Caring for Your Aging Pet with Dr. Greer from CheckOut Vet

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Height thirty six thirteen ten WIBA and ask the experts
with Checkout Veterinary hanging out this morning with doctor Marty Greer.
Of course, doctor Greer recognized as Veterinarian of the Year
by the Westminster Kennel Club. You can learn more about
doctor Greer and check out Veterinary that vets as well
as what makes the clinic so very very convenient and
unique online checkout vets dot com. That's checkout vet dot com.

(00:24):
Great day to start that relationship, make that appointment, Get
on in. Their open Monday through Wednesday, Friday through Sunday.
Say well what about Thursday. It's one great thing is
their other clinic, check in Vet is open Monday through Friday,
so fantastic. I mentioned starting that relationship. First visit is
free to doctor. Good morning. You're not going to beat that.
That is a great way to for a great introduction

(00:45):
to what you guys do at Checkout Veterinarian. A really
a really nice thing that you do for pets and people.

Speaker 2 (00:52):
Well, thanks.

Speaker 3 (00:52):
We want to make sure people feel comfortable with the
business model. It's a different way for you to receive
veterinary care, and we want to make sure you and
your petter comfort that so you have absolute corfonde to
drive up, give us a call, come on in, and
let's see what your cat or your dog or cats
and dogs think of us before you commit to anything.

Speaker 1 (01:13):
It's it's pretty and it's it's such a you mentioned
kind of see what the clinics like and get that experience.

Speaker 4 (01:20):
And I know I've said this before.

Speaker 1 (01:21):
It's revolutionary, but it's also one of those things where
you're like, why is you know, why is this just
now that it's like one of those I think it's
there's a lot of great ideas where you're like, why
didn't we just always do things that way? What was
kind of the backstory for you? Where did you come
up with this idea of this concept and why did
you say, you know what, we've got to do it

(01:42):
this way.

Speaker 3 (01:42):
Well, we travel a lot, and when I go through
the airport, I remember when we didn't have suitcases with wheels. Yeah,
and now can you imagine going any place without wheels
on your suitcase? So you're right, I mean that was
patented sometime in the nineteen eighties and it's kind of hard, like, really,
how did that happen? So our backstory is We built

(02:02):
a clinic in Lamyra in two thousand and eight and
at the time I put in one garage bay between
our main clinic and the staff building where the lunch
room and the doctor's offices are. And as we were
undergoing construction, I called my architect and I said, I
want more garage base. I want three, not one. He goes, okay,
we'll push the other building over, but don't mess up
my roofline.

Speaker 2 (02:22):
I'm like, okay, fine.

Speaker 3 (02:23):
So it works so well for us at the Lamira
Clinic for clients, and it's not for the staff to
pull in, you know, because.

Speaker 2 (02:29):
We're lazy or want to hide our car or anything
like that.

Speaker 3 (02:31):
It's for our clients, so that when you come in
and you have a dog that's recovering from surgery or
Heaven help you, you need to have a euthanasia or something,
you know they're really sick you can't get out. Or
maybe it's you that has a mobility issue. Maybe you've
got three kids with you on your way to soccer practice.
Maybe grandma's with you in the car and you're a
little worried that if you run inside for a second,

(02:53):
Grandma may like slip over into the driver's seat and
take off even though she's not supposed to be driving.
So all those things make it a lot more difficult
for clients to get their pets in and out and
their families taken care of at the same time, So
it just made sense to combine those.

Speaker 4 (03:08):
It's such an amazing concept.

Speaker 1 (03:09):
I do want actually one of these weeks, I think
we should talk pat you ethan age, because I think
it's such an important area and not talked about enough.
But it's obviously with everything the circle of life, and
I want to talk about this week though, I think
it's a We've got a couple of things. First off,
mentioned the phone lines are open six three two one
thirteen ten six three two one thirteen ten. You can

(03:29):
also email if you want to shoot me an email
Sean at wiva dot com. We can get you on
the air. But we had I had somebody message me
about their dog going going through cancer treatments, and just
like people dogs with cancer battling cancer with health concerns,
appetite is effect and they were wondering what can be

(03:50):
done to help keep the appetite up for their for
their pet while they're undergoing these treatments and thought, that's
a really.

