue comes in. The dog is 14 years old. We knew she had a little kidney thing from her blood from six months before. Anyway, dog now isn't eating and so now we got to figure out why. Kidney values didn't look that bad. We did an x ray, and her kidneys were five times normal size. Both kidneys and this dog didn't have much else going on, a little nodule here or there on the skin, right? So got an ultrasound, and they said, metastatic kidney cancer. All right? So the dog probably did have a tumor, tiny, little tumor somewhere. That's a bad one. So anyway, we the lady wasn't going to go for chemo or anything like that, and it probably wouldn't have worked. So we started the dog on mistletoe, and it's a little bit of a journey. The dog wasn't eating well for a month, okay? And we were giving this stuff twice a week. Initially, sometimes she didn't feel well. We backed off on the dose. Finally, the dog is eating. So I have one that that dog should be six feet under already, and I don't know, there's no other explanation. She's not getting anything else, you know, but she was not eating, probably at least for a week. The owner was force feeding her a week or two, we gave her appetite stimulants and something for nausea, something for pain. None of that was helping, and she's suddenly eating. And so there's no other answer. I haven't re x rayed her yet to see if the kidneys shrank, you know, or what's going on. But she's eating. So it's something to think about.

Dr. Spencer Baron: 1:08:53

Yeah, so we, I gotta tell you, we probably have a ton of other questions and even the rapid fire, but we're gonna have to to move on. Okay, put a close to the show, but thank you so much.

Dr. Sonja Friedbauer: 1:09:07

Yeah, great talking to you guys. Constant, no, so good. I'm just excited to share. I'm really happy to share with you. So thank you again, too. All right, have a great day. Okay, I'll see you. Okay. Bye, bye.

Dr. Spencer Baron: 1:09:23

Thank you for listening to today's episode of The Kraken backs podcast. We hope you enjoyed it. Make sure you follow us on Instagram at Kraken backs podcast. Catch new episodes every Monday. See you next time you.