New arthritis treatment help aching dogs
get back on their feet.

New drugs reduce inflammation and pain and treat the underlying cause; the damaged cartilage.

When your dog slows down, or starts showing signs of pain while standing up, jumping or walking you can expect some kind of inflammation in the joint (arthritis). One out of five dogs of large breed will suffer this.

A healthy cartilage gives the bones of the joints a smooth surface to glide across. If the cartilage becomes damaged for any reason it becomes inflamed. This will start a cycle of damage to the cartilage and the joint tissue surrounding this joint.

Many factors increase a dogs risk. Genetical disorders, joint instabilities from injuries ex the ligament in knee, hip- or elbow dysplasia and wear and tare due to excessive exercise.  Overweight stresses the joints and increases the risk of arthritis.

Only few years ago veterinarians mostly treated pain caused by an arthritis with anti-inflammatory and pain relieving drugs, weight loss, controlled exercise and finally with surgery .

Now we are stepping into a new approach-veterinarians now have a wider scale of drugs available for treatment of arthritis. The real news are the injectable polysulfated glykosaminoglycan products which reduces painful inflammation, inhibits cartilage degrading enzymes while restoring the degraded fluid (the lubricating fluid around the joint, cartilage) and stimulating the production of cartilage matrix component to repair damaged cartilage. This is injected by the veterinarians four times with an interval of about five days. According to veterinarians and dog owners 75 % of the patients shows a positive reaction to the treatment, and 60 % of these shows it after the first treatment. Occasionally the recovery is constant, but usually a new injection has to be given 6 months later.

According to studies made (University of Guelp, Ontario Canada), where surgical and medical treatment were compared for orthopedial problems in elbows in dogs the medical treatment resulted in more rapid return to normal weight-bearing than did surgical treatment. After nine months of follow-up, differences were not detected between the medically and surgically treated dogs.

As a veterinary surgeon, I am very happy for these new options. These not only give us a possibility to start the medical treatment at an early stage of arthritis in young dogs, when the first signs of arthritis sets in, but also a good alternative to treat an older dog with a chronic pain.