Speaker 3 (03:58):
Great question because we're I know, on the human side,
on the veterinary side, that one of the greatest risk
factors to treatment is weight loss. When my mother was
sick with cancer, I had to encourage her to eat.

Speaker 2 (04:11):
Oh my dad was I had to do the same.

Speaker 3 (04:13):
And you know, my dad's nurse kept looking at me saying,
what are you so concerned about appetite for? And I'm like,
because weight loss has such a high correlation with poor
outcomes that it's really important that the caloric needs of
the pet are kept up with. So it may mean
cooking them a special meal. Hey, what the heck? You know,

(04:33):
scrambled eggs, cottage cheese, a little chicken. A lot of
people boil chicken. Don't boil it, poach it very gently,
cook it, and use dark meat chicken. Don't use white
meat chicken breast because the dark meat chicken taste better,
has a little more fat in it, it's a little
higher in touring for the heart. So all the reasons.
Buy chicken thighs and chicken legs. They're fifty nine cents

(04:53):
acount by ninety nine a pound, so throw them in
your instant pot. Cook them up with some celery and
some carrots.

Speaker 2 (04:59):
Make them fla.

Speaker 3 (05:00):
Favored cook for your pet. If you need to hamburger
and rice, chicken and rice, you can do pasta, you
can do There's lots of things that you can do
to entice your pet to eat. If they have loose stools,
you can use probiotics, and you can use yogurt and
things like that. So there's lots of things you can
do in the kitchen. So start with really going out
of your way. If you open the fridge or you
start making dinner and the pet comes over and looks

(05:21):
at you, like that smells pretty good, unless it's grapes.
Raisins are really spicy. I share, I share a lot,
so start with that. There are drugs on the market
that are really helpful. There's one called mertazepine. It's used
as a tablet in dogs. We used to use it
as a tablet in cats, but now they make a
gel for the inside of the ear. So instead of
trying to poke another pill down your cat when you

(05:44):
already have a cat that's not feeling well, that's hard.
So it's a little gel inside the ear. And then
there's a liquid product. It's on the feline side.

Speaker 2 (05:52):
It's called a lura.

Speaker 3 (05:53):
The same drug as a dog drug is called entice.
The actual name of the drug is kind of a
long and complicated you know, who wants to really say that,
but a lot of people can remember a license called
cap rome. Morelen is the generic name, but you can

(06:14):
buy it from your vet. It comes as a liquid
if you ask your vet for that. Great and some
of our pets we put on steroids for a number
of reasons, like prednozone, and if they're not feeling well
and not eating well, prednizone can stimulate the appetite as well.
So there's lots of things we can do, and that
weight loss is really it's very important that we don't
let that get ahead of us. I have taken care
of many pets over the years with cancer and I

(06:36):
had a Golden Retriever that came in a number of
years ago. We lived with lymphoma, which is a pretty
common kind of cancer. It's lymph node cancer and Golden's
and I said to her the greatest risk is weight loss.
Go home and feed him. She brought him back. He
had gained twenty pounds. You could set a table.

Speaker 2 (06:52):
For four on this dog's back like it was.

Speaker 3 (06:55):
He became enormous, but he lived for over a year
with nothing other than predna zone. So there's a really
strong correlation there, So make sure your pet is eating it.
If your pet isn't, talk to your veterinarian about what
else can we do to support them.

Speaker 1 (07:09):
It's fine, And it's interesting about cancer treatments for pets,
cats and dogs is obviously we experience for humans. There's
great treatments out there for dogs and cats. Are there
are there good treatments that can help really prolong life
and really keep a good quality while they're in that battle.

Speaker 2 (07:27):
It depends on the kind of cancer.

