Hello pet parents! Welcome to the Naturally Healthy Pets podcast where we empower and educate you to be the best advocate for your pets, giving them a happier, healthier life. Are you confused about all the overwhelming information out there about your pet's health, nutrition and overall wellness? You're in the right place! I'm your host, Dr. Judy Morgan, an integrative veterinarian, author and speaker. Join me for an exciting show where you'll discover the healthy options for raising your pets in a more holistic manner. Find out the answers to your questions during the short and succinct episodes where I chat with experts in the industry and showcase the latest products that will help your pet stay naturally healthy. So let's get to it.
My guest today is Carrie Hyde. Carrie Hyde has worked in the pet industry for 40 years. She spent 15 years working in veterinary hospitals as a veterinary technician and a groomer. But she left the veterinary field in 2000 and opened the first holistic boarding daycare, grooming and nutrition center in Orange County, California. Carrie holds a BA in argumentation and debate and won first place at a national level debate tournament on the need for blood banks for dogs. Carrie now combines her three passions, debate, pet nutrition, and educating her clients on the benefits of protecting their animal's first line of defense, the skin and coat. Carrie, welcome aboard. Thank you so much for agreeing to be our guest today.
Oh my gosh, agreeing? I'm like, are you kidding me? I'm so excited and also really nervous. So, just talking to you Dr. Morgan is just such a pleasure all the time. So of course, of course anytime.
Well, we've had many conversations over the years. So to me, it's it's just sort of, you know, talking to a friend, so it's awesome. So our topic today, it's one of Carrie's favorites is our pet skin microbiome, and what we do to destroy it. I think that as a whole, people don't realize how important it is and and the ways that we really make things go from a train wreck to a nuclear holocaust.
Yeah, good analogy.
So tell me, Carrie, why the skin is so important?
Oh my gosh. So the skin which we know for sure is the largest organ, right, that our pets have. And it gets kind of forgotten until it's flared up. And it's the number one reason we go to the vet. We're spending all the money at the vets because of what's in it. But often I hear clients say to me, Oh, well, it's just dry skin. Or oh, it's just a hot spot. Oh, it's just like, it's not important. And the idea of it just being a hot spot when you're talking about the largest organ. It's our first line of defense. It's what protects your animal from everything. And so yeah, it's absolutely probably, you know, it's what we can see. So it's what we can we can respond to because we see what's going on. But it is so important. It has its immune cells are in there. That's how we're protecting the body. So absolutely super important.
Absolutely. And it's a barrier. If you think about it, it's the outer layer, and anything that gets through that outer layer is now wreaking havoc on deeper areas of the body. So really, really critical. And I know in my veterinary clinics that I would have people come in with their dogs or cats with and this seems to be more of a dog problem. But I have seen some pretty disastrous problems with kitty cats as well. But people come in and they have spent literally 10s of 1000s of dollars trying to solve the disaster that has occurred. Do you see that at the at the Spaw as well?
Oh my gosh, it's daily. We see probably anywhere between 40 and 60 dogs a day. So I have Yeah, I have nine groomers and we have lots of bathers, an aesthetician and nutritionist so we see an enormous amount of animals and honestly I know people are gonna think I'm crazy but I'm gonna say close to 80 to 90% of those dogs are having some form of skin problem. And it's getting younger and younger. It used to be we saw kind of in older dogs but now I see puppies coming in. It's young dogs that are already experiencing dry skin and how it's being treated is part of the problem. Yeah it's awful. 1000s of dollars. I see the bills because they'll bring them in. They're like a lot of times I'll ask people for important information I need for the boarding facility, but they'll bring me their entire packet, which is fine. And this dog's two years old and he's already been to the vet 12 times for skin and ear infection. And it's just awful.
Yeah. Yeah. So and then once that, and I find that interesting that of those 40 to 60 dogs that you see per day that have, you know, 80% of them are having some sort of skin issue, are people bringing them in because they have these skin issues? Or are they just bringing them in for routine grooming, and you're looking at them and saying this is not normal?
It's both. I think that you know, people are desperate to stop the itch. So they think a bath is going to solve all problems. And so, yeah, you get a lot of dogs that are getting bathed because they're itchy. But then we get a lot of dogs who are just coming in. And because I am obsessed with skin, I spend most of my life in what I call my therapy bathroom, which is where I am tweaking all of those dogs in there so that I can kind of assess what kind of situation we have oily skin, dry skin, hotspots, bacterial infections, all of these things. And then I kind of will have a conversation about what I find. But it's a combination. Many just want their dogs to be pretty. We all do, and we sleep in bed with dogs, so we certainly don't want them to smell. But it's a it's a it's a problem. It's a huge problem.
