Welcome to the Natural Health
for People in Pets podcast, a show that aims to empower you with
the knowledge and tools needed to take control of your own health and wellbeing, as well as providing health promoting
strategies for the dogs in your life. The world of health and
nutrition can be overwhelming, so what better way to understand
what works and what doesn't, what's evidence-based and what's not,
then to hear it from someone in the know. So please welcome your host of the show, accredited naturopath and
nutritionist Nelle Cook. Welcome back to Natural Health for
People and Pets. I'm co-host of the show, Glenn Cook, but I'm gonna introduce
the host of the show, Narelle Cook, who's going to also
introduce our special guest. Hello everyone. We have a really exciting show for
you today and we are very excited and privileged and fortunate to be
able to speak to Dr. Christopher Lee, who is the veterinary director
of C B D Vets Australia. C B D Vets is literally Australia's
first veterinary service where pet owners can legally access medicinal cannabis
under the care of an Australian registered veterinary practitioner. To give
you a quick background on Dr. Lee, he has been a small animal
veterinarian for over 30 years. He's certified as a
veterinary acupuncturist, which we just love and we've spoken
about the huge benefits of acupuncture on the show before. He has a keen interest
in small animal surgery orthopedics. He's recently been to the University
of Tennessee to gain his canine rehabilitation practitioner
certification. And Dr. Lee runs his own veterinary practices
in South Australia where he and his amazing team specialize in pet
rehabilitation regenerative medicines, including the advanced pain care
techniques. So I'm guessing Dr. Lee, that's where your interest in the clinical
application of C B D for pets came about with your pain care
techniques. But welcome, there's so much we've
got to talk about today. I know this is a really big
topic for a lot of pet owners. I get a lot of emails every week from
pet owners asking me about options for not only chronic pain but stress,
anxiety, epilepsy, you know, all things that C B D comes to mind for. So there's lots of things
that we can cover today, but I dunno if there's anything else
you wanna say as an introduction. Maybe we can just begin by
outlining what is C B D, and one of the main
questions I get asked is, what's the difference between C B
D and something like hemp seed oil? Thank you very much for having
me on your show today, Narelle. Very excited to be here. Yes, that's,
uh, very good questions. I guess, uh, just a bit more about what I'm about. I've been a vet for a long
time now and you know, animals give so much to us as, uh, as
human beings, as as owners and, uh, pet parents. And when you think of what they can do
for us and what they've done for us, really pain control becomes something
that's very close to most veterinarians focus and heart because we know
that pain causes so much issues. And as a result through my career, I've always been very interested
in trying to, you know, look after our pets the best possible way. And their quality of life translates to
a lot more joy that we see from them. And of course it brings so much benefits
to our health and our joy as well, and they become part of our family. And that's why it's so
absolutely important that
we look after furry friends. My journey's gone through
a long, a long way. I guess it's 30 years of a
long way and being a surgeon as well, like my passion is in surgery. We
do cause a lot of pain in surgery, so I'm always looking at
advanced techniques of, uh, pain relief to look after our patients
post-surgery and for their whole life, even just for chronic pain for
arthritis and things like that. So obviously straight away
when I graduated back in 91, I qualified pretty much immediately
with the International Vet Acupuncture Society with acupuncture
in 92. And then, uh, my journey went on to, uh, surgical, uh, learning episode for five years in the
uk and then I came back to Australia. We probably got into stem cell
therapy and regenerative medicine. So that's another form of
painkiller and healing that's super important. And then of course,
uh, rehabilitation has, let me down a big rabbit hole of
different technologies including electrical stimulation, tens,
ultrasound, shockwave therapy, and, and of course C V D came along
straightaway my years picked up and, uh, went and explored it. So C B D is actually stands
for cannabinoids and they are extracts or active ingredients of the
cannabis part. Cannabis, of course, is the most well known for its
marijuana, which is cannabis sva. And that is, uh, has a very high level of T H C in it, which is the psychoactive
component of cannabis. But then C B D, which is cannabidiol and these names
are just crazy because there's a lot of different names that are
very similar sounding. C B D itself is actually
also a cannabinoid part of the marijuana plant, but it does not have the
psychoactive components and it also has a lot of the health
components of the cannabis plant, which on looking into it, and I'm sure your listeners and uh, readers know it probably has
a hell of a lot of benefits that, uh, makes it sound as if, as the of all illnesses in
the world and in many ways it can be. So yeah, so that's my journey down into why I'm
here now talking about A C B D oil. It is an extract of
the, uh, cannabis plant. We do not have to be worried about
C B D being addictive. It is not, it does not give us the high
that marijuana does either. And it is, uh, extract of the leaves and the stalk
and the flowers of the cannabis plant, but not the seed. And this is where the other confusion
is when we have cannabis seed oil that actually has no C B D or T H
C in cannabis seed oil that is actually just a nutritional supplement. Like olive oil would
be high in omega three, omega six fatty acids and
vitamins and minerals. But, uh, none of the medicinal benefits
of the cannabis plant itself. And I think that's a big
point of confusion for a lot
of people in pet owners is hemp seed oil is heavily promoted and
there's a lot of misinformation and mismarketing around hemp seed
oil versus C B D. So, uh, it's great to clarify the difference
between the two and it's good for pet owners to know. I mean, hemp seed oil has enormous nutritive
and health benefits as you mentioned. And I guess because they are different, if a pet owner does have their pet on
hemp seed oil for general health and wellbeing, they can still incorporate
C B D under the care of a vets. That's right. And C B D itself
is a fascinating, uh, compound. Certainly. Uh, I've been ordering my C B D from C
B D Vets Australia and the reason I've done so is that it's pretty
much pure. Hmm. And that is, uh, something that's really, really important. That means I get predictable
results when I use it. And C B D itself has been shown
to have painkiller activity in some cases similar to codeine,
which is, uh, opioid. So that's a, a phenomenal, uh, result.
