Dr. Judy
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? Well 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 Dr. Chris Bessent. She has 34 years of experience in veterinary medicine, including certificates in veterinary acupuncture, veterinary chiropractic, and Chinese herbology. She's also a diplomat in oriental medicine for humans. Man, you just really like studying. But also received her degree in nutrition, and formulates recipes from nothing but Whole Foods. And I am so ecstatic to talk about that because I saw an article in one of the holistic magazines about a week ago. And it was talking about changing foods for the seasons. And there were recipes in there. But they were using synthetic vitamin mineral mixes to balance the diets. And I just about blew a gasket because I really believe that if we're going to talk about whole food nutrition for our pets, then we have to go the the whole nine yards we can't stop at here's your synthetic vitamin mix. So thank you very much for that. We speak the same language there. Currently, she divides her time between like she doesn't have enough to do... The Simple Food Project, Herbsmith and Medicus Veterinary Diets. And we really want to talk about get into that today. So the Medicus Veterinary Diets is a manufacturer of innovative herbal and whole food solution to provide a personalized approach to help for dogs and cats. So Chris, thank you so much for being willing to do this. I think the more we get this word out, the better we're going to be.
Dr. Bessent
I agree 100% I think that we as a profession, and as holistic veterinarians have really have gotten the word out that fresh food matters. And that and that ingredients matter. And if you're eating have beautiful chicken breast for dinner, and you have some steamed broccoli, why wouldn't you give some to your dog. So this idea that I would never feed them from the table is, is craziness. And it's the opposite. We should be feeding healthy, vibrant food. But I think what happens, and I know that you'll appreciate this as well is, is pet parents feed really well when they're healthy, when the dog is healthy. So when the dog is healthy, and they're doing well, you know, the pet parents are empowered and they're feeding whole food and they're feeding real food and understand it. But then when their animal gets sick, for whatever reason, they get scared. And and what happens is that pet parent then goes into the Veterinary Clinic their dog gets diagnosed with kidney disease or their cat gets diagnosed with kidney disease. And despite all that they know, they find themselves walking out of the vet clinic with this bag of brown heavily processed, dry kibble made of ingredients, they would never feed their pet any other time. And they're like I will do anything to to help them. And I'm not blaming veterinarians at all, because we all can agree that if a cat has kidney disease, we really need to lower the phosphorus level and that lower phosphorus levels absolutely correlate with longer lifespans. But can we do it in a better way? Can we do it with whole food? Not with corn and sorghum and wheat gluten meal and all the things that we normally would never use? And that's kind of what I'm coming to say is that we can do it with whole food. And I think that you know it's like such a psychological thing you know, people get people are scared. So they want to do with their vet says to do the vet of the only tools the vet has, prior to Medicus was these dry heavily processed therapeutic diets. And people are afraid to home cook for a dog who's sick, because then all the propaganda that they've heard about, it's not complete and balanced. You can't feed real food, you know, just all of that propaganda. that I think kind of starts to play in people's minds. And then they find themselves, giving them giving their pet the worst nutrition possible when they need it the most.
Dr. Judy Morgan
Absolutely. We see this all the time, I did a consultation for someone yesterday, and she was feeding these beautiful raw foods, really high end foods to her dog, a young dog, who really was set up for failure with the vaccine schedule that had been done and the chemicals that had been given. So it was one of those we could predict that this dog would fall apart and the dog fell apart. And she got scared. And she dumped all of the high quality foods, she dumped all the high quality supplements and herbs and things that she was using, and went to a hydrolyzed protein diet. And this is a young dog. And I said this is just not compatible with life. And one fallacy that I think people really don't realize and that veterinarians have forgotten is that prescription diets, the highly processed kibble, canned prescription diets are really meant to be fed short term, to solve a problem. This is not something that is meant to be prescribed once and then the animal is stuck with this for the rest of their life. Unfortunately, it has become that. And I will never forget my second year in practice, I had a little schnauzer that was a patient and it was obese. And at the time, the clinic that I worked in, we sold more prescription diets than any clinic in the country. And we were a two Doctor practice. So that is really scary what was going out of our door. And I like to apologize to all of my clients and patients from back in the early 1980s. But this little dog was put on RD that reducing diet to lose weight. The dog lost so much weight and actually starved to death. They had the dog on it for a year and nobody in the clinic caught it. They just kept coming to the front desk and picking it up. And the dog actually died of malnutrition. And that is a travesty. Like I should I should have paid the price for that. Because I wasn't on top of what was going on with that pet. And I think that if if veterinarians really kept on top and kept track instead of the client is just stopping at the front desk once a month and picking up their new supply of something that is not offering good nutrition to the to the pet.
