WhY is weight management in pets so hard?

Ever heard the saying "If you aren't part of the solution, you are part of the problem?" We think applies perfectly to weight management in pets from a practicing veterinarian's perspective, so we took it to heart at HPC!

As long as our 3 DVM HPC founders have practiced veterinary medicine, we have tried to improve methods of patient care in veterinary practice by developing new solutions. That is what we do as veterinarians: we solve challenging problems to get pets back to vitality!

My initial chosen practice areas of preventive care, veterinary rehabilitation, dentistry & nutrition provided me with many challenges to solve! The general ownership & running of a busy vet clinic provided plenty of opportunity to develop new solutions as well!

Dr Joey has had 18 years developing solutions in a feline-only practice setting, working with and around the many idiosyncrasies we all know cats have! (and love them for it!)

Dr Hadar has been solving data & technology solutions since his first day in practice and is now a PhD veterinary epidemiologist helping to design studies & help solve some of the most complex problems in veterinary medicine!

Our last 5 years working together on clinical application & research projects to get cats to ideal weight safely using technology in the home have been challenging, rewarding, and productive.

Why is all this important ?

We can help get the pets in your care back to ideal weight and help monitor those pets with chronic conditions with very little effort or extra time from your team.
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We have proven solutions for weight management and remote patient care that we have shown solve problems for the pet parent, the clinic team and most importantly the pet! Prevention using home health technology is also a key focus of HPC!

Research here

So Why is weight management in pets so hard, and what solutions can HPC provide ???

Pet Parent Challenges

1) Feeding pets is an emotional, complicated issue Dealing with pet behaviors of begging, food stealing/sharing making sure each pet eats the right amount of the correct food is of prime importance.

2) Choosing the best food and calculating calories is hard As consumers we are all bombarded with mis-truths, half-truths and overzealous marketing that IS the pet food industry!
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3) Follow-up is challenging (especially cats!) having validated scales and other devices at home to follow trends in between office visits is vital

Clinic Challenges

1) All clinic team members don't have the same interest in nutrition It is not a judgment, just a fact! As a practitioner myself, I enjoy basic surgery but refer all complex procedures to my colleagues. Unfortunately with nutrition there are not enough board-certified nutritionists in the world (less than 100) and very few practicing at the mid level VTS-nutrition CVT level.

HPC can step in following all establish guidelines to set up safe "weight management guardrails" and provide tele-monitoring for most routine cases and we urge veterinarians to reach out to board-certified veterinarians whenever they need them. We love the tele-consulting concept!

2) Follow-up, calculations of safe rate of loss take valuable team time and is not an exact science Most of us were taught nutrition basics in vet school but calculating rate of loss, trying to be as precise with our body condition scores is not always easy!

Our app & dashboard auto calculate Average Weekly Weight Loss (AWWL) over 10 day periods to stay within the 0.5 to 2% AWWL recommended by established guidelines for cats (1 to 4% for dogs)

3) We know how precious veterinary team time is I still practice 4 days a week in my clinic where HPC was designed. I make every technology can "pay its way" in terms of time-saving, improved outcomes, more accurate monitoring whether it is a tablet, a scribe or any new widget!

HPC's solutions (to date)


1) Using home health technology works. Our 2 papers & 6 abstracts have shown that consistent measurement using devices that measure food & body weights are up to 4X more effective than without that technology.

2) An app and a platform (essentially a virtual diary) for the pet parent and insight for the veterinary team improves outcomes further and also saves veterinary team time. We have a published paper of a 37lb cat losing 25 lbs.

3) We use only non-branded calculators so the choice of food is always open between the veterinarian and the pet parent. We won't "go there"

4) Rewards motivate! Fit Pets for Rescues has reached over 1000 pet owners in its 13 years and we have shared our resources with dozens of clinics . Almost all participating pets have lost weight and through our generous sponsors rescues have received $42K in 13 years as of next month.

5) We have had very good success with severe obesity but our solution is for all pets and prevention is our most important solution. A pet parent that weighs their pet routinely and knows what ideal weight looks like will live a healthier & longer life.

We can help educate pet parents and team members. We have heard MOST OF IT before!

Let us help, even just one test case (see our current challenge details below) to see join this one of just enter one pet to be ready for our big spring challenge)

Dr Ken