It's got antioxidants in it, it it's neuroprotective, it's been used in epilepsy treatment
and has been shown in several clinical trials to be beneficial for epilepsy and
also registered in the human field for it. C B D has also been neuroprotective, so we do know that it has
benefits and there is, uh, studies done with dogs with
degenerative myelopathy, which uh, unfortunately some dogs will suffer
from where the nerves degenerate in the spine has been used for
intervertebral disc disease. So neurologically it's uh, it's a, it's a wonderful drug for
pain and neuroprotection. Um, it's got other benefits such as
it's found to be anti-cancer. And recently this year, this research
done as an antibiotic as well. It's potential benefits are
pretty much limitless really, um, from what I can tell. But ultimately the other small benefit
that comes with C B D oil is that it actually makes our pets feel more
settled because it does have a mood balancing effect. So C B D is
interesting because it's really, uh, the science behind it's
not really well understood. It's got to do with the
endocannabinoid system, which is a neural hormonal pathway
system that's not very well known in at all. And it's really important that
this system regulates our balance in our body. So it
balances our mood and uh, hormones and uh, abilities to
control inflammatory responses. And certainly in humans
they're investigating it
in many autoimmune diseases including I B D. It's
a fascinating compound, but to be fair, a lot of it is unknown. And while it's been
proven to have benefits, how effective are these benefits that's
yet to be discovered and what dose rates we need to get the effects
is still completely unknown. It is pretty much venturing into a little
bit of unknown territory when we start talking about C B D oils. But there's plenty of proven
benefits about how it actually works, what dose rate we need. Most of that
is still, uh, under investigation. We do know a couple things though we
do know that it's a great painkiller. We do know that it's good for
epilepsy and we do know that it is a good mood balancing product as well. And being neuroprotective is also good
for any nerve degeneration issues. Sounds like CBDs the new turmeric, 'cause turmeric in the past has been
touted as the elixir to every sort of health condition. We actually started, Glen and I started on the journey of
C B D because of one of our French bulldogs, you know, with spinal issues, which is certainly not
uncommon in the breed. So we've touched base
with C B D Vets Australia, which has been wonderful and I'll talk
a little bit more about how people can get in touch at the end of the show. But one of the other benefits I've
read that people may not think of, and I'd be curious to hear
your thoughts on this, Dr. Lee, is for allergies because a lot, you know, so many dogs suffer from varying degrees
of atopic dermatitis or just, you know, food allergies, environmental allergies, and it makes sense to me that C B D may
potentially play a role in providing relief for those dogs being such a
potent anti-inflammatory agent, you know, helping to calm the nervous system or
the immune system helping to just reduce that angry inflammation and sort
of redness topically and even the disruption that chronic, quite severe allergies can have in
terms of quality of life. But you know, disrupting sleep, creating
anxiety, creating more
compulsive behaviors in dogs. Is that something that you've used it
for or had any case studies that you've come across in the use of C
B D for allergies in dogs? I must admit I haven't used
it for allergies and dogs
because there are so much more other products that are so
effective and proven with allergies in the veterinary world. We tend to use what we know has
been proven and successful and safe. And when we run out of ideas and
we do not have any other options, then we start reaching out
to more experimental or more
unknown products such as uh, C B D, which are
still being investigated
thoroughly. So with allergies, I haven't specifically gone to C B D
as a treatment for allergies basically because we've got so many other super
effective treatments for it that can be very effective. There is a very strong
anti-inflammatory component, uh, because that's the second
component after the neurology, the nervous system that C B D works on
and that's why there's investigations into inflammatory bowel disease
and allergies at the moment. It's certainly a benefit,
certainly a help, but exactly how great that help once
again is question is a big question at the moment and certainly a lot more
investigations need to go into it. And the beauty about C B D, which
I probably haven't mentioned yet, is that it's extremely safe. So there's very little harm that can
be done with C B D by adding it onto other allergy forms of treatment and
certainly can reduce uh, use of uh, medicines if you're using C B D as
well at the same time for allergic conditions. You raise a good point. You're
saying that C B D is very safe, but there still are a lot of unknowns
as you indicated. Which brings me to, you know, a concern that I have for pet owners
who do have dogs in chronic pain states and they go online and they just start
Googling C B D oil and they might buy something that comes in
from overseas, for example, because not as tightly regulated
in countries like the us. So what are your concerns about people
who are just buying a product marketed as C B D from the internet? Yeah. Look, there's a lot of stuff out there. I've even seen things in super
markets with C B D on it. And I think that even what, uh, about three years ago there was a
massive study done in America about nutraceuticals. I think they investigated
over 200 nutraceuticals for human use. And these were things that omega
three fatty acids, uh, chondroitin, glucosamine, you know, just your normal
supplements that are in the human field. And unfortunately they found most of
those compounds did not have what they or most of those products on the shelves
did not have what they claimed was in it. Some of them had zero active ingredients, and others actually had 20
times too much, which is actually toxic. And that's on products that
