Vitamin C for Your Pets by Bud Stuart DVM
One of the most commonly used vitamins in human nutrition is vitamin C or sodium ascorbate. It is supplied in either tablet, capsule or powder forms to humans and the same vitamin C, in either regular or ester-C form is often used in pets as well. Ester-C is a more potent form of vitamin C and less acidic. It is also the form which is usually made in the United States and not in China.
I have often recommended vitamin C in dogs which have joint problems. This vitamin is known as a collagen precursor, which means it can help build cartilage which lines the joints. Some years ago a Swedish experiment proved that administration of vitamin C to pregnant German Shepherd females who had hip dysplasia, cut the incidence of that problem in their puppies by approximately 75%. These puppies were evidently born with much better cartilage lining their joints. Additional work since has shown that hip dysplasia is basically a nutritional problem and not a genetic one as once thought. So vitamin C can work to prevent hip problems even in dogs at high risk for it.
With older dogs we use vitamin C in treatment of arthritic hips and joints. Someone once called vitamin C “The poor man’s cortisone”. This statement points to the fact that vitamin C has many of the anti-inflammatory effects of cortisone, but not the side effects. Vitamin C, as we have noted, is also a collagen precursor. It helps build the collagen tissue of which cartilage is formed. Basically, if cartilage can be preserved or repaired, arthritis can often be avoided.
This vitamin also has a general anti-inflammatory effect in the body tissues as well. This, in turn, thus relieves pain in those tissues. Recently I treated an extremely painful episode of plantar fasiculitis (heel spur) in myself with huge doses of vitamin C and was symptom free in two days despite my friends and clients telling me how many cortisone injections they needed for the same results.
In addition to this, years ago, when canine distemper was a very deadly common virus disease, I used vitamin C to defeat it. Taking a page from Nobel prize winner Dr. Linus Pauling’s notebook, I devised an intravenous treatment of distemper with large doses of liquid vitamin C. In just 24 hours their high temperatures would begin to fall and by the day following the snotty noses and discharging eyes would be clearing as well. A second intravenous administration of vitamin C would clear them up completely. I know this saved the lives of many of my patients. For Dr. Pauling had discovered that vitamin C can actually destroy virus particles in the body. So that is what my huge i.v. doses would do to the distemper virus.
Vitamin C is also a water soluble vitamin and thus readily removed from the body via the urine thus making it virtually impossible to overdose. This fact makes it valuable in acidifying both cat and dog urine. For pets suffering from chronic bladder problems it is easy to add the powder form to their food and produce a nice acidic urine which defeats most bacteria. From approximately 100 mg in the cat to a maximum of 500mg in large dogs, vitamin C is usually well received by the pet. This dose can be given multiple times a day as needed.
So check with your veterinarian if you think vitamin C could be in your pet’s future. You might find it will bring surprising benefits in many different areas and at a cost far less than many medications.
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I just recently learned from my holistic vet about Dr. Wendell Belfield and how large amounts of Vitamin C have helped German Shepherds ( and other dogs) with hip dysplasia. Having just acquired a German Shepherd puppy whom my vet feels may have hip dysplasia, I have order Dr. Belfields Vit C.
In the fall of 1965, Dr. Wendell Belfield, veterinarian, drew 2000 milligrams of sodium ascorbate (buffered Vitamin C) into a hypodermic syringe and injected it intravenously into a dog infected with the canine distemper virus. This one procedure was the beginning of orthomolecular medicine in a veterinary practice. “Orthomolecular medicine” is the preservation of health and the treatment of disease by the provision of the optimum molecular constitution of the body, especially the optimum concentrations of substances that are normally present in the human body and are required for life. This is a new branch of medicine established by the late Linus Pauling, Ph.D. — a two time Nobel Prize-winner