Introduction To Plechners Syndrome

Hi, this is Rita Hogan and welcome to the Dogs Are Individuals podcast. I'm a clinical canine herbalist and I've been practicing for over 20 years. This podcast is all about your dog through an herbal lens. So let's get to it and dive right in.

Hey everyone, this is Rita Hogan. How are you? I am coming live from New Haven, Connecticut on my way to Virginia and Charlottesville, Virginia and then Williamsburg, Virginia. Then I will be going to South Carolina and to North Carolina, so stay tuned. You can go to the Herbal Dog Book Tour sponsors to check my sponsors out and also to check and book tour stops to check my stops out. I will be updating for August, September very very soon. So I want to say thank you to my sponsors. Green Juju. Green Juju is a sponsor of this podcast. It's a sponsor of my book tour. Goodness gracious. Human Grade Pet Food, Real Mushrooms. Also a sponsor of this beautiful podcast, Earth Buddy Pet Anacelle Pawdaga which is a great online based store, Innovative Pet Lab, Fido's Bone broth, Feline Essentials, Dr. Ruth Roberts, Pet Health Coach Raw Some Pets in Plainville, Illinois and Raw Pets Tampa and Coco Therapy. My Pet Carnivore and Farm dog Naturals all make my tour possible and I mention them here on this podcast. Special thanks goes to Green Juju the Pug and Hound Apothecary and Real Mushrooms for sponsoring this podcast. So this is a short and Pug and Hound Apothecary pugandhound.com They are awesome in that they have one of the most comprehensive online stores for holistic dog products that I know of. Krista and her husband Jeff do just a wonderful job at everything. Basically. If you ever get a chance to stop in to the Geneva, Illinois store, please do because it is amazing. Pugandhound.com check them out. They have a wonderful, wonderful staff and they can tell you everything about their products. They have great flea and tick products and we know that we are knee deep in flea and tick season. So one of the things that they carry is Madoricide. Madoricide is a wonderful flea and tick repellent. I love it. They also have natural flea collars, they have natural flea soap and shampoo and they have the flea mitts that I absolutely love and was talking about a couple podcasts ago that when you go into the forest you can run that flea mitt across your dog's fur and it will pick up the fleas that have not attached themselves. Love, love love it. It's great for hairy dogs. So check them out. Pugandhound.com Pug and Hound Apothecary thank you for sponsoring these shorts, you guys. I really appreciate you. Okay, let's. I got an email from Sharon Garcia. Thank you, Sharon. She says, I would love to know more about Plechner's, also known as Pleckner's syndrome, if you are able to assist. I am able to assist. So I'm going to do this little short on basically what Plectner's is. And then the next one, we will go over things that you, you can use for if you think your dog has Pleckner's syndrome. Okay. You know, and whether or not you think your dog has plector syndrome, the, you know, the symptoms are the same. So dealing with those symptoms in the body and that endocrine system imbalance, organ health, right? Improving organ health, improving endocrine system health is very important. So either way, but let's go through it. So Pleckner syndrome, some of you may have never heard of this and some of you may have. So it's also known as endocrine immune imbalance syndrome. Right. It's in the holistic world, like integrated veterinary care. Best definitely knows what Plechnic syndrome is. I wouldn't say that it is accepted by like allopathic veterinary communities. It is a syndrome that, or you could call it a clinical theory that was proposed by a doctor named Alfred Pleckner. He was a doctor of veterinary medicine. And he talks about the chronic imbalance in the adrenal, the thyroid and immune function originating by cortisol dysregulation and leading to systemic dysfunction. You know, personally, I'm all over it. I am all over it. And whether we call it a syndrome, right? Whether we name it and put it in a box, I don't care. But as I will tell you again and again and again, the nervous system rules all. And this is definitely too much fight or flight. Too much cortisol dysregulation, and that cascades into low immune function, liver issues, thyroid issues, adrenal issues, adrenal exhaustion, and definitely systemic dysfunction. So I can totally get behind Plectner syndrome. You know, I talk about Plecthner syndrome when I don't know I'm talking about Plecthner syndrome. But yeah, it is called. It's given a name. And so