are well-recognized brands
and it was independent of price or branding what they
found in these nutraceuticals. So it could have been your big
brands that were selling these, uh, products that we are all aware
of. So when it comes to C B D oil, a lot of it, there's no guarantees that
you're getting what you're asking for. And certainly what we as
veterinarians would use would be to try to get the pure ingredients. So, and that's really important because
there's no point buying something which may or may not have any
active ingredients in it. And the second problem with
it is how is this product made? What toxins are in it or what
impurities are in it and how was it even manufactured? So C B D oil
cannabinoid extractions, there are about three or four different
ways and people can, you know, extract it using solvents and
petroleum type products, uh, like alcohol or various solvents like,
like that. And when they do that, we have found petroleum toxins in
the end of the distillate section. The cheaper ways of doing it is to
extract it with olive oil for example. But once again, you know, pesticides and poisons that might be on
the plant or in the process that's not been purified. The
cleanest and most accurate, safest way of extracting it is with
a carbon dioxide extraction system, which is also the most expensive, but it is the cleanest and purest
C B D oil that you can get. And then they need to be analyzed
to make sure that the product has no surety and no toxins in it. And most of these products out in the
market because it's in the over the counter products, just like
your supplements in America,
they're not regulated. So there's no requirement for them to
prove that what is in it is really what they say is in it, is
what really is in it. So I have a lot of clients
that's come to me and guiltily, you look at me and say, oh yeah, but I, I've got some C B D and I've used
it on my dog said it doesn't work. And I'll go, well, it's probably not pharmaceutical grade
and we do need to use pharmaceutical grade products to be safe and effective. And when I tell them about the price
of C B D, the eyes bogle and they go, well that's not how much
I paid for mine. I said, well why don't you try these for a
couple of weeks and come back to me? And invariably they all come
back and say, oh my God, it's amazing my dog's different
now. It's so much more happier, it's less painful. Obviously what I
was giving before was, was rubbish. And it's like, yeah, well
that's, that's usually the case. So it's really important that we get our
drugs from a reputable source that is pure and that has active
ingredients that it claims it has. And also while it is extremely safe, there are side effects and every animal
can have side effects to different products. And if you do not know the
concentration of what you're giving, then the risk of getting into an
adverse reaction as well becomes much greater. And it may not be the
C B D itself that's poisonous. It may be that it could be interacting
with other medications your pets are getting or the toxins may be and that
could cause some serious side effects. It's quite sad that in trying to do the
right thing by their pets, you know, a lot of pet owners can be
inevitably doing harm to them. I mean we're quite lucky to have quite
strict regulations in Australia through the T G A, which as you mentioned is a lot more
lax in the US with supplement side of things. So I guess one of the risk is not just
whether their C B D that someone buys offline is contaminated or you know, they may not know the accurate dose or
the dosage given is for humans and people may not know how to accurately dose that
down appropriately for the dog or how to introduce it to the dog
in a way that you know, is titrated up in a safe
and effective manner. So there's a lot of things that I guess
people don't realize need to be taken into account, you know, the health
status of the dog, like you said, any medications that they're on, any other health conditions
that they're suffering from. So really people do need to be under
the care of a vet who understands C B D to do it in the most safest
way possible for their dog. That's right, Narelle. And the thing about medications that
we have to remember is that a lot of medications are actually sourced
from nature. Paracetamol, aspirin, a lot of medications that we use
for heart disease and so forth, they are all naturally occurring
compounds that has been purified, experimented on thoroughly and then
market it as a medication for you know, whatever heart disease
or or whatever it may be. And because they've been
thoroughly experimented, we know exactly their
side effects and their uh, benefits and their risks of using it. Products that are fairly new onto the
market that's going through all this research. For example, like C B D, A lot
of experimentations going through it. It has been registered as
safe levels for certain usage. But certainly for us in
uh, the veterinary field, because it's not been
licensed specifically, there isn't any real published
materials saying that you can use C B D oil but you can't use it with X,
Y or Z or you can't use it. You know, because the experimental studies
haven't been there yet. Hmm. So because of that, using
pharmaceutical grade products, which we know are pure means that
we can carefully titrate our doses up, as you mentioned, to make sure it doesn't act to anything
else that your pet might be getting. And as a result of that, we can use it extremely safely with all
the wonderful effects and none of the side effects 'cause we're
always watching out for those. We don't really know what
the uh, long-term, uh, usage of C B D oil is in with
is going to produ, you know, is going to result in with animals. But certainly the
toxicity trials are very, very safe and people that are using
it are understanding that it is a, is a non-licensed product. In other words, it hasn't been regulated to be said
that it is definitely safe in animals and we do have to use it at our own risks
because of that and we have to use it cautiously and report anything that may
be abnormal back to your vets if, uh, if, if you see anything at all.
