Would your dog food cause allergies?

My female poodle has allergies and our vet says she may be allergic to chicken.

He recommended that she eat dog food with only a few ingredients which contains mainly duck and potatoes and it has worked for her. Would your dog food with chicken cause my poodle allergies?

Dana

Dana, there are 3 ways to tell if an animal is allergic to an ingredient in the food; food trial/elimination diet; blood allergy testing and skin allergy testing. When I suspect an animal maybe allergic to food, it will be an animal that has skin issues on a year round basis, not just having problems during different seasons of the year as they do with pollen allergies. Dogs are allergic to the PROTEINS in the food, not the brand of the food, so start with there. For a dog I suspect may have a food allergy and we don’t want to do the testing, I chose a food that has a different protein make up from what the dog is used to and try that food for 2 months or so. Remember to account for all treats, table scraps and cat food the dog may steal to get a real test under way. You just want to feed that dog a few different or novel proteins for a time to see if this improves the situation. If the allergies had led to infections, those need to be cleared up first or that will lead to miss interpretation of your food trial.

Timothy A. Hunt, DVM