Speaker 3 (07:28):
Just like with us, we don't have quite the sophistication
level of cancer treatment that we do for humans. But
you know, if we start coming up with some of
the things that the AI proposed health care changes are
going to be, that we can make a vaccine for
specific kinds of cancer, we're going to see some major
breakthroughs in the next few years. But for right now,
we have prednozone which works for a lot of kinds

(07:49):
of cancer, especially lymphoma. There are very specific protocols for
lymphoma One was actually developed at the Universe University of
Wisconsin in the oncology department, called the Chop protocol, and
it's been used for probably thirty years and it's still
the backbone of that. We have some newer drugs ones
called Palladia, and it's used as a pill every other
day at home, so this doesn't require hospitalization. That takes

(08:12):
care of mass cell tumors. In certain other kinds of cancer.
We also have a drug for lymphoma, specifically Lavardia. It's
a pill that's given orally again at home. They're ccnu
or low mustine, which is given at home. So not
all treatments require in the hospital care. They do require
periodic blood work. They do require seeing the pet from

(08:33):
time to time to make sure that they're doing okay,
that their dose is correct, that there's nothing else that's
come up that we need to adjust. But we are
getting better at chemotherapy for dogs. There's also specific radiation therapy,
so they will have to do anesthesia for your pet
because of course they won't lay under the radiation machine
for the extended period of time that it requires. And

(08:55):
surgery can still be one of the most important parts.
Things like mammory tumors. Really there's no chemo for those,
so really surgery is your best choice. So we have
those options and we're going to see some pretty impressive breakthroughs.
Some of the drugs we use were developed for dogs
and moved into the human healthcare, some were reversed, some
came from human healthcare to our dogs. Osteosarcoma, for instance,

(09:16):
they've been doing a lot of studies on dogs for osteosarcoma,
which is bone cancer, because children's osteosarcoma is similar, so
they have used dogs as a treatment model. So we
see that healthcare going both directions, and it's pretty cool
when we can see a breakthrough that comes from the
veterinary side that helps human health as well.

Speaker 4 (09:35):
That's really fascinating.

Speaker 1 (09:37):
As we talked this morning with doctor Marty Greer of
Checkout Veterinary, the website checkout vet dot com. That's checkout
vet dot com. Mentioned the Great Clinic, and of course
you can learn more online at checkout vet dot com.
A really cool animation that kind of walks you through
how checkout vet works and what makes it so unique.
I have mentioned how convenient it is to get to
They are right off the Interstate, right in Sun Prayer

(09:59):
and Praier Lakes dri the Interstate on one P fifty
one and it's right there, so it's a very convenient
location as well. At checkout Veterinary again the website checkout
vets dot com. That's checkout vet dot com. I'm going
to talk a little bit about caring for an aging pet,
but I wanted to ask one thing too. As we
are on pet cancers, identifying pet cancers is typically just
done through noticing. Obviously, different types of cancers are going

(10:21):
to are going to present differently, But what are we
doing for identifying cancers and pets?

Speaker 3 (10:27):
Well, any lump or bump that is newer, starts to change,
should be addressed by seeing your veterinarian. Different lumps can
mean different things, and that's pretty difficult for you as
a pet owner to really be able to tell. If
you have your pet groomed every six to eight weeks
and your groomer says, I just found this or this
is getting bigger. The groomers have their hands on those
pets far more often than your veterinarian does, and they

(10:48):
will identify and be able to let you know that
there's a change or something new or a changing type
of mass. And I see lots of clients, lots of
clients will say, well, you know, I'm just going to
watch and see what it does. Well, I can tell
you what it's going to do. It's going to get bigger.
So don't wait until it's so big that it's surgically unapproachable,

(11:08):
or that it metastasizes, or it turns into something really serious.
When you find something that looks at all suspicious to you,
make an appointment, go in see your veterinarian or your
veterinary professional. If you're a VET can't get you, and
maybe your vet tech can take a look and take
a look and see is this something that needs to
be addressed surgically? Should we do a needle aspirit and
determine what the problem is. There's a new piece of

(11:29):
equipment that a lot of veterinary clinics have now. It
uses some artificial intelligence. It's a little microscope that sits
on the counter in the lab at the veterinary clinic.
And if you have your vet do a little needle
asprit like they slip a needle in, pull out a
few cells, put it under the microscope. A pathologist remotely
can come in, look through your microscope and look at
the cells. They'll look at a number of different fields.