But from my experience of it, and I've been using a fair bit
of C B D now for over a year, I've got quite a few animals
on it for quite a while, I've not seen a serious
side effect at all. The benefits is brought
to pets that are on it, especially older pets or pets that
are in pain is tremendous because unlike a lot of painkillers that we have
in the veterinary field that are toxic today, uh, kidneys, C B D oil is
completely safe in kidney disease. So it gives us an opportunity to use
painkillers that are non-addictive because C B D is not addictive, it
doesn't develop tolerance either. So it doesn't mean that you need to keep
increasing a dose over time like you would with narcotics. So there's a lot of benefits in C B
D oil bearing in mind it's still a non-registered, non-licensed product
and it is you at your own risk, but under careful supervision it's very,
very safe and very, very beneficial. I guess there's a lot of medications
used in the veterinary world that are off-label and you know, there is still a lot of those unknowns
hanging over them, for example. But a question I often get asked from pet
owners is their pet has a chronic pain condition, their vet has told them
that they need to go on something, whether it's meloxicam or gabapentin,
you know, for the rest of the dog's life. So how would a pet owner make
that decision about, you know, what's more indicated, whether you know, C B D is right for their dog or whether
something like gabapentin is the better approach. Is there a thought process that you
go through in a situation like that? Well, it's a, it's a
complicated one and once again, gabapentin is also a product that's not
licensed for use in dogs or cats either. So uh, it falls under the same sort of
category and it really does depend on coexisting diseases in the pet though
it could be cognitive dysfunction syndrome whereby, you know,
you might have a a a pet, it doesn't have to be old. I mean scientifically if scientists or
veterinarians are looking specifically at cognitive dysfunction syndrome, we find it as young as dogs of
seven year or eight years of age. Whereas clients or as um, pet owners, we don't tend to see them till they're
12 or 13 years of age before we start recognizing cognitive
dysfunction syndrome. So there
are a lot of other factors, PET based, disease based factors as well
as concurrent medications
that would determine which medication we would then
tend to lean towards. For me, I tend to look at whether there's other
issues as well. If it's just for pain, well you know, there are lots of variety of medications
available and once again as a veterinarian I guess I would lean
towards the registered known products that we know have been
thoroughly experimented and
safe for long-term use and if those are not available to me or they're
not giving me a sufficient response, then certainly C B D oil, gabapentin, those products come into fold and we would
probably choose one based on whatever the most benefit it would give
to that particular patient. So if the doc's suffering from anxiety, if it's suffering from
cognitive dysfunction, I'll probably tend to choose C B D
because it does have neuroprotective function, it can slow the uh, cognitive
dysfunction syndrome down. You know, if it's just acute pain
and anxiety and it's a cat, well there's a lot less information
known about cats and and C B D, so I would tend to reach for
gabapentin in that situation. So it is something that needs to be
assessed by your veterinarian depending on which product suits your pet best. You mentioned acute presentations there. I guess in my mind I've
always just thought of C B
D as sort of a long-term use product for chronic conditions, but
can, can it be used effectively acutely, like for short-term acute presentations
and then discontinued and then reintroduced as needed if
there's any flareups for example? Or is that sort of not its best use? Well I've started using that in short-term
conditions as well. For example, post-surgical in some cases and look,
I'm getting really good results, no side effects and I do ramp it
up quite quickly in those acute phases. But when you're
talking about chronic cases, certainly there's the
opportunity to go slow, which is the recommended way of
approaching any non-registered, non-licensed product and slowly build it
up watching for side effects or adverse events acutely, I've used it a couple of times where my
routine drugs are of no good, you know, the the kidney, the dog, the dog or the cat's got kidney disease
and I need something else different that I can use and it's anxious for example. So I do tend to reach for C B D in those
situations and I've had pretty good results with it. I do find that I do
get a response within a day or two, but it is fair to say starting
slow and going up slowly. It might, it might take longer for you
to get a response as well, but I've also found that a response at a
much lower dose rate can occur as well. So there is a fair bit of
individual variants and that's, that's also something that we have to be
a little bit careful about because uh, different animals, individual animals
will absorb it at different rates as well. Yeah, it just highlights
again the importance of using
C B D under the care of a licensed veterinarian to mitigate any of
those risks and to get the dosing right for the individual animal. Would you think that C B D
would be a good approach, a first approach if someone, their dog was in the early stages of
a degenerative disease and they didn't really wanna go for any of the
heavier medications at that point, could they potentially use C B D initially
and see how that goes and then over time progress to something
heavier if need be? Is that an approach that people
could take with their dogs? Like I guess I'm just thinking
with our french bulldog, like his acts a bit of a mess but he's
not so far that we need to put him on medication, but I'm, you know, in the back of my mind I'm thinking well
