Why was Omega QD developed?
Medical and scientific literature demonstrate that Omega 3 fatty acids (EPA/DHA) from a fish source provide possible health benefits to both humans and animals. The health promoting antioxidant properties of blueberries are also well documented and researched.
As a practicing small animal veterinarian, Dr. Decker developed Omega QD because available fatty acid supplements did not seem to be providing the clinical benefits that she thought she should see.
“I would read the medical literature and expect to see those benefits with my patients, but I wasn’t. I used several common veterinary brand fish oil capsules and oils that had been around for a long time. I even tried some newer brands. Sometimes, if I gave two or three times more fish oil than the product recommended, I would start to see positive changes. (if the dogs and cats were willing to eat several capsules or larger amounts of oil daily.) However, most of my patients that would eat the larger amounts would also develop side effects: diarrhea and actually have their bodies ‘smell like fish!’ Yikes!”
So, Dr. Decker started researching the available fish oil products, both veterinary brands and human supplements.
“I started to read Omega 3 fish oil supplement labels more closely and found that the majority of the brands had about the same amounts of Omega 3’s. The front of the bottles stated: ‘1,000mg Omega 3 fish oil per capsule.’ But, when I read the ‘Supplement Facts’ box on the back of the bottles, it said: One capsule has 300mg of Omega 3s (EPA/DHA). That is 1/3 less than what I thought when I read the front label!”
“All this time, most of my clients and I thought we were getting 1,000mg of the Omega 3’s with one large capsule, when actually, we were only getting 300mg of Omega 3’s per capsule. That meant that they had to give 3 capsules daily to their pet to give the 1,000mg of Omega 3’s that they thought they had already been giving! This changed everything for me when recommending Omega 3 fatty acids for my patients. Now, a cat or small dog would need to eat the liquid inside one of those large capsules once or twice daily depending on what we were using the supplement for. For example, if I wanted to use Omega 3’s for a golden retriever patient with cancer, I would recommend that he or she have 3,000mg of Omega 3’s dialy. They would have to eat 10 of those fish oil capsules every day and not have side effects! There must be a better way.”
Dr. Decker also learned that, in general, the FDA had less strict labeling requirements for nutritional supplements (nutraceuticals) compared to medications. That seemed to explain, for example, why she sometimes could only find a percentage of Omega 3’s per bottle of salmon oil but no information about exactly how much Omega 3 fatty acids were provided in a serving. Most products, veterinary and human, did not seem to provide several other pieces of information that Dr. Decker wanted to know about the fish oil before she recommended it to her patients…
“I routinely could not find several things on the labels that I wanted to know: what type of fish that the fish oil came from, if the oil was tested low or free from heavy metals or contaminants, what country the fish came from, farm raised or wild, and where the oil was actually made and not just distributed. It seemed that every international company listed a USA-based distribution company on their product labels which seemed to try to give me a false sense of security.”
She was very frustrated with the available fish oil supplements available due to either low concentrations, added ingredients, production outside the USA, or a lack of product information provided on the labels that she, as a veterinarian, wanted to know about before recommending it to her patients.
“There has to be a better way to do this. So, I set out to see if the type of Omega 3 veterinary fish oil supplement that I envisioned could actually be made. And, then I thought…why can’t it be a powder? That would be less messy and much easier to measure out very specific ‘doses’ for my patients.”
Well, after 2 years, a few ‘twists of fate,’ and some uniquely supportive people guiding her in the right direction, she had met all of her goals with ‘OmegaQD.’ It is manufactured right here in the USA by a human supplement manufacturer that adheres to FDA regulations and GMP (we are their only veterinary/pet supplement they make). The ingredients are manufactured in the USA. (even the labels are from Kansas!) The fish are wild caught in the Atlantic (no fish are from China) and their oil is made into a powder form in the USA. Is the supplement a little more expensive to make than we had hoped for? Yes. But, we realize why…
“It’s not about high volume quantity at low cost, it is about affordable, high quality for each pet that uses this supplement. I am so pleased! Our pets – ‘furry children’ – deserve the same high quality nutritional supplements that I would want for myself and my family.” – Dr. Debbie Decker, DVM