(11:51):
So sometimes it uses artificial intelligence if it's doing something
like a urine sample or a stool sample. But if
it's looking at a tumor type or possible tumor type,
the pathologist looks at it and within two hours you
can have an answer of is this serious or is
this something.

Speaker 2 (12:04):
That I don't have to be concerned about.

Speaker 3 (12:06):
It's really cool to see what artificial intelligence is doing
for us.

Speaker 4 (12:09):
That is amazing.

Speaker 1 (12:10):
As we talked this morning with doctor Marty Greer, I
had no idea such technology existed, and I love technology.

Speaker 4 (12:16):
Yeah, so cool. I want to I want to.

Speaker 1 (12:19):
Talk as mentioned, we're going to talk about caring for
aging pets and some of the adaptations you can make
around the house and to make things easier for your pet.
We're going to talk with a doctor about that in
just a moment. Don't forget if you've got a question,
We've got tom for you. We'd love to have you
join us this morning. Tell if I'm going to get
on the air six so eight three two one thirteen
ten that's six soh eight three, two one, thirteen ten
gets you right on the air with doctor Marty Greer

(12:41):
and again the website for checkout Veterinary, checkout vet dot com.
That's checkout vet dot com. First visit is free, get
that free exam obviously of treatments, medications, those type of things.
There are fees. And a nice thing about checkout Veterinary
is if you go check out vet dot com, they've
got a great section that'll help you understand costs as
a pet owner. I know every for everybody, I mean
money makes the world go around understanding what what the

(13:04):
costs are going to be. It's very transparent, black and white.
Right at checkout vet dot com. We'll into our conversation
with doctor Prey. We will do that next as ask
the experts with Checkout Veterinary continues right here not thirteen
ten wu ib I so shortest yeah.

Speaker 4 (13:17):
Shortest break in the world. I look up and I realized.

Speaker 1 (13:21):
We didn't have a commercial in wich is which makes
it easier and so that's good to see. So just
talking this morning with doctor Martin Greave. Checkout Veterinary. The
website checkout vet dot com. That's checkout vet dot com.
Right at twenty seven to ten Prairie legs drive in
sun Prairie. Super convenient to get you right off the highway,
just off the interstate in sun Prairie. They're tough number six,

(13:43):
So right three one eight sixty seven hundred. That's three
one eight sixty seven hundred. Talked about the website checkout
vet dot com. You can learn more about checkout Veterinary,
the unique model and how it's so convenient for you
and really good for your pet to come. Drive right
on into checkout vet. You can see a really good
explanation of how it works. The other cool thing about
the website is if you are a patient, your pet's

(14:04):
are patient, you can make an appointment other things right online.
You're just head them over to check out vet dot com.

Speaker 4 (14:10):
Doctor inevitability. We all get old, and so.

Speaker 1 (14:13):
Do our pets if we're lucky, if we're that very
good point, very very good point. And obviously with all pets,
and I always focus in with this, I start thinking
about dogs, cats as well. You want to, Yeah, they
start aging. What are some of the as far as
like around the house, some areas that people should maybe
be thinking of when it comes to aging pets and

(14:34):
making sure that the house is still accommodating and this
is their place.

