Does your dog have itchy skin, gastrointestinal problems (diarrhea, loose stools, gas, bad breath), or a paw-licking habit?

These are common food intolerance or allergy symptoms most pet owners will need to figure out at some point in their dog's life to decode how to get their dog back to feeling healthy and happy.

Let's talk about food allergy symptoms and what to do if your dog has dog food allergies. (You can also watch the recorded video version of this live learning group/Q&A with me a Clinical Pet Nutritionist and Dogly Nutrition Advocate above, just click watch.)

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Is it a food allergy or food intolerance/sensitivity?

Before we can know how to help your dog, it's important to understand the difference between a food allergy and food intolerance or sensitivity in dogs.

What are true food allergies in dogs?

A food allergy is an immune reaction to a particular protein or ingredient in the diet that results in symptoms like itchy skin, rashes, gastrointestinal problems, and/or respiratory distress. This type of reaction is relatively rare in dogs.

What is a food intolerance or food sensitivity in dogs?

On the other hand, a food intolerance or sensitivity is an adverse reaction to a particular ingredient or protein in the diet that results in more mild symptoms like gastrointestinal upset (diarrhea, loose stools, gas, bad breath), itchy skin, and/or paw licking.

Food intolerances and sensitivities are much more common than true food allergies in dogs because they can be triggered by anything your dog can't digest. When a dog has a sensitivity or intolerance to a particular food, upset stomach issues will likely be your first visible sign.

Both food allergies and food insensitivities are caused by genetic and environmental factors. While calling a dog's symptoms an allergy instead of a sensitivity means a much more extreme reaction, pet owners tend to use the term "dog allergies" more frequently since it's easier to relate with human allergies. But I promise, most dogs have food sensitivities and not food allergies!

How do I know if my dog has food allergies or food intolerances/sensitivities?

The only definitive way vets go about diagnosing food allergies vs food intolerances is by doing an elimination diet food trial.

An elimination diet is when you remove all potential allergens from your dog's diet and then slowly reintroduce them one at a time. You're looking for any reaction or change in symptoms as you add each potential allergen back in.

This type of trial can take up to 12 weeks, which is why it's important to be patient and work with your veterinarian throughout the process. Before going to the lengths of an elimination trial though, let's go though the food allergy symptoms to look out for first.

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Common symptoms of dog food allergies/sensitivities to watch for

If your dog has food allergies or food sensitivities, you want to catch and address it early. The first sign of food sensitivities or food allergies in dogs is GI upset. Upper GI symptoms include vomiting, nausea, bad breath, and inappetence (lack of appetite). Lower GI issues include gas, diarrhea, soft stool, blood or mucus in stool, irritable bowel syndrome, and colitis.

• If your dog has gas, something's not right in your dog's gut. Many people take gas as a normal part of dog life, but if your dog has gas you can smell (sorry, GI talk is rather straightforward!), that is not natural for a healthy dog.

• If your dog stops eating and that's unusual for your dog (not usually a picky eater), call your vet.

• If you see blood or mucus in your dog's stool, see your veterinarian to rule out anything bad. The reality is it's not usually serious but good to rule out. It could be your dog's tummy just does not agree with a certain food ingredient for some reason.

• What you do want to see in your dog's stool: you want firm, well-formed "logs" to nuggets. Welcome to poop talk! The color should be dark brown not light brown. Light brown means some nutrients are not being absorbed, and maybe your dog's system is not doing its normal detox function.

• If your dog consistently has bad breath, that's also not something to write off lightly as just being "dog breath." It's not natural for healthy dogs to have bad breath. It could be bad teeth or plaque (you'll want to check that first, more on that later) or a digestive issue. It could be that your dog's system is not producing enough digestive enzymes and foods are not being properly digested.

• If you're seeing symptoms such as excessive paw licking, that could be a skin allergy, referred pain from possibly a leg injury, or it could be related to a food allergy/sensitivity, but in that case, it's not usually the first sign. (Quick heads-up: we're addressing skin allergies specifically here.)

For all of these instances, we can usually do a lot to solve the root cause and the symptoms that come with it naturally and nutritionally without drugs. More on that later.

Just because your dog never had a dog food allergy or sensitivity doesn't mean he/she never will

Dog food allergies or sensitivities can be acute or chronic. Meaning they can come on suddenly or gradually over time. Just because your dog has not had a reaction to a food in the past, does not mean he/she won't have one in the future. Sorry to be the bearer of bad news!

