Peace of Mind for Pet Parents Episode 027: The Whole Pet: Conventional, Holistic, and Integrative Care Approaches

Episode Transcript: 

Karen Wylie: Hello and welcome back to Peace of Mind for Pet Parents. I'm Karen Wylie here as always with Gail Pope. Today we'd like to talk about something that can often be confusing and that's the various types or approaches to pet care that are out there and are available to you to choose from. Especially important to us when we have senior pets that are facing illness or their continued aging.

So you may hear terms like conventional care, holistic care or integrative care. We're going to talk about what they really mean and how they can affect the choices that you make for your pet. Gail and I, as non-veterinarians, are going to break these into simple terms so you can understand each approach a little bit better. Then also see our perspective and understand better— perhaps what your preference is in the approaches you would like to take to your own pet's care.

So Gail, let us start out with you. Let's start with conventional veterinary care because that's perhaps the most common of the veterinary clinics available. So how would you describe what conventional care looks like for pets?

Gail Pope: That sounds like a really easy question and yet...

Karen Wylie: Sounds easy!

Gail Pope: I wouldn't have thought about it but I think we're all very much used to the word conventional and it is what it says. It's the old mindset. The new mindset. It's the current mindset— although I think the world's changing somewhat. As children, particularly in my generation, we were brought up to understand that as being medicine. There wasn't really anything else. If you didn't feel well or then you felt worse - you went to the doctor or the hospital and were treated with medicine.

Now, you might take other medicines that you could buy at the shops that could have other things in there that you weren't used to, like herbs of various kinds but your main medicine would be what you'd grown up conventionally to understand— "This is going to make me better."

I think we still carry that as a huge philosophy all over the world. Not all over the world, maybe, but certainly in our culture here it's your mainstream medicine. It focuses on what your symptoms are and what we can give you to make you better. Is that a beginning?

Karen Wylie: I think that's a great beginning.

Gail Pope: That's the direction my brain's taking me.

Karen Wylie: Then I guess what I would add in here is that from those symptoms that are reported or discovered by the vet in an exam, there comes a diagnosis. Then that diagnosis can lead to treatments or procedures, medications, surgery, all sorts of different lab tests or all of the above, depending on what's going on. So I think I would add all that into what we think with conventional care. If we go to a conventional vet, we're likely to have at least one of those things resulting from the visit: a diagnosis and maybe medication, a diagnosis and perhaps x-rays, and a  diagnosis.

So what are the benefits of conventional care? What are situations or times when conventional care is a very valuable approach?

Gail Pope: I think the most obvious first one there is, especially, in an emergency situation because if a life needs to be saved then the benefits of a conventional approach to care are outstanding. Wouldn't you agree? Obviously, there are lots of other benefits but to me that really constitutes the main one.

Karen Wylie: I would agree. Whenever anything is urgent or acute, where time is of the essence and you don't have time to just try things and wait a few days and see if it works, you want those pictures of what's going on. You want the lab work to tell you what's going on.

So that the vet can take action and you can too. 

GSo what are the limitations of conventional care? Again, this is conventional. Obviously in this podcast, we're focused on our pets but sometimes it helps to also talk about the care we receive as humans in our human medical care system as well. But what are some of the limitations of being focused on disease?

Gail Pope: The most obvious one we are going to get to in another part of the conversation. I think the limitations to a degree, and I'm bringing this up because it's so personal to me, but I think the limitations that I saw particularly with my husband in the latter part of his life, when he went through a major illness with different responses to different medications along the way. You could see an escalation of how one made him feel but then when the other joined, it moved this way and that, and created a huge mix of the unknown. I think eventually, we reached a point where hospice came in because it was the obvious way to "Let's sort this out and find out what you really need for your comfort."

So I think the overuse of conventional medicine sometimes can change the picture of an illness.

Karen Wylie: Yes and especially in human healthcare. It's so fragmented now with all the different specialists and all the focus on one organ or one body system and having medication or multiple medications for that one pathway.

Then probably this is what you were thinking about, as you were talking about Richard, you end up with all these different medications from all these different providers, and nobody is looking at the total patient. They're just looking at the symptoms, the diagnoses and that fragmentation of care is a huge problem— at least in the United States. I can't speak for a whole lot of other places. But for human healthcare, especially for senior citizens who are on God knows how many different medications and have all sorts of diagnoses, it can be very confusing and unhelpful to be in this conventional approach.

It seems it's happening more now in veterinary care. We're seeing a whole lot more specialists in veterinary care. So hopefully we're not going to go down that same path and the same extremes of fragmentation. It is a worry, for me, as I watch what's happening because we can be excited about specialties, the advances in research and treatment. It can be so exciting and helpful, but if there's no one looking at the big picture of the one person, the individual, or in our case the individual pet, then it doesn't matter all the research breakthroughs they're having, if it's actually causing confusion, poor care, and poor quality of life for our pets.