Dr. Bessent
And I think we've also seen it with we've also seen it with struvite oxalate stones. Yeah. Oh, absolutely. That, you know, for the longest time in kitties, it was struvite stones. That was that was the problem. And so everybody started feeding CD or a therapeutic diet that changed the pH. So that struvites couldn't occur. Now it's oxalate stones. So exactly what you said instead of feeding for a short time period to kind of right the body. And now let's go now let's go back to a complete and balanced diet, or a healthy whole food diet. We just kept on feeding CD and now it went from oxalate stones all the way to I mean struvite stones all the way to oxalate stones. And now we have people and I have people contact me all the time, my cat has oxalate stones, which is unheard of, because it's not a natural thing. It it was caused by chronically eating the bad eating CD and when they didn't need it anymore. And and I think that has really become a big part as well as it's changed from changed from just the therapy to a way of life, which is crazy.
Dr. Judy Morgan
Absolutely bad
Dr. Chris Bessent
In therapeutic diets. I think it's not only that you're restricting some things, but I think there's a tremendous amount that we don't add enough to. And I'm sure you can agree with that. 100%. So omega three fatty acids. I mean, we talk about it endlessly. And we all appreciate how important it is. But is there enough in the standard food? There really isn't. You know, unfortunately that goes to the idea that you just have to have the presence of it, not a therapeutic amount. And if you have the presence of it, you can put it on the packaging, and the average pet owner's like yep, I'm doing omega threes. You're doing a little sprinkle of it but not a therapeutic amount. And then when you talk about antioxidants like not even heard of like AAFCO does not even acknowledge that antioxidants matter. That that we need antioxidants. So some of them in in Medicus are not only some are restrictive, but some are the opposite. It's like our cancer diets are just flooded with good food so flooded with antioxidants, really high in omega three fatty acid contents from a lower species. So it's really clean, and then super clean wholesome meat and organic fruits and vegetables, which is kind of unheard of. And, and I would say that this idea and I'm sure you agree with that 100% This idea of clean wholesome meat, it's not just a marketing term, right that, that it could be used as a marketing term.
Dr. Judy Morgan
And it is.
Dr. Chris Bessent
It is. Even if it's wrong. so you look at that bag and it has that beautiful piece of chicken breast. It has the DNA of chicken, it does not beautiful chicken breasts, but the average person assumed that it is so it can go anywhere from meat and bone meal which is just basically roadkill, dead, rendered, dried out, horrible. Any any species. That means not just the main species, we think of like chicken and beef and duck, it could be anything. So it goes from meat and bone meal all the way to MSB for mechanically separated, and then all the way to Human Grade USDA approved meats that could go into your diet and how could the pet parent really know? Because as you said, it can just be marketing. Well, well, we've been testing biogenic amines. And I don't know if you've looked into that at all.
