Ketosis is a metabolic state in which fat provides most of the fuel for the body. It occurs when there is limited access to glucose (blood sugar), which is the preferred fuel source for many cells in the body.
Who is a Ketogenic Diet ideal for?
A Ketogenic Diet is ideal for both humans and dogs suffering from various health issues like treating and curing diabetes, skin rashes, hot spots, itching and almost all allergies, controlling seizures, and cancer. It can also be used with healthy humans and healthy dogs to help prevent future sickness.
What exactly is a Ketogenic Diet?
A Ketogenic Diet is a high fat, moderate to low protein and low carbohydrate diet.
What is a 2:1 Ketogenic Diet?
2:1 refers to the specific type of ratio that compares the amount of fat to the amount of protein and net carbohydrate. A 2:1 ratio means for every 2 grams of fat, there is 1 gram of combined protein and net carbohydrate. In terms of percentages this equates to 82% of calories from Fat and 18% of calories from Protein and Net Carbohydrate.
How long should my dog stay on a 2:1 Ketogenic Diet?
There are many factors that come into play here that will determine how long your dog should stay on a 2:1 ketogenic diet. Depending on the health of your dog, and their current metabolic markers, he or she may be on this ratio diet for a number of months. Once we are comfortable with their metabolic markers, we may suggest a ratio change and start throwing in some higher protein (1:1 ratio) days. This will help prevent muscle loss that often is associated with a low protein diet.
How long can my dog be on a Ketogenic diet?
If your dog is suffering from some form of metabolic disease, like cancer, epilepsy, or diabetes, it would probably be a good idea that he/she remains on ketogenic diet. Also if your dog is suffering from an autoimmune disease like allergies, lupus, skin allergies or even arthritis, it would be a good idea that they remain on a ketogenic diet as well.
What is the long term effects of a Ketogenic diet?
One of the most common long term effects of a ketogenic diet would be weight loss. Caloric intake should always be closely monitored and adjusted to meet the nutritional needs of the dog.
Can my dog eat this diet while on chemo or radiation?
Yes they can. As a matter of fact, a ketogenic diet can improve the outcome of these treatments as well as mitigate the harsh side effect often associated with standard of care therapies.
What is 70/30 Ground Beef?
Meat is typically labeled by percentage of fat. You’ll see 96/4, 90/10, 80/20 sometimes you’ll even see 75/25 and all that means is the percentage of lean meat to fat content. We recommend using 70% lean meat and 30% fat content because it is a 2:1 ketogenic ratio. You can ask your local butcher or meat dept. if they can make you a 70/30 ground beef if you don’t see it at the store. If you are absolutely not able to get anything less than an 80/20 or 85/15 meat, please let us know and we can give you the additional amounts of fat that we’d like you to add into the meals.
Does the beef have to be grass-fed?
If you can afford grass-fed beef, then by all means buy it, because it is a better option for your dog. What a cow eats directly effects the types and level of nutrients you get from eating meat from that cow. Meat from a grass fed cow is loaded with even more nutrition then a cow fed a corn or grain-based diet. At the end of the day it call comes down to what you can truly afford.
What about bacteria and pathogens in the meat?
Raw meat should be handled with the same safety precautions you use when you prepare burgers or steaks on the grill. There is no risk of contracting GI parasites from USDA-inspected, human grade meat. If you are still concerned, you can freeze the meat for a few days before you feed it to your pets. Please make sure you are washing pet bowls after feeding and sanitizing eating surface regularly. Also make sure your hands are clean when handling all raw meats.
Is beef the only meat I can feed my dog?
No, you may feed other meats, but we always suggest starting with the fattest cuts of meats available to you. Meats like Chicken, Turkey, Venison and Elk are very lean and high in protein, so in the beginning stages if your dog is on a higher ketogenic ratio diet, we suggest you try stay away from those. If you can only get access to leaner cuts on meat like those mentioned above, you will need to add an fat source (fat source list mentioned below) to the meals in order to meet the suggested ketogenic ratio. Also I want to mention that if you don’t see a certain cut of meat it in the store coolers, ask the butcher if he can prepare it for you (most of them will).
What fat sources do you use?
Besides the fats found in the beef we use, we rotate the fats source often as it is healthy for them to get a variety of fats in their diet. Rotation also helps prevent our dogs from developing an aversion to a certain fat. We suggest that you rotate fat sources from week to week. The fats sources we suggest are the following:
Monounsaturated Fat Sources: Avocado Oil, Olive Oil, Avocado Mayo. Saturated Fat Sources: Coconut Oil, Red Palm Oil, Ghee, Kerry Gold Unsalted Butter, Unsweetened Coconut Cream and Heavy Whipping Cream.
What about the risk of fatty liver disease with the high amount of fat consumption?