So then let's look at it from the perspective of a caregiver. I guess I would say that sometimes conventional medicine is really helpful for stabilizing our pets when we have those urgent or emergency kinds of situations that we were talking about earlier. But, then it can start to feel really clinical and limited. If we stay purely looking at the medical aspect— the diagnosis and the symptoms. Especially because we're providing care at home which is more comfort based. We know our whole pet. We're not looking at our pet as just a sequence of diagnoses or symptoms. We know they're more than that.

Gail Pope: I totally agree with you. However, we also have to remember that, and I'm talking from my own experience, I was brought up in a completely conventionally-minded household. We had pets who we loved, and we cared for them in our way.

When I first started working with BrightHaven, I lived in that tunnel vision of what was right and I heard other people talk about other things, which I really didn't understand or know much about, and I didn't want to. I think there are millions of people like me with that conventional approach that they've grown up with and trust totally. They don't necessarily look beyond that because they're comfortable in the knowledge they've got. I think that's very important. Don't you?

Karen Wylie: I think that is an important thing to make a point about because they may not have time to do research in other approaches, or they just don't feel a need for another approach.

They're very satisfied with the diagnosis that they've been given and the instructions or prescriptions. If the pet is improving or stabilizing because of that, there's really no motivation or reason to be searching elsewhere.

Gail Pope: Exactly. Look at the number of people and animals too, who live way beyond the general old age figures and they do amazingly well. So I guess it's what suits the being, isn't it as much as anything.

Karen Wylie: The being, the family— everybody involved. Let's take a look at holistic care, which of course is a field you've been working in for a long time now because you went from a purely conventional approach to discovering different modalities that started making a difference and that shifted your whole approach. So can you describe for everyone how holistic care is different from conventional?

Gail Pope: I guess in summing that up, the first thing that springs to my mind is that it's more in tune with Mother Nature— it's natural care. It makes sense. The plants, the trees. Mother Nature is there for a purpose. I think when I learned about natural medicine, it took me a long time before I embraced it property because it wasn't then a part of my understanding.

But when you actually think about it logically, it is nature. We are all as nature intended. If we didn't have modern science and all modern technology, we would still be eating those plants, herbs, fruits and vegetables. We wouldn't be relying on other things. The holistic route, which has been my passion for a long time, offers so many different modalities within its approach. 

We've learned so much over many generations about herbs, homeopathy, acupuncture, flower essences, essential oils, and the list goes on. We also have things like Craniosacral therapy and everything that is appropriate in the human world.

We're all beings. It's all appropriate in the animal world because it is natural. I think for me, it took a miracle to convince me that Mother Nature existed in a form that I hadn't really thought through. 

Once I started seeing our animals thriving with sparkly eyes and chasing toys across the floor and being the kind of old age person that you meet, who is clearly in their eighties or nineties and they're sitting having a funny, wonderful, rich conversation with you or with someone else, and you look at them and you think they're shining. 

When you see that kind of shining in animals that had dull coats and flattened ears and they're winding down and then you see that spark come and they start winding back up again. To me that's the beauty of natural care and with lots and lots of different options under that umbrella too.

Karen Wylie: Because what happens in holistic care is that we're treating the whole person, the whole animal— that's the whole mind, body, spirit approach. I don't think there's a lot of people in conventional medicine or conventional veterinary medicine who would say they also consider that, but that's not what conventional training is about. It's not about the spirit. Conventional training is all about the body. So when we're looking at this from a pet centered approach, the pet perspective makes a huge difference in the holistic approach. One thing I did last night as I was thinking about this conversation today was to wonder, "Where did the word holistic come from?"

So I looked it up and holistic is from Holos, H-O-L-O-S. It's a Greek word that means the whole person. The whole (W-H-O-L-E), and yet the way it's spelled in Greek is H-O-L-O-S. So I think that gives rise to both of the spellings for holistic and wholistic. Putting a little “W” in front to try to emphasize this viewpoint that it truly is the whole being, and the word holistic in Greek means the whole being. So I thought that was interesting.

So with holistic care, I guess that's where we get into some of our terminology of balance and prevention and just overall wellbeing. I tend to use the term Equilibrium. I'm always trying to determine how one thing that I may change with my pets may upset their equilibrium or whether they are able to integrate it in a better way

So that's always what I'm looking for. That's another way to look at balance. But the equilibrium for me is like when we're trying one thing, is it making a difference rather than changing everything at one point? 

Gail Pope: You’ve  just underscored my journey because the Menu for Healing, BrightHaven's Menu for Healing, was developed by us tippy-toeing into the world of Mother Nature - still embracing little pieces of the conventional approach, which I think are really important to keep hold of— particularly as you were bringing up the subject of diagnostics because Mother Nature will provide a symptom or symptoms and then diagnostics are a wonderful tool. They help us to understand what the cause is. 