maybe just a low dose of C B D might just give him a little bit of peace and
comfort for the next couple years until things degenerate further and then we
might need to go on to something like gabapentin longer term. Yeah, that's a very good
point Elle, and I think you, you're very correct in that
because it's a natural compound, there is a a perception
that it's safer, it is uh, certainly got a very high safety profile
but we do know that it does affect the liver so we do have to be a little bit
careful about that aspect of it as well with respect to uh, using it for
say your dog's uh, back problem. I think it's a brilliant
application for that. This comes back to the original
uh, statement I made just now, uh, about what is actually therapeutic
levels because there's no point treating something if you are not
getting a therapeutic effect. So we do know that we can give C
B D for pain alone and we do know roughly the uh, correct
dose to achieve that. And of course I'm talking about the pure
pharmaceutical grade C B D that because we do have accurate control
of what we're doing. And the next question is what
level do I need to use to achieve a neuroprotective effect of C B D? For
example, if your dog's got a back issue, if I want to not just suppress pain
but I want to protect the nerve, nerve function and preserve nerves, what dose rate do I need to get to
before I get that effect? And that's, a lot of these questions are still
under research at the moment. So I guess in that situation I would
tend to look at it saying, look, if your dog's got muscle spasms on its
back, if it's got pain and discomfort, if it looks a bit stiff in getting up, we would titrate our C B D dosage
up to the level whereby we can control most of that or until
we see some adverse events happening. And that could be excessive
drinking, it could be vomiting diarrhea, it could be excessive licking or
some sort of abnormal behavior. And then what I might do then is back it
off a little bit and hopefully getting to a point whereby I have a
happy healthy dog with no pain and probably some neuroprotection
there would be where I would go to but exactly what dose I need to achieve
for neuroprotection, I do not know, but hopefully we can at least at the
very least control the pain and get the benefit of perhaps doing
neuroprotection as well. Yeah. And I guess it doesn't have to be
all or nothing, one or the other. It doesn't have to be C B
D or another medication. From what I've heard that C B D can be
used quite safely alongside standard veterinary medications. So if
someone's combining the two, the beauty of that might be that a lower
dose of a medication can be used to minimize potential long-term side effects
of that drug while still supporting the dog and getting a therapeutic
benefit over time. Yeah. That's right Noelle, the thing about it is that I guess
I look at C B D as another drug, I treat it like a drug,
it's, I've gotta respect it, it has known side effects
even though they're very mild, is very low in toxicity because
the toxic dose rates are thousands of times higher than therapeutic
dose rates. So we know that uh, generally we're not gonna cause a lot of
harm with C B D, that's the good thing. But I still look at it as it is another
drug in my armament of pain care I guess in, I don't tend to separate
natural remedies from drugs in so much as I respect natural remedies
as much as I would respect registered drugs. In both, I'm trying to
understand your side effects, the benefits and the dose rates. Hi Dr. Chris, it's Glenn here. I'm the untalented passenger
on this show . So I'm sitting back and listening to
the conversation between Narelle and yourself in regards to this, but something that I is sparking
a little interest in myself, I would probably say as a consumer level
when you're talking about side effects, what would be some of the most common
scene side effects that you would see with C B D? The most common side effect
I see really is uh, sedation. We do see good side effects as well, which some of it is actually really
beneficial such as increased appetite, especially in your older dogs or your
animals with kidney disease. Once again, increased appetite is
a great thing to have. We do see a mood balancing effect
whereby the lytic as well as the antidepressant effects and
so dogs are getting older, they might be getting a little bit, you
know, confused, might be barking more. I found that those dogs have benefited
a lot from C B D as well because once again it's low toxicity, it
doesn't affect the kidneys, which we are always very worried
about with older animals. Dry mouth syndrome is described in people
and we do find that some animals drink more water with C B D but I do
not see any changes in renal parameters that would make me concerned
that it's actually affecting the kidneys at all. So I do think that that's a
dry mouth syndrome in animals as well, essentially causing the increase
in drinking, vomiting and diarrhea. But you know, the thing about it is that could be as
much the carrier oil as it is the C B D drug itself because most CBDs are uh, mixed in with some form of carrier oil.
Generally the side effects are low, but we do have issues when
we start mixing C B D or any psychotropic type drugs, potentially psychotropic
drugs with antidepressants. So if you mix it with
other antidepressants we
could potentially get an Gabapentin and all these
other painkiller drugs. With antidepressants you
could get a serotonin syndrome
which can cause seizures and potentially death. So I guess that's where we want to stay
well clear of that even though the C B D product by itself in a healthy animal
is super safe when you mix it in with drug interactions, perhaps liver failure as your
pet's getting older and you can metabolize these drugs and you
eliminate it as well as it should, then you get a relative overdose of all
these drugs building up in the system and that's where we get in trouble.
