For many dog owners CBD oil is already part of their dogs regular health regium, but if you have just had your canine best friend diagnosed with a painful condition like osteoarthritis or even cancer, has developed an anxiety conditions or suffers from seizures, you are probably starting to look into whether CBD oil is going to be a suitable treatment.
After years of having any product derived from hemp or cannabis plants banned in the US there is still a lot of uncertainty for people about the effectiveness of medications based from these plants, and there is still quite a lot of confusion about which products are legal, where they are legal, and if they will get you, or your pet high. There is a lot of information to be found regarding individual products on top dog, but first let’s clarify some of the terms and look at what the research says.
CBD Is From Cannabis But It Is Not Going To Get Your Dog Stoned
This is perhaps the most confusing aspect when people suggest that you use marijuana to help with pain relief, however although once the only option (as a human) if you wanted to use cannabis oil or other products for pain relief was to try and obtain a prescription for medical marijuana or to obtain the herb illegally, actual CBD Oil is not going to get you high and is not illegal.
In fact, it is often sold as ‘hemp oil’ to try and differentiate itself from cannabis products that will get you high, however hemp oil is usually derived from the seeds of a cannabis plant, while CBD oil (like the products that produce a psychoactive reaction) are obtained from the leaves, flowers and steam of a cannabis plant.
You can click here to get a better understanding about the pain relief properties of cannabidiol, but essentially both the ‘high’ giving version marijuana and the non-high giving versions all derive from either the cannabis indica or the cannabis sativa plants. The difference is whether you have something that contains a certain level of tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) or whether you have a product that contains only the cannabidiol (CBD) extract.
At this stage cannabidiol products are not generally regulated by the FDA, so there have been some instances where the level of THC in the oil has been higher than the 0.3% allowance normally considered to be of a level that will not be detected in the body. If you are giving this product to your dog, then you need to make doubly sure that you are purchasing from a reputable supplier who is able to ensure that their manufacturing source has done an excellent job in harvesting from low THC plants and has extracted just the cannabidiol.
Hemp Oils And Seizures
There is a lot of research starting to come out about the various properties, uses and contraindications of different hemp and cannabis products, with one of the more recent studies from Colorado State University looking into using a CBD oil to treat seizures in dogs, with very positive results. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/31067185 It is still early days, with more research to be done before you will likely to see this as a mainstream solution to all forms of seizures in our canine friends, but if this is something that your poor puppy suffers from, definitely discuss the option with your vet.
The key issue is to ensure that you are getting the dosage right, this means not only making sure that you are getting the right amount of the oil into your dog’s diet, but that the amount of milligrams of CBD per milliliter of liquid base (mg/mL) is appropriate not only for your dog’s size, but for their condition.
