18 Apr Nope! Not all cannabis is safe for pets – Harm reduction education. 

As many pet parents look to natural ways of helping their pets, CBD is often considered or sought out to help better manage a range of ailments including pain and arthritis, anxiety or as part of end-of-life or palliative care treatment.  

As we have detailed previously, the only legal way for pets to obtain medicinal cannabis in Australia is through a veterinary prescription.  In addition to legalities, PetCann | Prescribing rules and guidelines, there are many potential safety considerations that we must ensure pet owners are made aware of.  For both of these reasons, the sourcing of CBD oil without veterinary prescription from a reliable source, should be strongly discouraged. 

One of the biggest risks to pets is human labeled products, where THC concentrations and harmful ingredients (such as xylitol) are a real concern, potentially harmful or even fatal for pets.  CBD found online or in market is completely unregulated and may contain harmful contaminants and insufficient label information to properly discern.  At best, pet owners may be purchasing a mislabeled oil containing no CBD at all and lacking any efficacy or potential benefit. 

Often the use of CBD for pets is initiated by the pet parent and is a great way for our profession to see the many and varied benefits that can be had.  Encouraging conversations and providing harm reduction education builds client-practice relationships and keeps pets in our care safe.  Prescribing CBD is easy through PetCann’s vet portal and offers many benefits with very low risks.  If you are new to prescribing, our state based veterinary science liaisons can make a time to guide you through the process. 

As a profession, we have the responsibility to educate and prevent harm and as such discourage pet owners from accessing CBD through any other means, which could lead to intoxication, contamination or not properly considering the overall impact for the disease and/or other medications being taken. 

By prescribing PetCann CBD oils, vets have the confidence in knowing that the CBD comes from our carefully selected sources and is imported with the required licenses through our parent company Cannatrek, leader in medicinal cannabis in Australia meeting all legal obligations and quality processes.  

A Certificate of Analysis (COA) is an important document that details safety information, including the molecules present from the cannabis plant and absence of contamination such as pesticides, heavy metals, residual solvents and/or microbials.  This is available upon request and provides vets and pet parents reassurance of the quality and safety. 

An interesting fact about the cannabis plant is its effectiveness in bioaccumulation and phytoremediation.  In industry, the cannabis sativa plant has promising potential for it’s ability to clean up contaminated soil.  However, for it’s medicinal potential, we want to ensure cannabis is grown in good clean soil to prevent heavy metal and/or pesticide contamination.  The COA tests for the presence of heavy metals and pesticides to ensure the product is free from these harmful contaminants and safe for patient use.   

As the use of cannabis medicine becomes more mainstream, it’s expected that these conversations will come up more often.  It’s important that we continue having informed conversations with owners.  The last thing we want is pet parents “doing it anyway” if their vet is not on board or unsure how to prescribe.  Pet parents taking it upon themselves to abruptly discontinue medications could have disastrous outcomes for certain conditions, whilst in other situations, dose adjustments of other medications may be suggested under veterinary guidance. 

The use of medicinal cannabinoids is proving to be a very effective option for pets; however, it is important to prioritise legal compliance and patient safety.  Open communication and harm reduction education are the keys to ensuring the responsible and effective integration of medicinal cannabinoids into veterinary practice for the well-being of our animal companions.