Your dog could eat chicken his/her whole life and never have a problem with it, and then start having severe diarrhea after eating chicken. The reason for this is as your dog's gut wall gets more inflamed from common food allergens, the integrity of the gut wall starts to break down and things that never used to cause a problem suddenly do. This is called "leaky gut."

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What does it mean if a dog has "leaky gut?"

Leaky gut is when the spaces between the cells that make up the gut wall (called "tight junctions") start to loosen and widen. When this happens, it's like Swiss cheese—big holes start to form and things that are not supposed to get through start seeping into the bloodstream.

This is a big problem because now not only are potential allergens getting through, but also toxins, bacteria, and other nasties that should have been stopped at the gut wall. This puts a lot of stress on the immune system because it now has to deal with foreign invaders that are supposed to be kept out.

Food allergies in dogs can also be hormone related

If your dog's symptoms are recurring, his/her food allergies could be hormone related. Hormones can play a factor in any health problem. (Unfortunately, not much research has been done in this area, so not as much information as we'd like is available to vets. If you do see this pattern though, it's worth noting so we can factor it into the right answers for your dog.)

Ingredients to watch out for when battling food allergies in dogs

In treating food allergies, one thing to keep in mind is we don't want to stimulate the immune system because your pet's immune system has already kicked in with an allergic reaction to help eliminate the cause.

What does that mean?

You'll want to avoid anything containing an ingredient that itself stimulates the immune system. Echinacea is the big one to watch our for; so is oregon grape. Many dogs can be allergic to these herbs as they encounter them in the environment. Most true allergies are environmental allergies not food allergies, so we want to steer clear of introducing herbs that might complicate your dog's issues further.

Food is your greatest point of control over allergic-type reactions

So many environmental factors exist that we have less control over than food. The greater environment beyond our homes/yards, for example, or medications that could contribute to allergic reactions and toxins in our dogs' systems. With food at least we can control what goes in our dog's body.

Nutrition is at the heart of setting up your dog to live long and live well. And it's in your own hands to control for your dog! By providing a diet that's tailored to your dog's individual needs and helping your dog stay as healthy as possible, you're controlling what you can to set your dog up for good health.

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Conventional vs holistic approaches: symptoms vs cause

Treating your dog's GI issues can follow two very different paths: conventional or holistic.

Conventional food allergy treatment

Conventional treatment usually addresses the symptoms to suppress them, most often with drugs. Holistic focuses on the root cause, to correct or balance the cause and the symptoms that express it naturally.

We're all incredibly fortunate to have traditional medicine available when needed. For necessary surgeries, antibiotics, vaccines, etc, it saves lives! At the same time, most GI and allergy issues respond for long-term wellness by going to the root cause through natural and nutritional approaches.

Holistic food allergy treatment

Tradtitional Chinese Medicine shows us that focusing on suppressing symptoms increases disease by driving the disease force deeper into the body. Those symptoms are the expression of the disease warning us of the true cause; masking or suppressing them is a temporary "fix" to what we can see but doesn't solve the problem.

For example, an anti-diarrheal drug or allergy medicine (like the too-often-prescribed Apoquel) address the symptoms making your dog miserable but doesn't help your dog be well and get out of the cycle of something being out of balance and unhealthy for the long term.

No one wants a miserable dog, so you may want to use conventional meds like anti-diarrheals to get your dog through it in the moment while you buy time to address the real cause.

Holistic and traditional medicine are two different brains. It is often said, "Traditional medicine can help your dog feel better. Holistic medicine can help your dog get better." (With that in mind, having a clinical nutritionist, holistic or integrative vet on your dog's team is a good idea.)

Next up in the Allergies Channel on Dogly

If you've followed my guides so far on the best dog food for sensitive stomachs, dog food allergies, and food intolerance and still haven't gotten to the bottom of the best dog food for your dog, you may be considering an allergy test for your dog. Go to my next guide to learn why an allergy test may or may not be a good idea for your dog.

Hop over to the Allergy Channel if you have any nutrition related questions for the Community discussion or start any of the step-by-step guides in Environmental Allergies, Itchy Allergies, and Seasonal Allergies. And if you ever need more personalized nutrition guidance, please reach out!