So adequate monitoring is really, really important and safe usage
of any drug and as I said to you, I treat C B D like I would
any other drug. Yeah. It's a really good point and as
the qualified herbalist as well, I'm always telling people
just because it's natural, just because it's plant-based doesn't
mean it's automatically safe and herbs have such powerful effects in the body
that people aren't aware of and brush aside and but, but something
like St. John's Ward, I mean that's one of the
most contraindicated herbs
out there with in terms of other medications and things like
that that people may not think about. So I dunno why today I've been sort
of separating the C B D as a natural alternative from you know, the other sort of standard veterinary
medications when they out or drugs and do have powerful effects in the body that
people definitely need to be aware of. I guess it's really my
point of view. I mean, uh, it's just the way I think you're
completely correct all your natural remedies, they all have side effects and toxicities
when used inappropriately and that's why it needs to be guided by somebody
like yourself or somebody that's educated in it's, it goes no different
for C B D. Fortunately though, C B D is much safer than a lot of
our therapeutic drugs in Australia. It's actually been de licensed
from a SS four to SS three drug. So in other words it's a
pharmacy drug potentially. Now that's not gonna happen for a few
more years because it's gonna pass some regulatory hurdles, but as a class of drug it has been
dropped from S four to SS three. So that shows the level of
safety that and the benefits of C B D at low dose away from toxic levels
are fantastic and that's why I guess we had this conversation really because
it is an exciting product that is both natural, it's organic as well. It's got a lot of new therapeutic
applications that we're not even fully aware of yet. For example,
I think there is a study, uh, describing C B D as a new
therapy in pain because it's using a glycine pain pathway that no, none of our current pain drugs are using. That's why it's so safe to add to other
painkillers as well to give us that cumulative or synergistic
effect where, you know, one plus one doesn't necessarily even
equal to it could equal three. Um, so C B D because it's completely
in a different system to our pain pathways in many cases its side
effects are also on a different pathway so it becomes something that we can
add to a lot of other drugs very, very safely as well. So we talk
about a lot about side effects. I think that's just because as a
medical professional always cautious about causing harm and that's a lot
of the focus of medical professionals. You know, we want to get the best
result but with the least harm. And of course to achieve that we
are always thinking about, you know, the harm aspect and how how we can
minimize that to maximize the benefits. But certainly the, the safety
and effectiveness of C B
D is something that, uh, is well worth looking into
and, and using on your pets. But find somebody that's familiar
with C B D medications as well as you know, all the other routine therapeutics and
balance it because the trick is if you get a good balance you can have the
maximum lifespan with the least amount of discomfort and least amount of damage
to organ systems which leads to better health. I think it's really exciting that
pharmaceutical grade prescribed C B D is available to our pets in Australia. Now that was a big point of wanting to
do the show with you today is because of my journey with my French bulldog and
wanting to source a pure source of C B D and not some random product from
the internet that I dunno what it's contaminated with, I
dunno what dose to use, I dunno how to titrate up
or to manage the frequency. And I really wanted to highlight
to people in Australia, pet owners in Australia, CBD Vets Australia is an option
and it is really straightforward. So go to their website,
cbd vets australia.com au. It's full of amazing
information and resources. Their blog page has lots of really
interesting articles that people can read. And the actual process to speak to
someone at CBD Vets Australia is really straightforward. You can give them a call or you can
just fill out their online form and then they will give you a call
back to get the ball rolling. And so the way it worked with us,
I contacted CB D Vets Australia, I had a call back and then they just put
me in touch with the closest vet, uh, vet to me who prescribed C B D. And it
was a really straightforward process. I took my dog there, my dog had a full vet check and we had
a great conversation about, you know, what was going on and what
my goals were for the dog. And we are still in that process,
but I just wanna let people know, do the right thing by your dog. Don't risk some adulterated product
that either has too high or toxic levels of compounds in it or on the other
end of the spectrum may have nothing medicinal or therapeutic in it at all
and it's just an oil that's been marketed for therapeutic benefit. I know we're
really conscious of your time Dr. Lee, is there anything else you wanted to
let the listeners know today about C B D Vets Australia or C B D itself? I've only dealt with uh,
C B D Vets Australia. My confidence in them is that the, uh, products that they are selling
are of extremely high quality. They supply a certificate of analysis
for every product that I get from them. So I do know that I'm getting pure
products and that that's important to me because for me, I'm not here to waste people's
money on things that may not work. I do want things that work
and work well. So, uh, I do find that good quality
C B D products are not cheap. It's not necessarily, uh,
something that I guess is, is necessarily affordable
for everybody. But uh, certainly with for small dogs and cats, it's extremely affordable
for your really large dogs, especially if you're using uh, using
it for epilepsy and things like that. But we tend to use higher doses.
It can be quite expensive, but it's certainly well
worth investigating. It is a bit of a pen here
in that it's low toxicity, great benefits, multiple benefits
throughout the whole body. It's involved in making your pets
feel a lot better. And for me, we started off dipping a toe in it, uh, with a couple of hundred mils and now
we are ordering it by the liters , it's not something that I've spent
much time looking into because it's not available for me to give to clients. Mm-hmm So when our French Bulldog op
started to have a few mobility issues and I'm like, ah, I'd love to explore C B D, I didn't know what to do or where to go, there's a lot of well-meaning people that
will give you recommendations for what to buy online. But because of
my background and you know, I am so particular about quality and
knowing exactly what my human clients are getting and my dog clients as well,
I don't differentiate and say dogs, we don't need to know exactly what the
excipients are and things like that. So I loved when I came across C B D
Vets Australia's website and was able to talk to the people who
actually know about it. And you're not getting a
kickback from it either. Oh, I wish I was somehow . Yeah, I. Know. That would be nice to get some cheaper
C B D, but you know, like Dr. Lee said, you do get what you pay for and if you've
tried C B D from an online source and you haven't seen the results or you've
had negative effects that you've noticed in your dog, then it might be worth
trying. It doesn't have to, you know, be a lifetime commitment.