Absolutely. So what do you find to be the most frustrating when it comes to skin issues and clients with these pets that have the skin issues?
Oh my gosh. I think the most frustrating and I'm gonna use a story to kind of tell you why this gets so frustrating, but I'm mostly frustrated with the it's kind of two part I'm frustrated with us just acting like the skin isn't that important, especially like when we talk when we just kind of say, Oh, well, it's just dry skin. And to me dry skin is our first uh oh, something's going on. But mostly what frustrates me, honestly, is the misdiagnosis of the skin issue. And so I get a lot of Yeah, I don't wanna say younger veterinarians, but veterinarians who maybe they don't have that tool in their toolbox. So they just call it an allergy because they have something for an allergy when in fact, it may not even be an allergy. An example, I had a kitten come to me one time that had gone into the veterinarian, and the vet told her that the cat had fleas. The client told me that the vet said that the cat was infested in fleas, and that it needed a flea bath and it needed flea and tick medication. While the veterinarian didn't have anybody there that day, that could bathe the cat, so the woman called me and I had her thinking the cat was infested in fleas. I said, Oh my god, bring the poor little kitty over here and I'll see what I can do. So long story short, the kitten didn't have any fleas. I couldn't find even flea debris on this kitten. What she did have was mange. She had missing hair on the tip of her ears and the veterinarian assumed it was fleas because she had some flea and tick stuff. Possibly never even knew what mange looked like. I don't know, I had her go to a different veterinarian and get a better diagnosis. But what could have happened is a harsh flea shampoo, and flea and tick medication. And that wasn't going to solve the problem anyway. Nor was it the problem the kitten had. And so it just it could have just trickled down into nothing right. That kitten's not going to get any treatment for the right purpose. And I see that a lot. And I'm not a veterinarian, so it's really hard. So it gets really frustrating, right? Because if I tell a client, your vet's wrong. Because I'm not a vet. I understand why a client would think you're not a vet, how the hell do you know, you know? My experience is what tells me and I have a lot of experience.
Well, it is frustrating, and I see. So for instance and this isn't really skin so much but I deal with a lot of Cavalier King Charles Spaniels, English Toy Spaniels and they are very prone to have a syringomyelia and carnal occipital malformation and the symptoms of that are scratching. So many of these dogs get labeled as having allergies, and so they're being treated for the wrong thing. So I understand your frustration everything gets labeled as fleas or an allergy when we really have not uncovered the underlying problem and I actually had this with my mother's dog. She suddenly became so itchy. And this is an only pet in the household with two older people. And the dog suddenly was very, very, very itchy. So I allergy tested the dog, I skin scraped the dog, I did everything you could imagine for this dog. And it took me 10 weeks to actually identify that that dog had sarcoptic mange. But it took that long with all those scrapes and tape preparations to actually find a mite and get that diagnosis. So again, if I hadn't been persistent, and I just said, Oh, this is allergies, and gave the dog steroids or antihistamines, or treated it for fleas that it didn't have, we would not have solved the problem. So sometimes it can be it can mean looking a little bit deeper. And I think it's amazing. You know, someone who's been grooming for so many years plus you have veterinary technician experience. So all those years in the veterinary clinics, certainly adds to the knowledge base, but clients are so lucky to be able to bring their pets in to someone who can look at it and say, I don't think we've hit the nail on the head yet. I think we need to to look deeper. So, so good for you. So what are we doing wrong that is destroying the skin's microbiome?
Oh my gosh, I can't, it's so many things. So many things. And so for the listeners, I'm just really sorry, but I know they're gonna be like, Oh, check, check, check. Right down the list. So as a nutritionist, I would be remiss if I didn't respond with nutrition, right, we definitely need to feed, there's a there we hear a lot about the gut/brain axis, but there's also the gut/skin axis as well. What we're feeding our animals directly will help and feed the skin as well. So we definitely have to look at that. And that becomes tricky, because people think that just means switching one bag to the next bag. So it's much deeper than that. So you really want to get with somebody who's knowledgeable about nutrition. And know what that means. I know that a lot of people now say that they have their certified pet nutritionist and I have one too. And I'm not minimizing it but my, my experience is far more important to me than that certificate that I have. You just really gotta make sure someone knows what they're doing when they're talking about nutrition. But one of the things that we do off the charts, over the top, that is destroying the skin's microbiome is we're over bathing our dogs. As a groomer. Right? I make plenty of...
