Improve Canine Coat Condition With Traditional Chinese Medicine

Sep 2, 2011
Dawn M. Smith

TCM May Enhance Your Dog's Coat - Kjunstorm

In addition to brushing, combing and feeding a balanced diet, following some basic TCM principles may help you keep your dog's coat healthy and shining.

Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) is based on over four thousand years of practice. TCM’s holistic approach to health looks at everything – diet, exercise (both mental and physical), present health conditions and even family history – in deciding how to bring the body back into balance. This is why Traditional Chinese Medicine can give you some extra tools for improving your dog’s coat condition.

Your Dog’s Healthy Skin and Hair Starts From Within

While it may be the most difficult part of keeping your dog’s coat healthy, paying attention to the mental health of your canine companion is important. Boredom and frustration not only lead to chewing and scratching, they contribute to other physical ailments such digestive problems, which affect nutrition and may contribute to poor coat quality.

In Traditional Chinese Medicine, lifestyle is considered as part of the holistic health approach. Mental stimulation not only helps reduce boredom, it stimulates blood and qi movement, which improves overall health. Time spent playing games or training your dog, relieves stress and helps calm the nervous or hyperactive dog, with an additional benefit of enhancing skin and coat health.

Improving Your Dog’s Diet Using TCM Principles

You may already be feeding your dog a top quality, natural food. This is a start, but a Traditional Chinese Medicine practitioner takes some other things into consideration when determining which foods might be best for your dog.

A busy dog who pants a lot need cooling, calming foods whereas dogs who head straight for the warmest place in the house to nap will need warming foods. These terms don’t refer to the temperature of the foods but rather how they act on the body.

Chicken, for example is very warming. If your dog is prone to hotspots, removing chicken, as well as trout, from the diet may help. Cooling proteins such as pork, duck or eggs may help these dogs.

Massage Acupuncture Points for Healthy Dog Coat

In addition to regular grooming, massage also helps keep your dog’s skin supple (not to mention easing tension and soothing stiff muscles). Massaging along the insides of the front legs and down the chest along the Lung Meridian helps to stimulate healthy skin by taking advantage of acupuncture meridians to move blood and qi around the body.

For stressed out dogs massaging the Liver Meridian, which runs along the inside of the back legs, will help calm them. If your dog is prone to hot spots, massage the back of the neck, starting just below the skull to draw heat and dampness from the body.

As you massage, when your fingers find indentations in the muscles put a little extra pressure there. Most acupuncture points are found in hollows in the muscles, along the bones or between muscle and bone.

If these adjustments are not enough, a Traditional Chinese Medicine Practitioner can develop an herbal formula specific to your dog’s needs. For some dogs acupuncture may help as well.