Speaker 3 (14:37):
Yeah, and I think this is really important because there
are definitely things we can do for our pets unlike
what they tell us to do. They tell us to
pick up the rugs so we don't have a trip hazard. Actually,
for our pets, the rugs can be helpful because if
they are starting to lose their footing and they're sliding around,
they can use those rugs for better gripping. They make
Doctor Busby makes a toe band. It goes around the

(14:57):
toenails of the pets. You put one on each. How
that helps with gripping as well. You can use little
inserts to put on your steps to make it easier
for the pets to go up and down. They make
a harness for dogs now that if they're bigger dogs.
You know, if they're little like yours, you can pick
them up and carry them up the stairs. But for
the bigger dogs sometimes we need to put that harness

(15:19):
on them. It's a dog lift to help them up
and down the stairs. Because you know, if your bedroom's
upstairs and you want your pet to go up there
at night with you and come back down at the
end of the night. You want just still be able
to accommodate that and not have to sleep on the
main floor on the couch. They make dog ramps that
fold up and go into your vehicle, so if you
have an suv or a minivan and your pet needs
to go with you, like weather Tech makes a great one.

(15:41):
There's some really nice products on the market, like that
orthopedic beds. Oh Man, they make temper pedic beds for dogs.
Now they make heated beds, so it's really comfy. And cats,
of course, we don't want to forget the cat's love heat,
so those heated pet beds can be really fantastic. So
there's a lot of little things we can do to
improve their quality of life and to improve their comfort

(16:03):
during that time period. If your pet is really cool
or cool, you know, buy i'm a heated bed. Make
sure they can get to their food and water bowl.
My sister feeds one of her young cats up high
because she has two and one you know, so if
you don't remember that, like you used to put the
food and water bowls up high so that the dog
didn't get them, and the cat used to jump onto
the washing machine or the bathroom count or whatever. Now

(16:25):
they can't anymore. They can start losing weight because they
literally can't get there. If your litter box is down
in the basement, move it for your old lady cat
so that she can get to the box. There's a
lot of little things we can do for our pets
that sometimes we forget about. They make senior pet diets
and those aren't just a gimmick. Those actually have a
higher fiber content to improve their intestinal health. They're lower

(16:49):
in calories. They put el carnatine into them to help
lose weight. And there's some brain diets. Now there's two
different companies make a brain diet. One it's called Neurocare
Bright Minds from Purina. The other is BD from Hills
and they just introduced. Hills just introduced the Cat Brain
Diet last weekend. So it's a combination of a diet

(17:10):
for cats that have arthritis and have some mental slipping
so that we can keep them up to date. And
then of course we have the new drugs Silentia for
cats and Librella for dogs that approaches ourthritis pain using
a nerve growth factor, monoclonal A and a body technology.

(17:31):
So it's an injection that's given once a month. We
use testosterone in our practice as well as a monthly
injection to improve muscle tone in male and female dogs.
So there's a lot of things that we can be doing.
Keep them at the right weight, keep them groom make
sure their teeth are clean. I mean, there's lots of
things that we can and should be doing to improve.

Speaker 2 (17:50):
Their quality of life.

Speaker 3 (17:50):
Get your blood work done on a regular basis once
or twice a year. We see a lot of older
cats and dogs that go into kidney failure, have diabetes,
have cancer, have heart disease, all that stuff we can
We have great drugs and great interventions now with diet
and modifications of your lifestyle that you can really help
your pets age gracefully and keep them comfortably, not just alive,

(18:14):
but comfortably alive.

Speaker 1 (18:15):
It's it when you mentioned the beds we bought Homer
or and we goof at it because he's got we
bought him. It's a certa, it's a human bread.

Speaker 4 (18:26):
But they make it.

Speaker 1 (18:28):
And we always joke like when we go on vacation,
we always we always are take them to travel with
them always, like we had a little Homer voice to
go don't forget my surdu He wants that with him
everywhere he goes. But I guess with all pets is
comfortable sleep and those things. What about things like steps,
ramps You mentioned ramps for getting into getting into cars

(18:48):
and things like that. What about having steps to get
up on, like if you have a pet that's on
the couch, having something there for him to get up there.

Speaker 3 (18:54):
You know, they make those. In my experience, most of
the pets don't want to use them.

Speaker 2 (18:59):
Okay, they to well, they might use them.

