Dog food can now be used to treat a whole range of medical conditions – keeping your pet healthier and happier for longer.

Over the past 20 years, extraordinary progress has been made in the development of highly specialised pet food formulas. These range from the more general weight management and sensitive digestion recipes, to diets designed to help manage specific conditions such as canine diabetes and failures in renal function.

Some formulations work to support treatment over a limited period of time, but others can help your pet for life. The very latest advances can even reduce or eliminate the need for medication.

You can now find a range of dog foods that have been created as nutritional aids in the treatment and dietary management of dogs with specific health problems. Today vet-prescribed dietetic foods - often known as therapeutic diets - play a major role in modern veterinary practice, supporting the treatment of many canine diseases, either as the sole therapy or as part of the total treatment.

The science behind these formulations is often ground-breaking, each providing a proper balance of total nutrients while satisfying special dietary needs. Such foods can support or replace drugs and dramatically increase a dog's chances of living a longer and healthier life.

Commonly prescribed therapeutic diets offer nutritional support for dogs suffering from

• heart conditions, high blood pressure or fluid retention;
• diabetes mellitus, constipation and diarrhoea;
• dermatitis and inflammatory skin conditions;
• gastrointestinal conditions such as enteritis gastritis and inflammatory bowel disease;
• severe food allergies or intolerances;
• inflammatory joint conditions (or for healthy dogs predisposed to joint disorders);
• kidney failure or liver disease;
• clinical obesity;
• urinary and bladder disorders.

Formulas are also available to support dogs during convalescence post-surgery, or when suffering from nutritional stress.

With around 10 per cent of all allergies in dogs related to food, it stands to reason that diet can play an important role in alleviating reactions such as itchy skin, recurrent ear infections, hair loss, skin abrasions, vomiting and diarrhoea.

The protein source of a food is usually to blame for an allergy, with the main culprits including beef, dairy products, chicken, wheat, chicken, eggs, corn and soy.  Switching to another source of protein, such as lamb, or to a non-wheat-based carbohydrate, such as rice, will often relieve the symptoms.

A staggering 25 per cent of dogs are overweight. The cause is simple - too little exercise and too much food. So it's vital to tackle the problem by looking at both the amount of energy consumed (food eaten) as well as the amount expended (through exercise).

Feeding dogs less of their regular food is not ideal, as the result could simply be that they don't get the right level of nutrients. On top of that, hungry dogs are more likely to fill the gap by looking for food elsewhere, such as in bins and from friendly neighbours.  Instead, a specially formulated 'light' diet will ensure your dog stays nourished while still eating a satisfying volume of food.