Please bring your dog in every week.
I'm telling you right now, stop it. Like we over bathing in these harsh shampoos so that they smell pretty so that they look pretty so that we can get a good haircut on them. And sometimes those shampoos are actually their allergen. And so I'm a storyteller, so I'm gonna tell you a quick little one. I had a guy bring me a dog. Because his groomer was, and I'm not throwing groomers under the bus and just want people to pay attention. But his groomer had been bathing the dog in an oatmeal shampoo and so he brought the dog into me wearing a sweater, was a little Bichon. When I said oh, she likes wearing sweaters and he says no, she's got these really bad allergies and he brought in his oatmeal shampoo. And they said because I hate oatmeal shampoo. I'm not a huge fan either. But what many dogs are allergic to oatmeal so I'm like why are we get it so I said to him You should go get an allergy test and can I use a different shampoo and he's agreed to and went and got the allergy test and sure enough this dog was allergic to oatmeal. That poor thing is getting this shampoo thrown on it you know every two weeks and all while he's allergic to oatmeal.
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So shampoos that we're using are often the allergens that are causing the problem and a lot of those shampoos have residual and so it stays on your dog. That's why you can still smell it for a long period of time. Because shampoo companies want your dog to smell good because then you'll rebuy their shampoo. So using a shampoo that your dog is actually allergic to is part of the problem. But one of the biggest pet peeves of mine is this medicated shampoo that is used. I have puppies coming to me now that have prescribed medicated shampoo that the vet has told them. You use once a week, so they don't get a bacterial infection. It's just like giving another antibiotic so you don't get a, you know, IBD let's just give them antibiotics. So people are starting to realize that giving antibiotics over and over can destroy the gut, but they're still not understanding that the skin has, we've been able to identify over 300 bacteria that live on your dog's skin. So we keep killing those off. And it takes about 20 days to regenerate that so skin cells on your dogs are regenerating about every 20 days or so. So if we're just bathing every week, and every day over and over and over, we're we're ruining it, we're not giving the skin time to not only regenerate those cells, but to get them to a mature level to where they're doing their job that they're supposed to be doing. So we're killing them off too soon.
Absolutely. And a lot of these shampoos, so the the anti microbials. We're putting Chlorhexidine in these medicated shampoos, which is killing off the microbiome of the skin. Ketoconazole shampoos, which are antifungal shampoos for these animals with yeast infections. So there are in the microbiome not only are there bacteria, there are also fungal organisms, viral organisms, there's a lot of different things going on in the microbiome. So a lot of these particularly the prescription shampoos are as you're saying, doing more harm than good particularly. And I remember before I was knew anything about holistic therapies. I had a Blue Doberman so anyone who's had one of those color mutant alopecia dogs, they have about two hairs per square inch instead of having a nice full coat doesn't show up till they're about a year old and then all of a sudden you have a bald dog that has really smelly skin. And my poor dog got bathed with with benzoyl peroxide and tar shampoo every single week. Every week, he had I didn't know any better. I didn't know any better if I had that dog now I would treat things so much differently. I mean, you can't you can't cure them color mutant alopecia is what it is. It's it's a genetic defect, unfortunately. But those dogs are more prone to skin infections and you know, just so many other issues going on. So besides oatmeal shampoos, the medicated shampoos over bathing is is so we've got all these things were just destroyed plus the use of oral antibiotics, oral antifungals. And that's, that's going to cause the same problem. So what can we do better? How do we protect the skin and coat? Other than bathing?
Oh, I know, right? I know. Everybody's like, oh, this crazy lady is just gonna tell me not to bathe my dog. That's not happening, right?
I have one who pees on himself, like, all the time. So you know, we got to get the pee smell off.
