Why is There is so Much Pancreatitis in Dogs?

Hyperlipidaemia (excess fat in the blood) is one of accepted causes of acute pancreatitis or recurring bouts of acute pancreatitis in humans. It is thought to account for 7% of cases, making it the most common cause of the disease after gall stones and alcohol. 

The presence of excess fat is how your vet typically diagnoses the condition in your dog. A pancreas in trouble does not digest fat very well. Hence, one way to detect the possible signs of pancreatitis is to simply measure the amount of triglycerides (fat) in the blood. Another way is to test for lipase, the enzyme secreted by the pancreas to digest fat. A stressed pancreas is assumed to produce much more of it, something a simple blood test in a fasted dog would reveal. Finally, as most pancreatic dog owners will testify to, the most obvious outward sign (asides pain, as it really hurts) is a loose stool that is greasy with undigested fat. 

So concerned are our vets for fat, that when discussing a possible cause of the issue the line “it can be something as simple as that bit of fat off your steak” is often trotted out. Like when we thought eating fat made you fat (giving rise to low-fat and thus HIGH SUGAR diets, greatly exasperating the obesity epidemic), it made perfect sense. If there is too much fat in the blood, then surely you have been eating too much of it. Only that statement is not only entirely unsupported by the literature but, as we have since learned from the obesity epidemic, very likely to be absolutely false. Of course, dogs should be able to eat a big lump of fatty meat now and again, that’s what they are designed to do. As you will learn below, they are more adept at utilising fat than we are. 

To understand a little more about this we need to first discuss the three different energy pathways…the first is your already formed and stored energy, ATP (adenosine tri phosphate, you might remember from school!). This energy system is ready to go. As such it is rapid but short lasting. In gym terms, it can produce lots of power but only for a very short duration, perhaps twelve seconds of maximal effort. Think of it as the favoured pathway of your 100m sprinter, for instance.

The second system is known as the Glycolytic System. This system runs on glycogen (blood sugar) stored in the muscles and liver, which you create after consuming carbohydrates and, to a lesser degree, protein. In gym terms, this pathway provides for you moderate power of moderate duration, perhaps thirty seconds. 

The third system is known as the fatty acid Oxidation System. This is essentially three systems (of which the Krebs cycle is part of it…I know you remember….!). For now, all we need to note is that instead of blood glycogen it uses stored fat (lipolysis) to fuel the ATP conversion. In gym terms, it offers the least power but the greatest duration. It is why top long distance runners (and all long-pursuit animals such as dogs and wolves) all do it on fat (and why they are all bordering-skeletal).

It happens that the more carbohydrates you consume, the less likely you are to use the fatty acid Oxidation System. In humans, the ingestion of high-carbohydrate diets for a long period of time decreases fatty acid oxidation by decreasing the rate of fatty acid entry into the mitochondria.  This means, rather paradoxically, the more carbohydrates you consume, the less fat is consumed by the mitochondria and the net result is an elevation of blood fat. In other words, it is a high-carb diet that raises your blood fat. Authors note, that when the content of dietary carbohydrate is elevated above 55% of ME, blood triglycerides rise.  It even has a catchy name too – carbohydrate-induced hypertriglyceridemia. 

Studies show this is very much what’s happening in dry fed dogs. Raw-meat-and-bone fed dogs (very low carb diet) exhibited reduced blood fat than dogs fed a dry, cereal-based diet. Dr Mark Roberts is a leading authority on the role of dietary fat in dogs, particularly in relation to sporting dogs. His latest work dispels the mythological role of dietary fat in pancreatitis in dogs. They found that their dogs’ pancreas were not working harder on high-fat diets by any measure available to them. Using twenty dogs that were fed regular diets and then alternatively fed high-carb or high-fat diets, then blood fat, lipase and stool quality was measured. Roberts found blood triglycerides were not higher in the high-fat diets, as expected by conventional veterinary medicine, but actually lower than those on high-carb diets. The pancreas does not produce more lipase under a high-fat challenge but the same as a high-carb diet. Even stool quality is better in the high-fat fed dogs. Thus, by all measures, increasing dietary fat failed to induce the parameters linked to pancreatitis in dogs which conventional veterinary medicine say it does.

In short, if blood fat is an accepted cause of pancreatitis and we know high-carb diets increase blood fat, perhaps they should ease off the carbohydrates in dogs. 

It gets worse for dry-fed dogs suffering pancreatitis on their high-carb meals. Once it sets in, pancreatitis will result in a Vitamin E deficiency.  Vitamin E’s primary role is as an antioxidant, mopping up excess fats in the system. As the failing organ struggles to break down fat in the diet, more Vitamin E is required to clean up the excess fat. But Vitamin E is notoriously unstable. And in dry pet foods, after just six months’ storage, it is proven to reduce by 30%.  It is, therefore, expected to be in short supply in most dry foods. And as this is what dry-fed dogs receive in the way of fresh nutrients, thus begins a vicious circle.

As fat builds in the blood of dogs consuming high-carb diets, the body screams for more lipase to get the fat out of the blood and the pancreas complies. Measure the dog for lipase at this point and the values will be worryingly high. What do conventional vets recommend now? Low-fat (and thus higher carb) diets. It is at this near-breaking point that, one more load of fat might push the system over the pancreatic cliff. In a perfect straw-camel’s-back scenario, it’s not the final piece of straw but the heavy load already in place. Of course, the carnivore’s pancreas should have been able for that bit of fat, as meat-eaters dogs are better as its digestion than we are (later). Sadly, it is at this low moment that modern vets tend to blame the owner for a dietary indiscretion, when it was far more likely that the vets’ own poor dietary advice put the dog on the table in the first place.