The first week of October is National Walk Your Dog Week and we’ll take every opportunity to share the benefits of walking! According to the website, “Walk Your Dog Week aims to improve the health and wellbeing of America’s dogs.” Walking has many benefits for our canine friends such as providing mental stimulation and an outlet for their energy. Perhaps more importantly, walking can benefit a dog’s joint health as well.

If you follow our blog, you’re probably familiar with the statistic that approximately 1 out of every 5 dogs is diagnosed with osteoarthritis (OA) in their lifetime. Thus, it’s important that we take care of our dogs’ joints from an early age. While there are several ways to support a dog’s joints, studies have found that regular, low-impact exercise, such as walking, can support joint health in dogs with and without OA.

There are several ways in which walking benefits a dog’s joints. One benefit of walking is weight loss or maintaining an ideal weight. Like with people, regular physical exercise can contribute to reaching or maintaining a healthy weight. When dog’s are at an ideal weight, there is less stress on their joints and therefore less wear and tear.

Additionally, walking can help to strengthen the muscles and supporting soft tissue structures around the joints to promote increased joint stability. This kind of movement can also improve joint fluid circulation, which is beneficial to maintaining healthy joint cartilage. With all of these benefits combined, walking has shown to delay the onset and/or reduce the symptoms of OA in dogs.

Of course walking is not a foolproof method to stopping or curing OA altogether. Your veterinarian can offer advice in terms of supplements and other ways to support your dog’s joint health. Additionally, VetStem Cell Therapy has shown to reduce pain and lameness associated with arthritis in dogs, thereby leading to a better quality of life.

If you think your pet may benefit from treatment with VetStem Cell Therapy, speak to your veterinarian or contact us for a list of VetStem providers in your area. And in the meantime, how about going for a walk to celebrate National Walk Your Dog Week!

Incredible new results for stem cell therapy were presented at the 3rd North American Veterinary Regenerative Medicine Meeting in Savannah, Georgia last week.  I was privelidged to attend and to present our data.  One presenter showed how stem cells can function to grow new tendons and ligaments.  Another (Dr. Ross Rich, Cave Creek, AZ) presented data on how over 85% of horses with ligament injury return to full performance level after being treated with adipose stem cells.  I was selected to present data on how stem cells can potentially help cats with failing kidneys.   Dr. John Peroni of the University of Georgia presided as the association president and introduced the keynote speaker from Georgia Tech who spoke on stem cells in bone healing.  One spectacular presentation showed how adipose stem cells can heal dogs with serious tendon and ligament injuries sustained in athletic events like agility and flyball.  Wow.   In the coming weeks, I will post on the data presented on dogs with arthritis and horses with arthritis and also laminitis to give you a flavor of the rapid progress in discovering new ways to use these cells!  They even showed how they can use advanced stem cell tracking to see how cells move around the body to do their miraculous healing jobs.  A dawn of the age of Regeneration has reached the veterinary world before human medicine.

Human stem cell therapy succeeds!  As part of providing insights into the world of dog arthritis, I think it is useful for you to see what all is happening in the human stem cell world.  Crohn’s disease is a horrible auto-immune disease where the lower GI tract is being attacked by the person’s own immune system.  A group in Spain has been working for a number of years treating patients with this disease with adipose stem cell therapy.  There is a great report of clinical trial you should all see (link: Crohn’s Trial Results) where more than half of these patients had a great response to being treated with adipose stem cells.  There are so many new trials around the world using stem cell from fat tissue that it is hard to keep up with the literature.  Proudly, I believe that the success with using adipose stem cells to treat dog arthritis, like Tucker’s Story,  has helped generate interest and to show the safety of this type of therapy.

Of course you already know about how you can store stem cells when your baby is born, right? Well cord stem cell collection in the dog is not really possible, but is there another opportunity, like maybe at the time of a spay or neuter or other elective surgery?  Yes, now there is such an opportunity.

I want to introduce Nancy Sapper.  She is a dog, cat and horse owner and is also the Marketing Manager at Vet-Stem.  Her story is amazing!

