Chinese Medicine & Dosing: one example

UPDATES on Ferret Food Recalls
Responses from Whole/Natural Prey Suppliers

I am very excited to share this with you all. As I mentioned to the site owner, even in Japan where TCM and Kanpou (Chinese herbal medicine) have a long traditional history and strong scientific background, most applications of it in animals have focused on cats and dogs.

From Four Paws Five Directions, the most advice one gets about dosing herbal medicine is "for small-sized dogs and cats use 1/3 or less of a 10 gram human dose." (translated from Japanese by M. Diamantis) How did that number get decided upon? Cheryl Schwartz, DVM judges a large dog to be about the same weight as a human (60 kg) and thus able to handle a full human dosage of 10 grams. Thus a "large" dog would get the full 10 grams spread out over 3 times a day, or about 3 1/3 grams per serving. A "medium sized" would get half a human dosage (5 grams), again spread out over 3 times.

I dislike vagueness in dealing with medicine. I think we all do. What constitutes a "small" or a "medium sized animal? Where is the cutoff for "small". Ferrets would likely be classified as "extra-small" to "tiny" size, wouldn't they? What does that mean for them?

What I am finally happy to share with you is this bit of information from the all-about-ferrets blog:
"according to the specialist, Kaos is suffering from 'blood stagnation' in Traditional Chinese Medicine...
Initially I have to give her an eighth of a 1ml spoon every other day for a week, for her to get used to the herbs, and then give them to her on a daily basis."

So now we have a baseline to work from taking into consideration the following patient specific information.

Kaos (patient):
weight:
age:
diagnosis: cardiomyopathy

As more general information about her case becomes available I will certainly integrate it with the information here.



Disclaimer: I am not a DVM. Advice is offered after my own extensive research and/or experience and should be undertaken at your own risk. Consult with your licensed DVM before undertaking any treatment!

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