Dr. Judy Morgan
No, but I'm very interested in that. It's really neat biogenic amines, really, actually, the testing came from seafood. And because seafood was so prone to rotting, and of course it smells before its rotten. And so it's harder to tell. But if you test for biogenic amines, that's like cadaverine and Putrescine, all of the chemicals that happen in meat when it starts to break down, and that there's a certain level that is acceptable. And so for human nutrition, the biogenic amines have to be higher. If you start going into bone meal and MS beef and those sorts of things, the biogenic amine is so bad. And it gives you a quantitative analysis of the quality of the meat that you're feeding. So to me, I think that in the in our future, hopefully in our lifetime, had this especially therapeutic diets really need to list what is your biogenic amine index? What is it? Is it? Are you using good quality meat? Are you using garbage meat? Right now we're at you either have food grade or you have a food grade or feed grade. Right? And that's the only differentiation but when it says beef, how does the average person really know?
Dr. Judy Morgan
They don't. And I mean, there is I've been to many AAFCO meetings and I've worked closely with Susan Thixton at Truth About Pet Food. And let me tell you, there is so much dishonesty in the pet food industry. So for instance, antioxidants have become a bit of a buzzword, omega threes have become kind of a buzzword, a pet parent who really is looking to improve their their pet's diet, they at least have heard those buzzwords, even from big pet food companies. So we have these packages, like you said that have the beautiful piece of chicken breast. And then they have blueberries and cranberries and fresh broccoli and all these pictures of these beautiful things. But when you read the ingredient label, you read down through the first ingredients, and then you start seeing the chemical ingredients. And then somewhere down in those chemical ingredients. You'll see blueberries and cranberries. It's like well, it's below salt, so it's less than .05%. So in that 20 lb bag, yes, you got a blueberry, congratulations, that's not going to do a lot for the antioxidants in that diet. And then for the Omega threes, well, if this is a cooked diet, that is, you know, like an extruded kibble that has been sprayed with fats, and maybe that's raising our omega three level. But if it's cooked or heated, or stays in that bag for any period of time, it's now rancid, and it's the opposite of a beneficial Omega three, now it is a toxic Omega three. When these companies that produce these dry kibbles will probably tell us that there's enough preservatives in there that that bag will be shelf stable for 25 years, even though it does have an expiration date of one to two years. They tell us it's shelf stable for 25 years, how can those fats not be rancid, even six months down the line? So it's to me it there's a lot of marketing that goes into it, because we have these buzzwords, and people do understand that they need to add these things, but I really want people to understand that these need to be you know fresh ingredients in an amount that is going to actually be beneficial and not just be a marketing buzzword
Dr. Chris Bessent
100% Yeah, I mean, I literally will find myself walking down a grocery aisle knowing, like, knowing the dirty truth behind all of it. And I'll look at the bag and think, Well, that doesn't look too bad. Because it because and it's hard for I think the average person to even imagine that that is possible. You know, it sounds so conspiracy theory that it couldn't be possible in 2023. Yeah, it is. So I'm really like, I think that I think that we really need to focus on sick animals and providing a really great foundation.
Dr. Judy Morgan
that's when they need us the most. So with these Medicus Veterinary Diets, they're called a veterinary diet, I'm assuming that these are being marketed through the veterinary clinics,
Dr. Chris Bessent
there's, we have nine recipes, and three of them are by prescription. Okay, and the other six are not by prescription. They're just super, super good quality. So the three that are by prescription are the two kidney diets, canine and feline, and then the feline bladder diet. And those are by prescription because I feel like you need veterinary supervision. there are so restrictive in phosphorus levels, or in magnesium levels, that I think it's really important that a veterinarian be a part of it. So all they have to do is write a script for it. and then the pet parent could do everything from that point on. But like our skin diet, and our sensitive stomach diet and our cancer diets are are the opposite of the restriction they're adding in. So they're just super good quality, high levels of nutrition that's in a freeze dried format, so that we have about 97% loss of vitamins and minerals. But the majority of it is all just good, wholesome, healthy food. So because you could say the opposite, you could say the next step is okay, my dog is sick. And now I need to figure out how to feed for him. I'm, I'm scared to death, and I don't have time. So here's an opportunity that, that you can feed good, vibrant, healthy food without having to do it yourself. That is kind of the idea. And this gives to me another tool for veterinarians to give, because I've I've recommended CD as well. you know, it was the only thing that we had at the time. And at least now, it gives veterinarians another tool that they can use. And you would think it would be a no brainer, wouldn't you like you just you're like, of course it's it's healthy, vibrant food. The veterinary profession is so they drank the Kool Aid of therapeutic diets, you know.