Hi All,

I am Nancy, the new Marketing Manager at Vet-Stem (I am the old Industry Relations Manager, but that’s a whole different blog!).  I grabbed the blogger keyboard from Dr. Bob today to tell you about my family’s personal experience with Vet-Stem’s newest service, StemInsure.

I cannot express how excited I personally am about this new service.  As many of you who regularly follow us on Facebook and Twitter know, Boomer, the mini Australian Shepherd, has been featured there frequently.  Boomer is my daughter’s dog.

I am always very proud of the Vet-Stem team, but as I write
this I am especially proud of the accomplishment announced last week, “Vet-Stem
Reaches the Milestone of 8,000 Animals Treated with Vet-Stem Cell Therapy”.

There are more than 8,000 of our beloved with less pain,
less stiffness, the ability to run, play, and return to what they love to
do.  There are more than 8,000 animal
friends who enjoy life again after using their own bodies’ natural healing
abilities.

It takes a team to do what we do:  Veterinarians, RVTs, Caring Customer Service
Reps, Scientists, Professional Laboratory Technicians, you get the idea.  Vet-Stem has compiled a phenomenal team to
bring our patients cutting edge Regenerative Veterinary Medicine, and I am so
proud of the Vet-Stem Team and can’t wait to continue to deliver the care our
companions deserve.

We are always pleased to hear happy stories of our patients. Below is the story of Hannah and how stem cell therapy helped her to overcome arthritis pain so that she could continue to serve others.

“Our Border Collie, Hannah, has hip dysplasia and our orthopedic vet Dr. Pam Nichols, at Animal Care Center K-9 Rehab Center, told us both hips were equally bad ….some of the worst she’d ever seen (hip dysplasia is one of the leading causes of arthritis in dogs). She was afraid Hannah would have to have both hips replaced to ensure a long active life; but suggested that we try stem cells first. Hannah used to use her front paws to pull herself up at times after a lot of running or play and the arthritis was very invasive. She was not making any extra trips upstairs and was unable to even stand on her hind legs. Read the rest of this entry »

A June 2011 article written in Cottage Dog Magazine called Stem Cell Therapy for Dogs highlights Thomas, a Dogue de Bordeaux, whose owner, Kira, is a sales representative and registered veterinary technician for Avivagen Animal Health. Thomas is afflicted with osteochondrosis (OCD) and dysplasia in both elbows. After receiving orthopedic surgery for his OCD, he is now undergoing VetStem RC stem cell therapy provided by Vet-Stem’s affiliate Avivagen in Canada. To read Thomas’ story and how Avivagen is helping treat dogs in Canada with stem cell therapy click here.

I want to share with you the stories of Cookie, a 13 year old Australian shepherd mix, and Scout, a 6 year old Newfoundland and their experiences with Stem Cell Therapy for arthritis. An article recently published in the Mercury News, “Stem cell therapy gives dogs new pep in their step” tells us the stories of Cookie and Scout.  Read the rest of this entry »

When making a decision on stem cell therapy for your companion, it is important to understand the process a bit, especially the process of storage of the extra cells for the future.  If your dog or cat is being treated for arthritis, it is likely that they will need additional treatments in future years for the arthritis or for other conditions.  One single collection of fat by your veterinarian provides for a lifetime of stem cells for your dog.  The Vet-Stem lab stores (banks) stem cells in a cryopreservation system that provides for safe storage of stem cells that can last the lifetime of your dog.  In most cases there are enough cells stored so that your dog can be treated one or more times from stored cells.  This way there is no need to do another surgical collection of fat (which decreases anesthesia risk and cost).  The first year of storage is free. Vet-Stem will then notify you as the owner/caretaker when it is time to renew the contract for storage of the stem cells. Read the rest of this entry »

Arthritis in dogs is what has been treated most often with partial tears of cruciate ligaments coming in second. However, Vet-Stem is part of an international effort that is exploring the ways that stem cells can be used to treat many of the major diseases and injuries known to veterinary and human medicine.  Read the rest of this entry »