Your dog will not develop fatty liver disease from the high fat consumption of the Ketogenic Diet. Fatty liver disease is often the result of abnormal bile flow in the liver and deficient hepatic function. Serious deterioration of the hepatic function can affect the liver’s capacity of detoxifying the bloodstream. Therefor toxins accumulate in the body and can cause further complications.
What vegetables can I give my dog?
Now for the fibrous veggies, you can choose any of those listed below, but make sure you finely dice them up or puree them and then mix them up good in the food before you feed them. Please stay away from other veggies sources due to their high carbohydrate content.
Fibrous Veggies: Brussel Sprouts, Green Beans, Cabbage, Broccoli, Asparagus
My Vet suggests that I do not feed RAW. What do I do?
Most vets are anti-raw diet due to the threat of bacteria or salmonella. If done properly you will have zero issues with either bacteria or salmonella. Also freezing the meat for a few days before serving can successfully avoid exposing your raw fed pet to parasites.
Can I cook the food?
We do not recommend that you cook the food. Dogs have the proper gut bacteria and enzymes to naturally break down RAW food. Also cooked animal fats can lead to pancreatitis, organ failure, and can be deadly if left untreated.
Why is the food measurements you gave me is in grams?
We want to be very strict on the caloric intake of your dog, so it is best to measure in the food in grams. If you don’t already own one, you’ll need to purchase digital food scale which will help you make sure you are delivering the exact amount of food suggested.
Are these food measurements correct? This doesn’t seem like a lot of food.
Yes, the measurements are correct. The standard kibble diet is roughly 30 calories per pound. This is the #1 reason that approximately 25-30% of the general canine population is obese in North American. Unless the dog is already extremely lean, we start most dogs at 15 calories per pound. This allows us to get the dog into a metabolic state to fight disease. As weight fluctuates, we will make the necessary caloric adjustments.
Why Calorie Restriction?
Excess body fat – or obesity – is also linked to cancer in dogs. The precise link is not yet completely defined, but new research has shown that fat cells secrete a chemical called adiponectin, which actually lessens the development of cancer cells. Fat cells secrete much less adiponectin when the body has excess fat in storage, which happens in a heavy dog. Fat cells secrete more adiponectin when the fat cells are being burned for fuel, which happens in a leaner dog. During a ketogenic diet, the dogs are burning fat for fuel.
My dog has very loose stools since starting the Ketogenic Diet. How can I fix this?
When changing from a kibble based diet you many experience a short time when your dog has very loose stools. This is due to the sudden change their diet. This will eventually go away as they adapt to the consumption of this higher fat diet. You can add a teaspoon of chia seeds to their meal if they are experiencing diarrhea.
How do I know if the diet is working?
The ketogenic diet is the only diet that you can validate with a simple blood ketone test. If the blood ketone test shows 0.3mmol or higher, then the diet is working.
What Glucose/Ketone reader do you suggest?
We suggest the Precision Xtra blood glucose and blood ketone reader. You can purchase it on amazon.com. Also make sure that you buy both blood glucose and blood ketone strips.
Where is the ideal location to draw blood to test both glucose and ketones?
To draw blood, you can use the side of one of the pads on the paw or the loose skin on their front elbow.
How often do you suggest that I test blood glucose and blood ketones?
We highly suggest in the beginning you test blood levels every other day, right away in the morning before you feed them their first meal. Once we see numbers consistently where we want them to be, we can back off a bit and test twice a week (Mondays and Fridays).
What are the numbers we want to hit for blood glucose and blood ketones?
Blood Glucose: 75 mg/dL or lower
Blood Ketones: 0.3mmol or higher
I recently discovered Ketostix (urine ketone strips). These are much cheaper than the blood ketones strips. Are these ok to use?
Ketone urine test strips truly will only work for the first few weeks of a ketogenic diet. In the early stages of a ketogenic diet your body will produce small amounts of ketones, but since your body doesn’t know how to use them yet as fuel, your body will pass these trace amounts of ketones in your urine. It is not until your body has burned off all the glucose that it will start to use the ketones as a fuel source. This is often referred to at keto adapted. Once keto adapted, ketones will no longer be present in your urine. So you can see these urine strips are not the most accurate means to measuring ketone levels.
My dog is losing too much weight, what do I do?
The thing about the ketogenic diet is that once in ketosis, the body switches into fat burning stage. The end result of this is weight loss. While this is normally a good thing, we don’t want them losing weight at a rapid pace. Closely monitor your dog’s weight and if they are losing weight too rapidly, please let us know and we can make some dietary adjustments.
My dog doesn’t want to eat their meal. What do I do?