Dr. Judy Morgan
Spend tons of marketing money. I mean, they were very smart. Yeah, you know, it's sort of big pharma hooked up with medical doctors early in the 1900s. So that the medical doctors would push certain medications and vaccinations and things that big pharma really wanted to push. And the same thing happened in the veterinary, "prescription diets" and prescription diet is actually owned by Hills. no one else is allowed to call theirs... So yours is a veterinary diet, because you're not allowed to call it a prescription diet. Even though a couple of them you are requesting prescriptions for them. But so this goes back to a veterinarian prescribes this very restricted diet, who is keeping track of it what happened, we could end up with the same issue. The veterinarian prescribes it once. And then the client just keeps picking it up and picking it up and picking it up. And no one is, you know, sort of watching what is going so we could end up kind of in the same scenario, especially with the fact that veterinarians are overworked, underpaid, understaffed, like right now things are really crazy in the veterinary field. So I would hope that somebody who's going to the trouble to prescribe a whole food, you know, out of the normal box of thinking that if they're going to that trouble to actually go to that level, that they're going to be also that doctor that is tracking things and really staying on top of what is going on with that patient.
Dr. Chris Bessent
we also talk a lot about the Simple Food Project. So the Simple Food Project is complete and balanced food nutrition for cats and dogs, but it's less expensive. And so, the natural tendency would be I'm going to feed Medicus when they need it, right? And then as they start doing better, Hey, Doc, can I go to this, this other one, that's whole food nutrition, that's really good food, but it's not quite as expensive. So there is this kind of natural funnel to going from one whole food diet, which is very therapeutic, very either restrictive or additive, to going into a complete and balanced. So we do a lot of conversations about that, that yeah, this is expensive, but it's short term, it's not that you're going to be using long term, you're going to use the feline bladder recipe for maybe, maybe a month, maybe six months. And then if your cat is doing well, and they've maintained their bladder health for all of that time period, now let's get transition you into the Simple Food Project, which is complete and balanced. Lower ash, lower magnesium, more species appropriate, and now they live the rest of their lives with that. So we are doing education towards that. It's really interesting. We do a lot of research. So people always like, oh, what kind of research do you have? Well, we have been doing hundreds of 1000s of dollars worth of research. And One researcher said to me, he said, he said, Well, you really need to do a long term study of the effects of this diet. And and I common sense wise said well, why this is not meant for long term. This is meant for short term. And so if I'm going to do a two year three year study on it, I'm implying that it's good to feed for two and three years of time when they don't need it. So why would I do that? Why would I imply that it's a good thing to use for long term? So kind of like you do. It's this, that it's you're kind of flipping the dogma on its head and saying, wait a minute, let's think about this. Why would you even say that the guys like Oh, good point.
Dr. Judy Morgan
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Dr. Judy Morgan
So, can pet parents who are looking for a whole food resource without chemical additives and things? So for instance, the Simple Food Project or the Medicus Veterinary Diets that are not the prescription ones, can they buy those over the counter? Are they only available in veterinary clinics? Are they available online? Are they available in pet stores?
Dr. Chris Bessent
The non prescription ones they could they could get from our website they could get from veterinarian's websites. We do have a few really good stores that carry it as well. They're very consultative and you kind of have to be because it's a higher price point. So yeah, you could the non prescription you could get in almost any place. So you know you could get it through us on our website or you could go to a store that would carry it.
