5 Best Hypoallergenic Dog Foods & Tips You Need To Know

---

Choosing the right dog food for a dog with food allergies can be a slow and painful process. But it is something that needs to be done for the sake of our dog’s health. Luckily, there are many hypoallergenic options on the market; you just need to know what you are looking for.

Dog allergies

Just like humans, dogs can be allergic to certain things in their diet. They might be intolerable to some protein sources or carbohydrate sources. You must find out which specific allergen is causing your dog trouble and get rid of it. That can be achieved in two ways - elimination diet and blood tests.

Elimination diets

Elimination diets are tricky, and it will take plenty of time to understand and find which foods are causing your dog's allergies. You should eliminate your dog’s food and exchange it for a single source of protein and carbohydrates. Keep your dog on that diet for at least 3 months until they have no allergic issues. After that, start reintroducing them one by one ingredient until you confirm which one is causing them problems.

Blood test

An elimination diet takes a lot of time, and sometimes, we have inconclusive results. The easier and faster way of determining your dog’s allergies would be blood testing. Unfortunately, these tests cannot confirm food allergies, and the only option is the elimination diet. This is an effective way of learning about inhalant (seasonal) allergies, which are more common.

Dogs with allergies can get medications to help them with this problem. To learn more, check out this article - Allergy medications for dogs.

What is hypoallergenic dog food?

The term is slightly confusing, and it doesn’t mean what most of us think it means. Theoretically, if a dog is allergic to lamb, any food that doesn’t contain lamb is hypoallergenic food for them. Other dogs can react to different things, and they will need different food that doesn’t include their specific allergen.

The term hypoallergenic dog food will mostly refer to dog foods that do not contain ingredients that usually cause dog allergies. The most common dog food allergens can be meat-based, like lamb, chicken, fish, beef, or pork. Other common allergens can be yeast, soy, corn, wheat, and dairy. Hypoallergenic dog food should avoid these common allergens, and there are five main forms of hypoallergenic dog food;

1. Prescription Diet

Prescription diets, as their name suggests, can only be prescribed by a vet. You can only get it with a doctor’s prescription, and they are usually bought in vet clinics.

2. Limited Ingredient Diet

This is one of the best ways to limit the different ingredients your dog consumes. A limited-ingredient diet is vital for the elimination process and finding out which ingredients are bugging your dog.

3. Hydrolyzed Protein Diet

Hydrolyzed protein diet is a special diet that breaks the ingredients into protein and carbohydrate molecules in small pieces. They don’t trigger allergic reactions.

4. Novel Protein Diet

This type of diet revolves around the introduction of novelty protein sources. Some of the most popular new protein sources are kangaroo, bison, venison, pheasant, and alligator.

5. Homemade food

There is a huge popularity rise in homemade foods because owners have complete control over all ingredients their dogs are ingesting. It is a popular way to conduct an elimination diet.

If you are interested in learning more about a raw diet, check out this article - Dogs and raw chicken.

Based on all information we found out about the topic, we went through numerous dog food brands and their hypoallergenic options. We picked out the 5 best hypoallergenic dog food options for your dog.

World Dog Finder team