Articles - Vital Animal® § The Natural Path

Stop Killing Your Pet: The Top 5 Ways

Last updated on April 30, 2019 By Will Falconer, DVM 4 Comments

You want your animal to be vital and healthy and around for as long as possible, right? Sick animals and early deaths are a drag. I signed on to help those guys when I entered vet school, but if I can keep you from ever having to deal with either, would you like that?

I’m guessing you would. Let’s dig in.

Common Sense: Not so Common

These things are commonly done by ordinary folks who own pets every day, week, month, or year. They are killing their pets. Shortening their lives. Giving them chronic diseases.

Yet, there are other pet owners who know better, don’t do these things, and their animals show the benefits of that natural path. These are vital animals.

My aim is to help you know better. Prevention is really important, but the way conventional veterinary medicine does it is all wrong. [Read more…] about Stop Killing Your Pet: The Top 5 Ways

Annual Health Exams: Necessary or Not?

Last updated on April 30, 2019 By Will Falconer, DVM 8 Comments

You may have done yearly pet exams in the past, often associated with <shudder> yearly vaccinations, if you’ve been in a conventional veterinarian’s care.

You dutifully brought in a baggie with some fresh stool in it. Bowser got up on a stainless steel table, got a thermometer stuck in his anus, and received a physical exam.

But now, you’ve put your animal on track to be a vital animal, one who lives a long, shiny life, free of health concerns. You’ve stopped vaccinating, you’re feeding balanced raw food, using non-toxic flea control methods, you’re giving immune support, and you’ve stopped the toxic drugs that kill heartworm larvae.

Should you still bring him in yearly for a check up?

The yearly exam question comes up from time to time, and I think behind it is a far more important question:

Who’s Responsible for My Animal’s Health?

If you answer, “my vet is,” this post is not for you. And I’m not likely to be your veterinarian.

If your answer is, “I am!” you’ve come to the right place and I’m here to help you succeed.

I’m on board to answer questions, prescribe homeopathically when symptoms point to an imbalance that needs to be addressed, and am happy to put my hands and eyes on your animal on a yearly basis or any other time you’d like me to.

Won’t My Vet See Things I’ll Miss?

Perhaps he might, sure. It never hurts to have a professional’s hands on your animal.

Some things I’ve noticed on exams that owners have missed:

Dull coat
Shedding
Coarse coat
Dirty teeth/red gums (you may have noticed bad breath, though…)
Distorted, brittle nails
Fearful behavior, or restlessness, or even aggression

One of my favorite “ah-ha’s” was having a new cat patient in my office, and being seemingly at the end of my intake questions, all answered by my dutiful and observant owner. I had written next to nothing by “mental/emotional,” as the cat walked calmly around my exam room while we talked.

Suddenly, she came to a low window, and saw one of my cats outside. She came unglued! Screaming at the top of her lungs, hair standing up, and looking like she would somehow squeeze through the screen to get out to eat her alive!

“Wow, you didn’t tell me she had such a strong take on other cats!”

“Oh, that. Yes.” Her owner had taken it for granted, and so no mention was made.

Things You’ll Know That Your Vet’s Exam Won’t Reveal

You’ll know things of great value from your daily observations at home, once you’re cued in to look for these things.

These things are called symptoms, and your homeopathic vet will be very interested in these, while they may mean nothing to a conventional vet.

My dog goes out every night while we’re all sleeping.
He’s terrified of flying insects!
After eating, he burps loudly.
When she sleeps, it’s with all four feet in the air.
At 4:00 every evening, he’ll clear a room with his gas!
Whenever I change her diet, she’ll have a loose stool for days.

And so on. These are impossible to glean on a vet exam, yet so important to assess your animal’s wellness, and make decisions about a likely remedy to get her back to being vital.

A homeopathic yearly exam will, by necessity, include questions to uncover things like this.

Don’t I Need a Fecal Exam?

This leads me to ask, “How many times have you seen a positive result in the past?”

If your animal is well, vitally so, he won’t allow parasites in. They just won’t have a home. Likely, if you’ve done them in the past, they were negative time and again.

How about a yearly Heartworm Test?

Definitely a good idea if you live in a heartworm endemic area like Texas. Here’s a 2012 incidence map to help you decide how likely it is you’ll need such a test in the U.S.:

http://www.capcvet.org/parasite-prevalence-maps/

I recommend my patients receive this test yearly, regardless of whether they are opting out of the heartworm drugs or continuing to use them.

Blood Counts? Blood Chemistry Screening?

There’s no harm in doing these periodically, though I’ll usually not ask that my patients receive them yearly. Consider though, can you get in and out with just the blood work, or will you be pressured into getting vaccinations that you don’t want?

More importantly, to the extent that you are the watchful caretaker of your animal, you’ll know something’s wrong likely before the blood results show it.

