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Health Alert: Licking up this skin gel is a worryingly easy way for dogs and cats to experience stomach ulcers and kidney damage. Here’s all you need to know…
Ask any member of the furry family and they’d say licking is in their top 5 favourite hobbies. Possibly top 3. And it’s easy to see why. After all, licking achieves so many things. Sure it’s a great way to get instant attention, tasty salt from your skin and most importantly show that love, affection and connection that’s so important.
However, that super common action of licking can also land them in trouble if you happen to have an anti-inflammatory gel like Voltaren on your skin. That’s because while it may be safe for us, dogs and cats are much more sensitive to its effects. In fact, the active drug, Diclofenac, can cause stomach ulcers at just 2mg/kg and kidney damage at 4mg/kg. What does that mean? Well, for an 8kg Cavoodle, they only need to lick 1.5 grams of gel off your skin for stomach problems and 3 grams of gel for potential kidney issues. For a cat, it’s even less.
It’s such a sneaky and surprising poisoning. Especially when your little hairy human is only trying to help with some tongue TLC. So avoid using the gel where you can and for those large painful sports injuries where you have to apply large amounts of Voltaren, keep those legs or arms covered if tongues look like they’re tempted to partake in their own kind of remedial massage…