So little by little as we step into the various different fields under the umbrella of the H-O-L-O-S, we start to pick out what works for one, but may not work for another. You start to form a balance of what works. You may have to shift your Menu just a titchy bit to suit. That's what I think we learned more than anything.

I think the next part that you haven't addressed yet, takes what we've talked about so far to another word. I must say at the beginning I wasn't quite sure what it meant and I know a lot of people shy away from it, but it's “integrative”.

In the BrightHaven Menu, we still keep some conventional care parts to it. It is more holistic but it has some conventional aspects. So when people started talking about integrative and what that meant, I thought, "Ooh, now this is now feeling more balanced."

Karen Wylie: I feel like I've always tried to provide integrative care for my own pets whether I had a conventional vet or not. I would be supplementing at home with the various modalities that made sense to me like Reiki and other energy massage, flower essences, nutrition, adapting the environment and all the things that I could focus on at home that would give me feedback from my pet's response— from their perspective. 

I think integrative care may be perhaps the most confusing of the three because a healthcare provider, again whether human or veterinary, doesn't necessarily integrate everything that's possible.

My veterinarian is licensed in acupuncture. She always considers when herbs can be prescribed in a situation. So she's very open to it. But the environment in the Blue Ridge Mountains is far more conventional than a lot of other geographic locations. Although she is very willing to provide integrative care it's not any part of the marketing, so it can be pretty difficult sometimes to find vets that are going to align with your perspective and your approach to care, wouldn't you say?

Gail Pope: I would. That's why I really love the clinics that advertise. You click the dropdown menu to see what their services are and it's so wonderful to see just about everything you can think of. It used to be just, "Oh, then maybe you'll find a vet that does acupuncture, that was really popular first."

But now you may find all sorts of things in that dropdown menu. So I think it's wonderful that students are coming out of vet school and are seeking these tools to add to their menu so that they can offer each client the kind of direction that they want to travel in.

Karen Wylie: Because there really are so many different directions that they could choose to go in. These days it's not just veterinary care but it's all the pet care practitioners who are also often being trained in holistic methods like K9 water rehab and all the different energy modalities. So your pet care practitioners can also take more of a conventional, holistic, or integrative approach too.

It's not just your veterinary care that you're looking for but as you need support with your pets and you're looking around, now the various pet care practitioners that are available have all different approaches too.

Gail Pope: Definitely. It's a jungle, isn't it?

Karen Wylie: Sometimes it can feel that way. It's like, "How do I find them? What words do I choose to put into Google to find these people?"

Gail Pope: One thing does occur to me and I do find it interesting in my work that I quite often come across people who have a holistic approach for their own healthcare. They're very single-minded about it, but they haven't adopted that for their animal or vice versa. But mostly it' seems to be that they follow a holistic approach but they don't do that for their animal because they didn't know that they could. "How would I do that?"

So again, I think you are absolutely right in opening this conversation up because so many people just don't know these things. I guess without the route that my life's taken, I wouldn't have known them either.

Karen Wylie: It can take so many different forms. So it can be confusing to find individuals and understand their different approaches and then have the time with them to find out if it's a good fit for you and your pet. 

But real integrative care really can be the best of both worlds because if your cat has kidney disease of some sort they can be receiving subcutaneous fluids that you can administer at home. Maybe there's a medication that your vet prescribed, maybe for nausea that can sometimes happen with kidney disease. But yet you could also be providing acupuncture and some dietary changes. So you have so much flexibility with an integrative approach.

Gail Pope: Yes. I'm sorry, but I have to just say the word and then I probably won't do it again: Homeopathy! That's what kind of sits as a premier member of the BrightHaven Menu for Healing. We’ve experienced so many miracles of healing using homeopathy. Okay, moving on.

Karen Wylie: That deserves a podcast discussion all on its own because homeopathy in its whole history and way to look at wellbeing and look at symptoms or disease is totally different and deserves its own discussion. But yes you have found it to be not just valuable and positive, but providing downright miracle turnarounds for many of your pets.

Gail Pope: Yes, without doubt.

Karen Wylie: As we look at these three different approaches that we're talking about, the conventional care, the holistic, as well as the integrative. Many families are probably finding integrative care more accessible these days where they can still work very closely with a conventional vet, while adding layers of holistic care at home, thus supporting their pet in the ways they think are important, plus how they think their pet wants to be supported. 

So now let's take those three approaches and talk about hospice care. How do you see these three approaches, conventional, holistic, and integrative relating when we think about hospice care for pets?