You can go through CCB d,
vets Australia, get a quote, try it out for a short period of time and
just make an assessment based on that. I know Nelle came in and when she
started researching all about C B D, she was like, we . And I said,
all right, well let's do a podcast on it. And that was that. Yeah. And
speaking of acts of quality, let's wrap up by talking
about our wonderful sponsors, which we normally do at the start of the
show, however, because we had Dr. Leon, we wanted to get straight
into that interview. So tell us about our wonderful sponsors. Our first sponsor is Big Dog Pet Foods
Big Dog are an Australian company that have been manufacturing raw
pet foods for 20 years now, so long before raw food
feeding became a fad. So they really are the leaders
and the experts in their field. Some of the key points of difference with
Big Dog as compared to many other pet food companies is that big dog only use
human grade ingredients in their raw patties and there's absolutely nothing
synthetic or artificial added in. And as a natural healthcare practitioner, I just love that they also offer complete
transparency in everything they do. And something that we both love is the
fact that they often post behind the scenes videos of their
product manufacturing process. And the reason they can do that is
because Big Dog believe in the quality of their products and the quality of the
ingredients that they use in their products. And so like they have
nothing to hide from the consumer, which that's not something you typically
see from any of the big pet food manufacturers. A lot of people may also not realize
that the big dog patties are nutritional and complete and balanced according to
official guidelines. So in this case, they can form with the
Afco nutritional standards. Big Dog offer a great variety
of different protein types, which means there's something to suit
the taste buds of nearly every dog. They also offer a great variety when
it comes to treating various health conditions. For example, this
is one that I've used a lot, like their kangaroo formula
is only 4% fat as fed, which makes it a suitable option for
dogs with mild cases of pancreatitis. Their goat formula has very low
phosphorus levels at only 0.2% as Fed, which makes it a great option for dogs
with mild stages of kidney disease and where owners still would prefer to feed
a little bit of raw food in the dog's diet Patties like their lamb
formula, uh, super high in calories. So even just 1 250 gram patty
contains nearly 600 calories, which is really great for dogs that need
to gain weight or for very active in sporting dogs. And then they also have their single
protein formula for dogs with suspected food intolerances or allergies. I highly recommend that everyone visit
their website, big dog petfood.com, check out their resource center, which is full of articles and guides
and frequently asked questions all about raw food, feeding natural diets, and just general health and
nutrition for both dogs and cats. I know I always tend to focus on dogs, but Big Dog also have raw food
formulas for cats as well. So definitely check that
out. If you're a cat owner, jump into their social media
pages, like their Facebook page, like their Instagram page full of
amazing tips and resources there as well. So that's Big Dog Pet
Foods. Our other sponsor, like Big Dog is Ballen Bone and
they are also an Australian company and they make a range of
dental sticks, collagen sticks, superfood treats and
freeze dried treats. Again, like Big Dog Ballen Bone believing, using quality ingredients and providing
complete transparency when it comes to what they put in all of their products. All of the ingredients in the bowel
and bone range are natural and healthy, which is so great to see, especially when it comes to
dental sticks and dog treats. And each of the dental and collagen
sticks have real meat as the number one ingredient where commonly on the market
you'll see grains as the number one ingredient. The dental sticks are great because they
contain active ingredients that have been proven to not only
freshen your dog's breath, but more importantly to
fight plaque and tartar. So a really good way to think about it
in terms of if you give your dog a dental stick that doesn't contain
active ingredients is like
us cleaning our teeth with just a toothbrush and not using any
toothpaste so it just doesn't make sense. Their collagen sticks are great to boost
mobility and just to promote better health and wellbeing overall. So you can find Bell and Bone online or
Instore at your favorite pet specialty store Australia wide. So
that's bell and bone.com au. And as an ongoing special
for listeners of the show, you can get 20% off Bell and Bone
products using the coupon code Ladybug, definitely jump on their website, bell and bone.com au into the
coupon code ladybug, all one word. So thank you to our wonderful sponsors
for the show. As always, great products, great service, great care for
the pet community at large. And before we finish up, why don't you tell the listeners all
about the range that you're offering? I'm super excited to be
stocking the Vet Activate Rain. A lot of the listeners will already be
familiar with the joint health and the joint care products that the
Vet Activate brands sell. So that's their products based on turmeric
and curcumin and you know, rose Hips. So they're amazing products for
joint health and joint care. But what I'm really excited about now
is that I'm also stocking their brain fuel. The Brain Fuel product is based on M C
T oil and one of my favorite uses for M C T Oil is for senior dogs or dogs
that are aging because there's a lot of research around the use of
M C T oil for things such as canine cognitive dysfunction syndrome and just
improved quality of life for our older dogs. So definitely get onto that. And then there's also their
dental health products. So the dental health is based on
the active ingredient ASCO Phylum Nodosum, which is a bit of a mouthful, but it has been clinically shown to
reduce plaque and tartar in dogs. So the beautiful thing about that is for
pet owners who are not comfortable in feeding their dogs whole raw bones, this is a great alternative to still