Speaker 3 (19:01):
Going up, but when they come off, they usually just
leap off. You know, your dog doesn't walk down the
full flight of stairs when they're young either. They about
three or four from the bottom. They just like jump
in and leap, you know. So it's a good idea
if you can get your pet to use it, But
sometimes they won't. So sometimes it takes some training. Sometimes
you just have to realize you're going to have to
lift them, so you know, do your best.

Speaker 1 (19:23):
What about morning routines is you know, is I think
of as myself as a little not quite as spry
when I'm rolling out of bed in the morning. I
mean that is that something like if you're somebody. Let's
say you've got a dog that's a running companion. You
guys are doing it, starting the day off, stretches, those
type of things, especially as they get older, are probably
pretty important.

Speaker 2 (19:42):
Oh yeah, all the.

Speaker 3 (19:43):
Same stuff you should be doing for yourself. Even if
you're not doing it for yourself, at least think about
it for your pet, because they don't have the judgment
and they don't have the ability to say, excuse me,
but let's do a little warm up here before we
go out, and if they are cold, if we have
a cold day like we have not today we've had.
They also aroo Ro that little company that makes the

(20:05):
heated human vests. They make heated dots per two that
are rechargeable batteries, so you can just put that on
your little dog and you can still go out for
your walk.

Speaker 2 (20:14):
But they can be comfortable.

Speaker 3 (20:15):
Put little booties on if you need to. But keep
our pets comfortable, keep them warm, keep them happy, make
sure they've got access to food and water. You know,
all the obvious stuff, but don't forget special diets do
make a difference. They make joint diets, they make they
make weight loss diets, they make brain diets, They make
heart diets, they make intestinal diets, they make all these
things that we can really help our pets. So talk

(20:38):
to your vet or your veterinary technician, your veterinary professionals.
Your vet may not be the one that takes care
of this, but you may have a vet tech that
loves to help with the elderly pets. Orvius has a
whole web page about aging pets that has all their
products on it. Avma has a great web page. So
do some research and figure out what you can work

(20:59):
into your lifestyle for that, because those oh my gosh,
those little orthopedic beds, they they're they're the bomb.

Speaker 1 (21:05):
Talking this morning with doctor Marty Greer here at thirteen
ten WUIVA ask the experts with check out Vetertari the
website checkout vet dot com. That's checkout vet dot com.
They're twelve number six oaight three one eight sixty seven hundred.
That's six o' eight three one eight sixty seven hundred.
Talking this week about caring for your aging pet. I know,
as as humans age, as so do pets, teeth become

(21:26):
a concern. And I know we talk about when they're young,
getting them, getting them used to and regularly brushing their
teeth and oral health is so important as they age.
It's certainly some of those maybe deficiencies that you may
have skipped don over.

Speaker 4 (21:41):
Your start to start to rear their ugly head, don't
they They do.

Speaker 3 (21:44):
And most pets, especially the small breeds, need to have
a dental cleaning done with anesesia as they get older,
for not just their breath, the quality of their breath,
but if they are loose teeth or diseased teeth, they
may need to be extracted. And of course all that
bacteria in their mouth is unhealthy, so every time they chew,
they set up a bacterial shower, so it predisposes them
to other health issues kidney disease, heart disease. So just

(22:07):
like us, we need to have good oral health to
have good health.

Speaker 1 (22:10):
Really good day to start that relationship at checkout vet.
They'd love to see you, they'd love to see your pet.
You can learn more online the website checkout vet dot com.
That's checkout vet dot com tel for number six O
eight three one eight sixty seven hundred. That's three one
eight sixty seven hundred. Again the website checkout vet dot
com a fantastic resource You can actually schedule appointment right
online or stop on end today.

Speaker 4 (22:30):
They'd love to see you.

Speaker 1 (22:31):
You can write a twenty seven to ten Prairie Leaks
drive in sun Prairie doctor.

Speaker 4 (22:35):
Great, great, see you have a fantastic day. Thank you, Vicky.

Speaker 1 (22:38):
Is your chance to win one thousand dollars next right
here on thirteen ten do w u IV eight