Gail Pope: Hospice care really has to be a team approach because not one size fits all. In hospice care, which, to me, is completely invaluable both for humans and for animals because it takes what is a very difficult time, for both the patient and the family, to a different level. It's calming. It takes away what isn't needed, keeps the crux of what's going to help, and follows a team approach to keep balance for the patient, but also for the family.

So practitioners of all types, from all sides, from conventional, holistic, and I guess integrative kind of fits the hospice umbrella more than anything.

But it really is about finding balance and healing. I think about the number of animals that have come to us for hospice care and, as we've changed their diet, we've changed their medications, we've changed their mode of living, maybe with more exercise or less, or whatever fitted that actual being. We've seen them grow and flourish and suddenly I wouldn't apply the word hospice any longer..

In fact, in the work that I do with our own animals, I don't really use the word hospice because we're offering healing for the highest good all the way through their journey.  Over to you again now.

Karen Wylie: I think in terms of the way you and I approach hospice care, I tend to think of it more as holistic even though it's integrating everything too. But when I think of how we approach it, we're looking at what the caregiver needs along with what the pet needs. I have to come up with a better way to describe this but we are looking at a home environment— a family relationship with the pet and the pet's perspective.

It really has to be considering the whole of that particular situation: that pet and their family’s wants and needs. It's everything. So it's a different “whole” in hospice care and the way we approach it. We want to support the caregiver and the caregiver's family as much as possible because of the challenges they face in trying to integrate their pet's perspective in conventional, integrative, and holistic care because it can be mind boggling to think about how you want to care for your pet as it's aging or declining.

It's just a whole different way to look at the world and it does require more peace and some stability in order to figure out the support that you need - and from whom to get that support. So for me, I think of our approach to hospice care as holistic because we're trying to include the pet parent and the pet's perspective.

Gail Pope: That great Big W in front of wholistic really fits the work of hospice because it really is about the whole being..

Karen Wylie: That's right. And once again, it is so individualistic. What works perfectly for one caregiver situation is dramatically different for someone else.

Gail Pope: Yes. Makes sense.

Karen Wylie: Very much so. Fortunately hospice can blend everything we've talked about.

Gail Pope: Unbelievably so, yes.

Karen Wylie: When we're in hospice care, of course the focus shifts from curing what's going on for your pet to providing comfort at home for your pet. So it's home-centered care. It's pet-centered care. 

But as we begin to close down our conversation here, how would you say the pet owner can combine these different approaches and feel comfortable with where they are? How does each individual make their decisions and find not just comfort care for their pet but a comfort level within themselves that they're making the right decisions as they go through this process with their pet?

Gail Pope: Good grief. You are so full of difficult questions today, aren't you? What are you thinking?

Karen Wylie: Come on. It's hospice care. This is your thing!  LOL

Gail Pope: I think the only thing that really springs to my mind in answer to that question is something that I think I've become known for saying, and that's "Follow Your Heart."

We actually called one of our books "Follow Your Heart" in the early days but it's different for each person based on what we know, based on what we've learned, based on what we've experienced in life. We all choose our own path and then we choose that same path generally for our animals depending on what they need and what our belief system has grown to become.

And again, our belief system plays a big part in how we work with our animals. It's such a big subject. What do you think?

Karen Wylie: I think that each person finding a blend of what works for them is absolutely the path to take because as you're saying there are also the spiritual aspects. We talk about mind, body, spirit as the holistic approach. So we were saying that the caregiver can integrate any or all of these approaches that they choose and you were saying that religious or spiritual preferences or beliefs can play a big role and they certainly do.

If someone holds to a more traditional view of spirituality and religion, it's very possible that they would not even consider acupuncture which is addressing the energy meridians of the body or Reiki and so forth. So the various options that can be chosen that are right for you depend on who you are and what your pet needs or wants.

So it's all of it together. I think, as we're closing now and we're bringing hospice into the conversation, it's really about shifting the focus from curing illness to creating comfort which embraces more holistic and integrative approaches as we try to create comfort for both the pet and the caregiver.

That's where our approach at BCA comes in because we're trying to help each individual find the right balance for themselves but also to begin locating the right tools to help them. 

That's why we created the LIVING Quality of Life Assessment tool to look at the whole being, not just their physical self but how much joy your pet takes in its daily life, how much connection they're having with you and the other members of the furry family in your house and so forth.

So we're looking at how finding the right support for you can make the hospice journey less overwhelming and more loving. We can say it begins and ends with love but we really want the end of life to be so very full of love.

And so I guess what I will say is that we'll have a blog post to say a little bit more about conventional, holistic, and integrative care  in case reading a little more detail about each of them is helpful to you. But that'll be what this week's blog post will be about.

We'll go a little further into- the concepts we were talking about today. I guess with that, I will say thank you for joining us and we'll look forward to seeing you again next week. Thanks. Bye-bye.

Gail Pope: Goodbye and thank you.