PREBIOTICS AND POSTBIOTICS: HOW DO THEY HELP MY DOG'S HEALTH?

As a pet pawrent, you want to do everything you can to provide your dog with the healthy lifestyle they deserve. What your dog eats, of course plays a huge part in this. Many pawrents strive to buy their fur children high-quality food to help their overall health and wellness, but many of us are left wondering, what do the ingredients actually do for your dogs health?

In our recent blog we highlighted how our Oven Baked Crunchy Feast is packed with functional ingredients and went into depth about how each ingredient can support your pooch's health while also satisfying their taste buds. We have also explained why our food is Oven Baked, rather than Extruded and how this has a massive impact on the nutrient availability and palatability of our food.

We understand that there’s a lot of scientific words bouncing around in the world of doggy digestive health. You may have seen that we have added Pre & Post Biotics into our new Oven Baked Crunchy Feast and you may be wondering what for?

We're here to answer those questions and that's why this blog will dig deeper into the world of Prebiotics, Probiotics and Postbiotics, along with explaining the benefits they offer to your pooch!

What Are Prebiotics, Probiotics and Postbiotics?

Prebiotics and postbiotics for dogs are a nutritional power pairing. Separately, they perform quite different functions, but together they ensure a well-balanced, peaceful environment in the gut by promoting growth of the ‘friendly’ bacteria your dog needs to help digest food, absorb nutrients, prevent disease and maintain a healthy immune system.

When probiotics feed on prebiotics, there’s an important end product that provides even more benefits: postbiotics.

Prebiotics

Prebiotics are resistant starches found in fruits, veggies, and whole grains. When offered as a food source, prebiotics provide the conditions for probiotics to thrive and multiply. They act as food sources for the good bacteria already present. By supporting the growth of good bacteria, prebiotics help suppress the harmful microbes that make your dog ill, boosting their immunity and overall digestive health. An example of a prebiotic-rich natural food is as chicory root which we also have in our dried food, in addition to our prebiotics.

Probiotics

Probiotics are friendly bacteria. Dogs and animals have billions of them in their stomach to help fight infections, make the immune system stronger, help digest food, and make vitamins and nutrients. This is called the microbiome and a healthy dog needs a healthy microbiome.

Changes in the microbiome can make dogs sick in different ways. This can include:

Diarrhea
Allergies
Obesity
Gas
Cramping
Bloating
General poor health
Upset stomach
Bad breath

These changes can be caused by many things, including:

Antibiotics
Changes in food
Weaning
Stress
Infections
Parasites
High carbohydrate diet
Eating spoiled food

If your dog seems to get sick often, it could be caused by changes in their microbiome. It's a good idea to talk to your vet if this is the case with your doggo.

Types Of Probiotics In Dogs

Dogs have certain types of friendly bacteria in their intestines. These include:

Lactobacillus acidophilus
Lactobacillus casei
Bifidobacterium breve
Enterococcus faecium
Bifidobacterium lactis

In order to keep these bacteria happy, dogs also need prebiotics to feed the bacteria and help them grow. Prebiotics are nutrients that are found in food.

Postbiotics

We add a postbiotic made from a proprietary fermentation process that promotes a strong gut and promote a healthier microbiome. Scientific research has actually uncovered many physiological benefits of postbiotics in the body.

Postbiotics reduce pathogens and cultivate “good” bacteria in the gut, improving the digestive process and helping your dog absorb more nutrients.

Postbiotics also support other systems in the body:

Anti-inflammation
Gut hormone regulation
Nutrition absorption
Immune response

Postbiotics And Anti-Inflammation Support

One particularly important benefit of postbiotics is they promote anti-inflammatory responses throughout the body.

Why Is Anti-Inflammation Important?

Inflammation happens when the body’s immune response kicks in, activating the white blood cells and other defenses.

Your inflammation response is what you’d expect when you have a minor infection from, say, a small cut: heat, pain, swelling, redness, stiffness. You can see that we also have an array of anti-inflammatory ingredients in our functional ingredients blog.

If you’d like to learn more about doggy digestive health or have any questions, get in touch with us at woof@thepackpet.com.