Yeah. It can be a challenge, right? It's definitely a challenge. There's lots of things that we can bathe them in that are actually proactive instead of you know, you brought up chlorhexidine. I just wanted to point this out, there's these little chlorhexidine wipes. And one of the biggest complaints I get is paw licking. My dog's just going out his paws constantly. So I actually have clients that are using chlorhexidine wipes on their paws. Every single day. Dog goes out for a walk, dog gets chlorhexidine wiped all over his feet and then they can't figure out why he's he's so yet when we talk about that stuff, but that's, that's killing. And what I suggest to people is using shampoos and sprays that are more proactive, that will have enzymes and nutrients that actually feed the skin that you that are in the shampoos and so they don't have the harsh sulfates, they don't have the perfumes and dyes so possibly your dog's not going to smell as beautiful, that perfumey smell. They're going to smell good, but they're not going to smell like perfume like they just walked out of the grooming shop. A lot of groomers will use colognes and sprays on top of their dogs so you don't want to do that on top of the bath. So what I suggest that people do is A. don't bathe your dog unless you have to so don't get in this habit of, Oh the groomer said... I know that there was somebody in this area a while back that was telling people that their cat had to be bathed once a week, once a week. And it was an interesting argument because they said, because she goes in the litter box, and I'm like, Yeah, she goes in the litter box twice a day, so well, so um, you have to be careful with this, this bathing, but what we're bathing them in. And so, keep in mind, water does an amazing job. I tell people, you know, sometimes you can just rinse your dog's feet off with just water and and see what happens. Sometimes it's it does what it's supposed to do. So we're not going to frequently bathe them. We've go as long as we possibly can, my dogs probably get bathed. Don't be shocked guys, but probably about every two months, they get a good bath, that they don't know they're not itchy and going at themselves. I like to use. There's a couple of shampoos I like there's one called Neugier Pet Shampoo, it's kind of hard to pronounce. But it has a bunch of enzymes in it and it doesn't lather up and bubble up. So people think it's not working, because we're used to seeing all those bubbles. But those are the, that's the problem with those shampoos is they're designed to look like they're doing something and in fact, they could be causing more harm than good. So we want to use shampoos that are more proactive. You got to be careful with that, right? It's just like the probiotics for our stomachs and our guts. Not all of them, they're the same. So just because you're looking at the bottle, and it says probiotic shampoo. And then if you keep going, you see all these perfumes and dyes. Okay, it's not, we got to be really careful. But some, there's some really great products out there where they're not just the shampoos, but they're a spray, there's a couple of them, I really like there's a spray made company called ION. And it is just a humectant that you can spray on and it comes from soil. And so it's a it's a soil based spray. So sometimes if your dog's skin is super, super dirty, you can you can use a you know, mild shampoo on them if you want and then spray this on the last thing you do, and get that up in the belly area. That kind of thing like for a dog who's urinating on themselves, that's probably your best option, because obviously, you're going to have to use something that's going to get that urine smell out of their coat. And that's probably going to be a little bit of a harsher shampoo. So then spraying on these these probiotic sprays on their skin. TEEF. Actually, I don't know if you've heard of TEEF. That's yeah, so they make a really good probiotic that you that you're they're supposed to drink, but you can actually use it on their skin as well.
I had never heard that that's really interesting. So Carrie's talking about something calledTEEF, and it's a probiotic, it's a water additive, to help balance the microbiome in the mouth to help decrease tartar and plaque buildup. And I had never heard of using it as a rinse after a bath. So that's, that's a great tip for the day, I just learned something.
Well, and that is also why I like to use theTEEF is because that's the other thing people don't realize is your dog is even if he's got good skin, now, he's going to groom himself, not like a cat, but he is going to spend time licking, maybe chewing a little bit, whatever it is, he's going to transfer that onto his skin. So if that mouth biome is not healthy, he's going to transfer that bad bacteria that's in the mouth onto the skin and coat. So we have to keep it all good, or we're going to have these huge problems and we're gonna get misdiagnosed almost always for allergies, when in fact, it's not even an allergy. So it's, it's, it's important.
Exactly. How do you feel about essential oil shampoos?
So I here's where I'm gonna say I kind of stay away from the essential oils only because it's not my expertise. Like I don't, I'm really careful with them because I know some dogs can have reactions and there's so many different companies out there. I know Animal Essentials make some good ones that I but for me, I need to dive a little deeper into essential oils before I can't but I have used some I think so long as it doesn't have all that other stuff in it. Right? So you can get, you know, essential oils that I think are great. I know a lot of veterinarians that I trust use them and like them. But then I see it's the same thing with everything and we take that essential oil we put it in a bottle and then we put all this stuff that kills it and then people go oh, that didn't work. Well it didn't work because it had so much alcohol in it. All the other stuff. So...
Exactly. Yeah, I think there are some really good companies out there that are avoiding the detergents avoiding the sulfates, you know don't have all those foaming agents and surfactants and things in them. So we do have some on our website that have essential oils in them so if you really first of all they can be very healing so I really like them for the healing aspect. But I also you know, for someone who does want their their pet to smell better, like my little guy who pees on himself all the time, these shampoos do a really great job, I don't have to use much of it. And and even though he pees on himself every day, I wash him maybe every couple of weeks, because I don't want to destroy his skin microbiome. And like you said, a lot of times just using some lukewarm water, and doing a, you know, little rub down with that, and a rinse is enough to actually do what we need to get done. So I think that's pretty critical as well.
