What to Do When Nothing Seems to Work

If you and your veterinarian are at wits’ end, when nothing seems to work to help a suffering dog, consider the two unique tests described in this chapter. Developed with veterinarians. They can reveal critical clues for developing effective hormonal and nutritional therapies. The tests can also be used to detect deficiencies and imbalances before problems occur so that a preventative strategy can be worked out by your vet.

TEST #1: THE ENDOCRINE-IMMUNE TEST FOR GENETIC PROBLEMS

Sitting atop each kidney is the tiny, thumbnail-shaped adrenal gland, part of an exquisite network of glands called the endocrine system. The role of glands is to produce minute quantities of hormones, including estrogen, adrenaline, and cortisol. Cortisol regulates the activity of the white blood cells known as lymphocytes, immune ceils that produce antibodies to counteract viruses, bacteria, disease, and toxic substances. Cortisol, in turn, is regulated by a hormone produces by the pituitary gland. This hormone controls cortisol production depending on whether there is too much or too little cortisol circulating in the body.

The pituitary-adrenal relationship is just one of many finely tuned feedback mechanisms within the endocrine system that governs a major branch of the body’s defense forces. When the system is operating smoothly the white blood cells naturally recognize the difference between friend and foe. They turn their chemical weapons on the enemy. They do not attack healthy tissue. The hand of man, however, has overturned this remarkable arrangement in many of our dogs.

“Years of inbreeding and line breeding in a one-pointed attempt to achieve certain cosmetic appearances for sales or show ribbons have upset the precision of theses systems and perpetuated the breeding of genetically flawed animals,” says Alfred Plechner, DVM.

Plechner, a Los Angeles veterinarian who has investigated this issue for more than 35 years, believes that the critical regulating mechanisms linking the endocrine and the immune systems have been seriously damaged. Many animals can’t produce enough cortisol, or what they do produce is inactive. Their other hormones are out of balance as well. The flaws are passed down from generation to generation, from purebreds to purebreds, form purebreds to mixed breeds, and from mixed breeds to other mixed breeds.

COMMON TYPES OF ENDOCRINE-IMMUNE DISORDERS

The end result is the proliferation of animals programmed for self-destruction, says Plechner. Their internal systems are out of control. They have all the medical diseases that the veterinary profession has trouble treating:

* Severe hypersensitivity.

* Relentless skin allergies with inflammation, ulceration, and itchiness.

* Chronic vomiting and diarrhea.

* Generalized mange.

* Aggressiveness, rage, and weird behavior.

* Seizures and head shaking.

* Chronic liver, pancreas, and urinary tract problems.

Moreover, dogs with genetically based hormonal-immune unbalances may not develop protective antibodies from vaccinations. Vaccines may be worthless for them.

“These animals need improved diets, the right supplements, and help with acupuncture and other natural means, but none of these good methods may work well unless you consider and rectify their hormonal mechanisms,” Plechner says. “It’s wonderful if you can enhance a system naturally that is suppressed, depressed, or screwed up some. I believe you can often do this with remarkable results. But many animals are too genetically defective, too far gone, and there is nothing you can do but replace the missing hormonal links-synthetically, with drugs. There is nothing there but a vacuum, and you can’t enhance it, you can only fill it.”

For many conditions, veterinary medicine relies intensely on a family of important synthetic cortisol drugs commonly called “steroids” or “cortisone” (such as Prednisone, Medrol, and Vetalog). They are anti-inflammatory and anti-itching agents that work well for a certain period of time, but when given in powerful pharmaceutical doses they can cause suppression of the adrenal glands and many side effects. If used properly, these drugs can keep many genetically flawed animals on an even keel, and indeed for some of them may be all that can keep them alive, says Plechner, adding that the key is using them properly, in doses that are physiologically relevant.

COMMON DETERMINING ACCURATE HORMONAL REPLACEMENT LEVELS

To determine accurate dosages, Plechner champions a blood test that, among other things, measures the level of cortisol an animal Is producing. The test is called “the E-l One” test and is available to veterinarians at the National Veterinary Diagnostic Services. The criteria and range of normal values for the test were developed by Plechner.

The test monitors a critical range of hormonal and antibody activity: resting cortisol, total estrogen, testosterone, progesterone, T-3, T-4, IgA, lgM, and lgG. Comprehensive tests such as these are not done routinely by veterinarians.

Veterinarians tend not to measure cortisol and simply prescribe steroids that are often too strong or not appropriate. This results all too frequently in side effects. Plechner strongly recommends measuring the level of a patient’s ability to produce natural cortisol and if a deficiency exists, to treat it physiologically.

“That means treating it at levels that are appropriate, and that usually means tiny amounts,” he says. “You correct the body’s own deficiency, and you don’t get the side effects. I recently corrected a 140-pound dog totally out of sync with 1 milligram of Medrol, much less than a standard pharmaceutical dose of 4 to 6 milligrams.”

One of the other important elements of the test is the measurement for total estrogen. Standard tests, by comparison, look only at a component of estrogen, called “estrdiol.”

“I have found total estrogen to be a more accurate measurement of this one particular hormone, “Plechner explains. “Estrogen can exert a dramatic blocking effect on cortisol and thyroid hormones, and just a slight variation out of the normal range is enough to cause a cascade of hormonal and immune complications.”

Your veterinarian can also arrange for the laboratory to do a more comprehensive test (called “the E-l Two”) that includes the E-l panel plus complete blood count and blood chemistry. “With this more elaborate test you can connect-and then correct-abnormalities in endocrine-immune activity to irregularities in organs or other systems in the body,” according to Plechner. “Hormonal imbalances can be addressed by simple hormonal replacement therapy, which helps restore normal immune function. This is an important first step in therapy. It allows the veterinarian to make an accurate correction and manage it long-term. True genetic imbalances require lifelong management, in my opinion. Acquired imbalances can occur as a result of exposure to toxic chemicals, anesthesia, heavy metals, or pollutants. They may require only temporary management or, in some cases, management for a lifetime. This test is extremely beneficial in providing clues for intractable cases or where there have been substantial health problems early in an animal’s life. It also has great benefit as a prevention tool in helping to determine which animals should or should not be bred.”

Yet another test, called “the E-1 Three,” looks at four hormonal levels. Plechner recommends it for any individual considering the purchase of a puppy. The greater the hormonal imbalances revealed by this test, the greater the loss of control over the immune system and the earlier in an animal’s life one sees health problems.

“If you find such imbalances, our choice i to put the animal on hormonal replacement or not accept the animal,” Plechner says. “I would very much like to see breeders use passing marks in this test as criteria for future breeding of animals. Fortunately, I have increasing numbers of breeders who are using it. As they breed hormonally healthier animals they are finding fewer health problems in the offspring. This type of test offers a solution to the current nightmare. We have a great urgency to do something, and this is something we can all do.”

Plechner says these special tests have allowed him, and other veterinarians who use them, to help animals who otherwise remain untreatable or who are walking time bombs just waiting to explode.

For individuals who may be philosophically opposed to using pharmaceutical drugs and synthetic hormones, Plechner says this: “I have found in so many cases that there is nothing you can do for these pitiful creatures other than replace synthetically what is genetically missing in their bodies. I am all for correcting the diet, feeding the best possible food, and adding supplements, but to do this, too. This is what the term ‘holistic’ should be all about. Looking at the whole picture. At least do these tests. Get the information.”

The information, he says, provides something to think about for cases that may not respond to anything good, well meaning, and natural you do for your animal.

{citation: chap. 16, pp-79-83}