Dr. Judy Morgan
And what about the Simple Food Project?
Dr. Chris Bessent
The Simple Food Project that is exactly the same, have some really great stores that carry it. And then we also a lot in California, a lot in Colorado. And you can also buy it from our website directly.
Dr. Judy Mogan
Interesting. Where are these pet foods made?
Dr. Chris Bessent
Sure that's a great question. Believe it or not, Judy? Well, we I own two large manufacturing facilities. So I have a 45,000 square foot facility and an 85,000 square foot facility. We employ about 50 people at this point right now so we do all the manufacturing in house. So in our 45 square foot facility we have it's considered a more high risk facility so that's where we bring in the raw meats and the organs and we do that the grinding and the chopping and then we're blending it with the organic fruits and vegetables and then forming them. They go into IQ alpha quick freeze tunnel, liquid nitrogen, then then go into the freeze dryers when they come out of the freeze dryers and we do finish product testing and Then it goes into packaging. In our other facility, we, we do all the herbs and soft chews and capsules. And then we do low risk ingredients. So either cooked meats, post HPP meats, or fruits and vegetables. So that's our lower risk facility. And the smaller one is our higher risk facility. But yeah, that's literally what I do every day.
Dr. Judy Morgan
Wow. So you just mentioned HPP for some of the products. Are all of the products HPP?
Dr. Chris Bessent
None of ours are. none of them are okay, we also make some make some food for others. So we manufacture for other companies as well. So, other companies might require HPP. But no, none of none of the Simple Food Project is HPP, none of the Medicus diets are HPP. And because we start with really good ingredients, right? And if you start you know, because it's really about it's, it's about the presence of bacteria, but more about the contamination, and about the bacterial mold. So if you start with ingredients are really bad, like 4D meat, you probably should be HPPing. Because the because the bacterial load is so high that you minimize it. Well, we're starting with healthy, vibrant, clean, USDA, approved, inspected and improved meats. So literally, it's something that you could feed to your family. That's what we start with. And so we don't HPP anything for ourselves.
Dr. Judy Morgan
That's, that's good news, because that is a huge question for a lot of people. And but you mentioned HPP, so I had to clarify that. So thank you very much for that. I think what you're doing is amazing. We only have a minute or so left, talk real quick about Herbsmith, what is Herbsmith?
Dr. Chris Bessent
Yeah, Herbsmith is kind of in my life, I felt like if I have more tools, I could, I could help more patients. And so Herbsmith really came from that. So Herbsmith is supplements that are added to a wholesome, complete and balanced diet. So there are certain things that you actually need to add as a supplement. So probiotics, you know, you need to make sure that they're of the highest quality, good Omega three sources, higher levels, you're better to do it as a supplement than you are to to only rely on what's in the food itself. So Herbsmith produces supplements that are based on Chinese medicine, many of them and then many of them are nutraceuticals and then we added Chinese medicine to them. So for example, glucosamine and chondroitin and then we added boswellia and corydalis and yucca and, and tumeric too, so it's kind of this nice blend between nutraceuticals and herbs. But really using a lot of Chinese herbs. So that was the beginning. And those were the beginning tools that I used. And then I went okay, I really need good food. So then we invested heavily in freeze dried, and then Simple Food Project came around based on food energetics, so warming, cooling and neutral. And then I said but we also need really good quality convenient food for sick animals as well. And that was Medicus. And now I'm done.
Dr. Judy Morgan
Let me tell you how well that retirement thing is working out. For those of you who want more information, it's Herbsmithinc.com, SimpleFoodProject.com, MedicusVeterinaryDiets.com. Facebook is @ChrisBessentDVM and Instagram is @DrChrisBessent. Chris, thank you so much for joining me today. I'm so excited about everything that you're doing, and I'm very thankful for everything that you are doing for our pets.
Dr. Chris Bessent
Thank you.
Dr. Judy Morgan
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.
Disclaimer
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.