Yeah, and it's kind of a twofer, right. So like if you use if you washed your dog and kind of just water every once in a while and nothing else, you've got a good water and got your hands in there and got the water on there. And then you used one of like the essential oils as a flea repellent, it would also have a good smell. So you can kind of do both things at the same time without using these harsh flea and tick products, which are just another you know, another thing that destroys the skin, right. harsh flea products on top of them and it's just we're just doing so much to destroy vaccines even you know, I can't tell you how many times a dog gets vaccinated and then they all of a sudden are coming in to be going I don't know why he's itching all of a sudden and then a look and I go well it was vaccinated a week ago and it causes an immune response because like I said in the beginning we have this immune response that's in the first layer of your dog's skin and by the way, a dog's skin is technically thicker than a human skin but the first layer the epidermis, the first layer is thinner than our skin. So it's only about six cells deep versus ours which is about 20 cells deep so we have a very thin epidermis layer and here we are just overwashing injecting stuff into it putting stuff in it we're just we're just destroying these poor guys. It's sad
Do you see a difference? And you I don't know whether this is a thing where you are but we're on a well we have well water and our last home we were in town and we were on city water. Do you see and then our house before that was well water but we had a water softener Do you see a difference in what type of water is used to wash the pets?
So we don't I don't know of any of my clients that use well water so it's hard for me to do that but I will tell you this so I have three tubs at work and two of my tubs have a water softener connected to those two tubs and so I have noticed a difference in the coat texture. I can't say for sure the skin but the coat texture is is is an indication of skin also so when you start to get that wiry coat right when it wasn't wiry before you can start going what's going on? And so I think yes in a lot of ways although I have used the water softener bathtub on a dog who did better with the non water softener water. So you have to suspect that maybe the coat or the skin is requiring some of those minerals that are left behind. So it's hard to say but it's something I tell people you know if you're struggling have your pH tested. Have your water looked at to see we don't think that water could be the problem but it absolutely could definitely be the problem. So it's something to look into for sure. For sure. And your groomer's water right if you're not bathing your dog I know a lot of people don't bathe their dogs they bring them to me. The girls will tell you like as long as I've been doing this I want to bathe dogs I love watching the skin get better by going through that process. So yeah, have your groomers water ask them if they can test their water to see if that's causing your dog's problem.
Interesting. Very, very cool. Carrie, this is just an amazing amount of information in a very short period of time. And I wish we had a lot more time because I think that we could go over this topic for you and I could talk about it for hours. If people want to get more information about the Spaw or about you, where do they go?
So the website that you can go to is called https://www.ahhthespaw.com/. And I use AHH because it's soothing. So I really do think that the Spaw is a really great place for your dogs to be but you can email me there you can I go on web, I'm on live a lot of times on my Facebook page because so that's @petlifecoach. So you can contact me there. I also do consultations I have a lot of people get sadly they get frustrated at the vets and then they're like desperate and so they end up on my table which is great. But I usually have to redo undo everything that was that's the best way to contact me is through the website.
* Instagram: @thespawdcast
* Facebook: @petlifecoach
* YouTube: @TheSpawdcastwithCarrieHyde
* Tik Tok: @thespaw
* LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/carrie-hyde/
* Website: https://www.ahhthespaw.com/
Great. Thank you so much, Carrie. This has been just an amazing amount of information. And I really appreciate you being willing to come on.
Oh my gosh. Dr. Morgan, thank you so much. Thank you so much for being the holistic vet that we all need.
Thanks for listening to another great Naturally Healthy Pets episode. Be sure to check out the show notes for some helpful links. And if you enjoy the show, please be sure to follow and listen for free on your favorite podcast app. We value your feedback and we'd love to hear from you on how we're doing. Visit DrJudyMorgan.com for healthy product recommendations, comprehensive courses, upcoming events and other fantastic resources. Until next time, keep giving your pet the vibrant life they deserve.
The purpose of this podcast is to educate and to inform. It is no substitute for professional care by a veterinarian, licensed nutritionist or other qualified professional. You're encouraged to do your own research and should not rely on this information as professional medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. Dr. Judy and her guests express their own views, experience and conclusions. Dr. Judy Morgan's Naturally Healthy Pets neither endorses or opposes any particular view discussed here.