Long before there were multiple blood tests, imaging services, and high tech diagnostics available, observant people knew when their animals were unwell.

And homeopathic doctors could use that knowledge of how they were not well to get them back on track once more. Symptoms can be clearly ascertained and point us to remedies to cure your animal.

So, do you do annual exams? Have they been valuable? Do you use them more or less than you did 5 years ago? Let me know in the comments.

Money vs Health 2, at the AVMA

Last updated on May 31, 2018 By Will Falconer, DVM 10 Comments

Do you remember the raw food proposition that the AVMA passed over the Summer? Saying, “Raw food isn’t good to feed your pets,” they surprised no one, right? (See my earlier post(s) on this)

Well, now homeopathy is on their table, as a result of a “white paper” they’ll consider in January 2013, saying homeopathy is “ineffective” and therefore shouldn’t be practiced by veterinarians.

Right to the Source

The source of said “white paper?”

Anonymous.

Uh, yeah. Really gives you a feeling of confidence when someone attacks a 200 year old system of medicine that’s repeatedly been demonstrated to be safe and effective, and fails to sign their name to the attack, doesn’t it? [Read more…] about Money vs Health 2, at the AVMA

Re-Engaging

Last updated on May 31, 2018 By Will Falconer, DVM Leave a Comment

A World Apart

I’ve just returned from a month in India, immersed in sadhana, or spiritual practice. I’m having a bit of a culture shock reintegrating.

I was away from media, email, Facebook, and patients for that whole time, turning my practice over to the capable hands of a few colleagues who are also full time homeopathic vets.

I dove deeply into devotion. I heard about the hurricane, but it had little impact. The election outcome, uh huh.

My concerns were keeping focused on remembering God very close to me, visualizing His/Her beautiful form while chanting beautiful chants filled with God’s divine names, virtues, playful past times; keeping comfortable in my body while sitting for hours doing this; getting my body moved from place to place within the ashram I was in, so my body could be nourished, briefly rested, and ready for more sadhana.

It was amazing the depth of love I felt, and I still feel wrapped in a cocoon of sweet appreciation for the relationship with God I’ve developed over the years, and the deepening that relationship took with the past month of practice.

Back to earth

Now, I’m faced with a bulging inbox, reports of patients dying (some unexpectedly, others predictably), requests for new patient appointments, rescheduling, a patient lost to allopathy, etc.

Animals were born, died, suffered, overcame suffering, and people’s lives have been intertwined with it all, grieving, laughing, feeding, petting, walking, running, nurturing, loving.

And I have been apart from it all. It’s gone on without me.

Suit Up

And it’s time to re-engage. To put my doctor “hat” back on, to share with my clients in the struggles of overcoming disease, the joys of new young lives, the wiggling bliss that new puppies bring to my office, the compassion that is elicited in seeing the old struggle to get up and walk, or live in their skins that itch and have sores.

To battle the demons of conventional medicine that causes the majority of this suffering.

To share with animal owners what can be done to truly prevent illness in a completely different context than that promulgated by Dr. WhiteCoat.

To struggle with the handful of other Davids against the megalith of Big Pharma and the Almighty Dollar that has my conventional colleagues following their MD counterparts down the slippery slope of “disease management” instead of true prevention and cure.

Is it all worth it?

Is there hope for the mass of animaldom in the face of such vast momentum away from true health?

Can one individual make a difference in such a huge downhill slide?

I have to hope that the answer is yes.

I have to do what I do, knowing that I’m a small voice of hope for those who find me after they’ve tried everything conventional medicine offered them to no good effect.

The human side of the equation can be heartbreaking, aside from seeing the damage done to the animals.

People who’ve invested thousands of dollars only to lose their precious animals’ health even further after treatments that haven’t worked.

People whose perfectly healthy youngsters became disfigured, lamed, compromised in functions basic to life, as a result of following recommendations from “experts” who they thought they could and should trust.

People who’ve lost a beloved animal way before they should have, robbed of precious life by a manmade disease.

But there’s also the joy of seeing an animal so chronically, seemingly hopelessly ill, whose vital fire, nearly extinguished, can still be gently fanned with subtle, deep acting remedies and come to life again.

There’s the joy in watching the animals who’ve been raised on processed foods from a bag or can positively glow when given balanced raw diets.

Joy also to see lameness go away, to see skin sores finally heal, to see sleep restored that was once robbed by chronic allergic itch, to see eyes restored to lustrous shine, teeth to white and shiny, appetites to full normality, and most of all, to see

Whole Animal wellness, with unexpected beneficial “side effects” that only come from treating the depth of the whole being

I’ve been fortunate to get good at my chosen craft and to be able to offer healing to the suffering animals who come my way, and hope to their caretakers who’ve often lost it.