keep their teeth nice and clean. And last but not least, your liquid herbs. Yes, I've got the Vet activate range,
which is just going off the shelf and I, I should have mentioned with the
joint health and the joint care, they have actually sold out unfortunately, and I'm expecting new stock to
arrive towards the end of November. So for those of you who are
currently using those products, you'll just have to wait a few
more weeks to restock your shelves. Goes to show how popular they are. They're amazing. And we've spoken on previous shows about
the benefits we've seen from both of those products, particularly
with Ladybug mm with her spinal. Injuries and also that little video of
that dog that was limping up the stairs and after a couple of weeks
of being on that product, was running up the stairs on its
own with a much better gait. If. You haven't seen that,
jump onto my Instagram, Paige Natural Health and Nutrition and
you'll see that video of the dog before and after the vet activate Joint health. And if you are a listener and you're
using the joint health or joint care on your dog and you're
seeing enormous benefits, please video it and send it into
me. We would love to see it. I know Vet Activate would
love to get testimonials, so please make contact with me if that's
something you'd love to share with everyone else. Moving
on to my liquid herbs, I've got a great range
of liquid herbal options. The top two sellers are always the
milk thistle and the mushroom elixir. So they're great super safe tonics
for dogs to use every day long term. And you can read about why you might
choose one of those for your dogs and the benefits on my website, natural
health and nutrition.com au. And I guess one more thing
before we go is my short course. Yeah, we better talk about that because that's
been getting some traction lately as well. Yeah, so I've done a short course. It's all about understanding
commercial pet food labels. So it goes for about two hours, it's only $39 Australian and it's
broken down into great little chunks of information. So you can do a little bit at a time if
you don't have a full two hour spare in one go. But it takes you through everything you
need to know about how to understand what you're actually feeding your dog. So what the different words
on a pet food packet mean, what the guaranteed analysis means,
what the ingredients list means, and the different foods in
the ingredients list means. So really fundamental information for
every pet owner to understand what their dog's eating, because that's a big part
of their health and their longevity. How about. Since Spell and Bone have just given a
nice generous offer to have a discount off that you do one for
your short course as well? Absolutely. I can do that. So what I
can do for all the listeners today, let's do a 50% off. That's very generous. Yeah. So. I will on my Facebook page,
natural Health for People and Pets. So what we could do for a coupon code,
since Bell and Bone using Ladybug, we better not leave out some of
our other dogs. So let's do Pixel. Mm-hmm Pixel 50. Pixel 50 P I X E L five zero. Yep. I will make that happen.
And you can jump onto my website, select the course, make sure you enter
the coupon code and happy learning. And even if you don't use it for
yourself like many other people do, is if you can recommend it to other
people who may benefit from it. Because I'm telling you now,
there's a lot of people out there, like I'm talking hundreds of thousands
of people who autonomously go into supermarkets and they just simply
buy anything off the shelf without doing any research whatsoever in it because
they've been commercially conditioned to do so. Many of us have, I've done
it, you've done it. Most of us do it. It's not an insult to anybody,
it's just a a way of life. So it's. Just, we don't know what
we don't know. It's, we. Dunno. That's right. Exactly. So it'll be beneficial to
anybody who's got a domestic pet, even people who've got any
type of pet whatsoever, but specifically in this case
for dogs and cats. Mm-hmm. They could read exactly what it is that
they're putting into their bowls every day for the rest of that pet's life. Absolutely. It is truly fundamental information
that pet owners really need to be educated around. And it's interesting because I get a lot
of dog trainers listening to the show and when they do the course, like these are industry experienced people
and even they're learning things that they didn't know before about what
they're feeding their dogs and how. Well, I was gonna say that it's probably not
a bad idea that a lot of other industry professionals are doing it because
unfortunately we get a little bit into a mantra of just selling whatever's in
the front office or the front room or anything like that without really
knowing what is it that I'm giving or recommending to my clients, my patients,
my staff, my customers, whatever. Yeah. And it's sad and, and this comes back to why
we're so passionate in our
support of companies such as Big Dog and Ballen Bone, because there are a lot of unscrupulous
companies out there selling dog food. Mm-hmm. . And it really does fall back
on the buyer to do their due diligence in assessing that food before
they feed it to their pets. Absolutely. So don't believe the
marketing hype. Do the course, learn the information for yourself and
both you and your pet will be better off for it. Last thing before we do, go tell everyone
where they can find you all the dates. I've already mentioned, my website,
natural health and nutrition.com au. That's where all the information
about me and my products can be found. That's where you can purchase the
Herbal Tonics, the Vet Activate Range, and the Understanding Commercial Pet
Foods course. If you wanna email me, you can do that at
nelle@naturalhealthnutrition.com au. If you've got any
questions about the show, you can either email me or
jump onto the Facebook page, natural Health for People and Pets and
just pop a post there and I'll see that and we can have a chat that. Way. And don't forget
to like your Instagram, you keep forgetting that every show. Yes. I'm slowly learning to use Instagram, so please support me by
liking my page. Mm-hmm. and I will put
more content on there. That. Sounds good. Okay. Thanks everyone. Bye. Bye.