It is perfectly ok if your dog misses a meal or even a few meals. They may not be interested and/or even hungry at the moment. If they are not interested, place the meal in the fridge and try feeding at a later time. Please don’t feel like you have to force feed them. Your dog should eventually eat when they are hungry. Often if you exercise them, they’ll eat afterwards. Now, if it has been multiple days and they still haven’t eaten, let us know and we can offer a few tips to try to get them to eat.
Speaking of exercise, how often should my dog get exercised and what exercises do you recommend?
As far as metcon (Metabolic Conditioning) is concerned we like to give our dogs (2) 20-30 sessions per day. We like to get them running and get their heart rate up so if possible I’d like you to do the same. Even a long game of fetch for one of the sessions would suffice.
Exercise is also a very important part of our program and works hand in hand with our ketogenic diet protocol. The goal is to get these doggies into a regular exercise schedule daily to increase heart rate, burn calories and stimulate their mitochondria. This keeps insulin low and helps battle their cancers.
What treats can I give my dog?
I know you’re probably wondering about what type of treats are ok to feed your dog. To be honest with you, we do not feed our KPS doggies treats. All of the calories our dogs get are in the two meals we feed them. Now I would try to avoid feeding treats as they can easily add a bunch of extra calories to their diet, not-to-mention many of them are full of carbohydrates and protein. Adding these can in fact prevent us from getting your dog into ketosis due to spiking their glucose. It is ok however to give your dog a bully stick once a week to help keep his teeth clean. Also if you must give them a treat, try freezing a tablespoon of coconut oil or unsalted butter in a hollow bone or Kong. Just make sure you give this to your dog outside or on a hard surface so it doesn’t make a mess on your carpet.
Are there any Supplements I should give to my dog?
You may want to deliver calcium, potassium, magnesium and an omega 3 supplement with each meal as well as a good prebiotic, and probiotic. We give our doggies the following: Garden of Life Prebiotic Fiber, LivPro Probiotic Fiber, and Yes Oil. But you can go online and purchase similar products on amazon.com. Just do a simple search and you should find a bunch.
** Please avoid giving your dog a multi-vitamin. These contain both Iron and Folic Acid which can feed cancer. **
Suggested Supplement dosing:
Probiotic Fiber: 1g per 50 lbs twice a day
Prebiotic Fiber: Small dogs: 3.5g, Medium and Large dogs: 6g once a day with AM meal
Yes Oil: 0.03mL/lbs twice a day
Why plant based omegas compared to fish/krill?
The reason we don’t use fish or krill anymore is because you can’t convert direct EPA DHA into what the body needs. You need to have the parental oil’s which are things such as coconut oil, flax borage oil or evening primrose and high oleic sunflower oil as the 3, 6 and 9 Omega oil’s to be able to make our own…these oils are needed as the precursors. Less than 1 percent is converted to EPA and DHA. So we need the parent oils to convert.
The human body does not produce significant amounts of EPA or DHA on its own, so you must get these important nutrients from Yes supps or Udos (as brand examples).
There are others, but we’ve checked into these companies and their processing of the fats.
And also too often people stuff themselves as much as I can with omega-3’s and you really need the balance of six and nine to make everything work and be able to convert appropriately too much omega-3 is actually bad for you which the general population doesn’t know quite understand yet but more and more is coming out about that we actually need a lot more omega 6 than people realize but 6 from the right places.
Are there any other supplements that are safe for my dog on a ketogenic diet?
You want to be careful when selecting additional supplements to give your dog while they are on a ketogenic diet. One reason for this is we don’t want you giving them a supplement that will prevent them from getting into ketosis. There are many supplements that can raise blood glucose levels, so before you give it to them, do some research and/or ask your Vet for advice. Turmeric, Turkey Tail Mushrooms, and Metformin are a few of the safe ones to give them.
My dog has seizures. Will they benefit from a ketogenic diet?
Yes, they will most likely see a benefit from eating a ketogenic diet. Often you may even be able to lower the dosage of seizure medications.
Will a ketogenic diet help a dog with diabetes?
Yes. If you follow the diet properly and stop feeding your dog non-fibrous carbohydrates, you will be able to lower your dog’s blood glucose numbers significantly. Often our dogs at KetoPet have blood glucose in the mid 50s to low 60s.
Will a ketogenic diet help a dog with arthritis or joint issues?
Yes. A diet full of high glycemic carbohydrates will cause a lot of inflammation in the body, especially in the joints of older dogs. Eliminating these carbs and increasing the consumption of healthy fats will often eliminate a lot of the inflammation and joint pain.
What are your thoughts on CBD oil. Can I give to my dog CBD oil?
We have never used CBD oil with any of our dogs at KetoPet Sanctuary and because of this we cannot validate its efficacy. If you still feel this is something you want to try with your dog, we highly recommend that you discuss this decision in detail with your vet.