People who’ve come late to the natural path, seeking a “DLR” (Doctor of Last Resort) to restore their vital animals’ innate health after months or years of ineffective and often toxic treatment; and

People who wouldn’t think of treating themselves with drugs who are overjoyed to find someone who treats animals the way they’d choose to be treated themselves.

So yes, the depth of devotion will remain, quietly inside, to have its outlet outside the office, but the work of veterinary homeopathy will resume now.

It’s good to be home.

Porcupines and Entry Drugs

Last updated on April 30, 2019 By Will Falconer, DVM 9 Comments

Arnica is the entry drug to the larger world of homeopathy for many people. Yes, homeopathic medicines are drugs, but safe, extremely dilute drugs, with no unwanted side effects.

And arnica montana holds its place as the first remedy many try. And most who do, if they use it in the face of any traumatic injury, are rightly amazed by its effects, and have a newfound appreciation of this gentle art and science called homeopathy.

The Mighty Guardian

Lionheart is the king of his world. A great big Airedale terrier, he protects my chiropractor, Dr. Mary Traverse, and her livestock out in the wilds of rural Texas. I have the good fortune to be his doctor, and he’s a quiet character when it comes to people, but a fierce guy when it comes to invaders.

A bit of insight into Lionheart’s personality from his loving owner:

“He is always ready to play, but please don’t expect him to do something inane like fetch a ball. Forget that. But he loves stuffed toys and will carry them around for months without damaging them. What a nut.”

While he’s been known to run off coyotes, and even learned how to kill a skunk without getting sprayed, he took one threatening step too close to a visitor he had never seen before, and likely hopes he’ll never see again: a porcupine!

As you can see, he got a snootful of barbed porcupine spines injected right into his tender nose. Ouch! Dr. Mary pulled a couple, as quickly as she could, but they bled and Lionheart winced.

Drugs Please. Stat!

It was time to get some serious drugs on board to get this handled! Dr. Rama Santschi was kind enough to offer her weekend services, and, once Lionheart was doped up with some morphine so he felt no pain, out the spines came, one by one. Tug with a forceps, tink in the tray. Tug, tink, repeat.

Lionheart got some arnica from my homeopathic remedy kit that Dr. Mary wisely owns. A few granules, mixed into a half cup of water, and she had enough arnica to dose many times, though I recommended only a few doses over the next 24 hours.

1/6/2013 Addendum: A Different Remedy!

In reviewing my records and checking with Dr. Mary, I realize that the remedy we landed on as “most similar” to the suffering incurred by Lionheart was not arnica, but rather, ledum. Known for puncture wounds and the effects of same, Allen’s Keynotes says of ledum, “Punctured wounds by sharp-pointed instruments, as awls, nails; rat bites, stings of insects, especially mosquitoes.”

Lionheart got a couple of doses of ledum when he was first jabbed, and post-surgically, also got some arnica to help with the trauma.

Invisible Exit Wounds!

“It’s almost eerie,” said Dr. Mary, when I next saw her for my Network Spinal Analysis session two days later.

“There’s absolutely no sign that he ever had these things poking into his flesh! No scabs, no red spots, nothing.”

Before I got on her table, she showed me the “souvenirs” saved from Lionheart’s encounter. They were stout, strong, and finely barbed. Stories exist of these barbs working their way into the brain (!) in some unlucky animals who didn’t get them properly removed. They have a way of migrating, apparently. Sheesh.

Arnica, the Wonder Drug

While I was still a homeopathic newbie, I was at a horse farm on Maui, taking care of a couple of patients. A mom, hearing I was learning homeopathy, recounted the following family story to me, and I’ve never forgotten it. It illustrates just how profound the healing from a simple remedy can be.

“My daughter at 12 was standing next to a jump when a horse was going over it. The horse’s front hooves hit the top rail, and sent it flying right into my daughter’s forehead! The sight of it hitting her sent me scurrying to her, and luckily, I had my remedy kit in my purse.

I immediately gave her some arnica, right on her tongue, and held her and soothed her, repeating the dose a few times. After what seemed an impossibly short time, she pushed away and got back to the business of being a girl there for the horses! And do you know, her forehead never even bruised!”

My Local E.R. Has This, Right??

Not likely. You’ll have to pack it in yourself. And probably, have to sneak your doses into your loved one or yourself, as Dr. WhiteCoat may fear what he doesn’t know and disallow its use! It’s not only totally safe, but will hasten the healing of traumatic injury many fold.

I recommend everyone have some arnica for emergencies. It’s easily found at many grocery stores, most all health food stores, and is found in homeopathic remedy kits everywhere.

Speaking of remedy kits, I have one that goes with a well-received course on how to use remedies and keep your animals out of the E.R.

It has eighteen remedies, well described in videos and a nice book, with indications and instructions on how to use them to avoid E.R. trips for most emergencies. My patients rarely, if ever, need the E.R.

How about you? Any arnica miracles in your life?