Peer-reviewed veterinary case report
Bone loss and pain in puppy and tiger from low calcium diet
By Krook, Lennart & Whalen, Joseph P·Published in Clinical imaging·2010·Department of Biomedical Sciences, United States·View original on PubMed →
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Original publication title: Nutritional secondary hyperparathyroidism in the animal kingdom: report of two cases.
- Species:
- dog
Plain-English summary
A 9-week-old German shepherd puppy was brought in with severe bone pain, trouble walking, and difficulty chewing food. The puppy had been eating a diet of only boneless meat, which led to a serious imbalance of calcium and phosphorus in its body, causing significant bone loss. After starting calcium supplements and switching to a diet with the right balance of these nutrients, the puppy showed improvement in both pain and mobility.
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Abstract
This report describes two cases of marked bone loss (osteopenia) occurring in a 9-week-old German shepherd puppy and in a 6-month-old tiger. In both cases the animals were fed a diet which was exclusively boneless meat. The diets in both cases contained approximately 40 mg of calcium and 1000 mg of phosphorus per pound resulting in both calcium deficiency and phosphorus excess, resulting in a phosphorus-to-calcium ratio of 25:1, well beyond the amounts known to cause marked loss of bone experimentally. This has been termed nutritional secondary hyperparathyroidism (NSH). Both animals presented with severe bone pain, difficulty in ambulation, and difficulty in chewing food. Radiographs showed marked osteopenia and spontaneous fractures. Both responded clinically and radiographically to calcium supplementation and a diet with an appropriate phosphorus-to-calcium ratio. The importance of calcium and phosphorus in the human diet is briefly discussed.
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Search related cases →Original publication on PubMed: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/21092876/