let's just discuss, you know, what are the core symptoms of Plechner's syndrome? Number one, you get adrenal hormone imbalance. Okay? So like I would say the central premise of this whole thing is Excessive cortisol, okay? Excessive production of cortisol and specifically cortisol binding proteins. All right? And there is a protein called transcordin, and that results in low active free cortisol, and that is despite normal or like, elevated cortisol levels. Okay? So that's cortisol binding protein. It's called transcordin, and it results in low active free cortisol. All right? And that causes what's called hypercardiosol mania. Remember, never quote me on those big, big ones, but hypo C O T I S O L E M I A Hypocortisolemenia. Mia. Mia, Mia. And that really does affect your dog's ability to manage stress, inflammation, and balance the immune system. Another thing. So we have adrenal hormone imbalance, okay? Then we have thyroid suppression. So when Dr. Pleckner was doing his clinical research on this syndrome or this theory that he had that he's putting together, he noticed that dogs with. With the syndrome with these symptoms often showed low active thyroid hormone T3 and T4 levels. Okay? And he believed that it was a secondary issue to the adrenaline issue. Okay? Secondary issue to the adrenal issue. And then he theoried that high levels of estrogen, you know, and even. Even in spayed and neutered dogs can disrupt both the adrenal and the thyroid hormone feedback loops. And this is normal for people as well. I mean, this can happen in people as well. Not that it's normal, but it can happen. And then basic overall immune dysregulation, okay, that means that the end, like this disruption in endocrine function leads to basically a fallout of the immune system. So immune system failure. And this is particularly. Dr. Pleckner is particularly looking at the immunoglobulin A, IgA deficiency, okay? Imbalanced immunoglobulin levels. And we'll talk about that on the next episode. What exactly that means. But what he believes is this kind of sets the entire stage for chronic infections, autoimmune disorders, allergies, cancer, epilepsy, the list goes on. And I mean, definitely deep thyroid dysfunction, basically inflammatory conditions, but there's a lot of stuff that happens before you ever get clinical signs. So what are the clinical signs, Rita? Of Plechner syndrome. So you have chronic skin infections, okay, Chronic allergies, gastrointestinal disturbance, vomiting, diarrhea, chronic constipation, ibd, ibs. You know, IBD is. I don't know what's wrong with your dog's gastrointestinal system. You get reincurrent ear infections, you can have seizures, you can have cancer, you can have autoimmune disease, hypothyroidism for sure. You can have anxiety, restlessness. You can even have the opposite, which is lethargy, you know, extreme behavioral changes and then a poor response to conventional treatments. Now, when I look at the, the, the symptoms for this, it could be the symptoms for so many things, but those are the clinical signs that are reported in dogs, okay, Having plector syndrome, okay? That's what they, they show. Diagnosing Plector's is a little hard. So hormone panel, okay? You want to look at total, total and free cortisol estrogen levels. You know, again, even, even in spayed and neutered dogs. Thyroid panel, you want to look at T3, T4, free T4, and then you want to look at IgA, IgG and IgM levels. So I think that when people are working with Plectnir, the testing should be done with specific labs that are familiar with Dr. Plettner's theory, syndrome and protocol. Okay? And I don't know what those labs are right today, but I will find that out and put it on the podcast. But again, you know, these things are, are definitely in conjunction with so many issues that are going on in the body, but they're related to what I talk about all the time, and that is the nervous system, okay? The nervous system getting overreacting, you, you know, getting, well, having issues basically in general with too much fight or flight, raising cortisol levels, causing metabolic dysfunction, burning out the adrenals. These are all things that can cause all of the things that I just talked about. The autoimmune disease, the cancer, you know, the gastrointestinal disturbances, chronic ear infections, weak kidneys, weak organ function. So I am going to address this on our next episode of the podcast. This is a short. So it's an introduction to Pleckner syndrome, but that is an overall view of Plechner's in general. We'll go over, like, what the treatments are. I think that because Plechner's syndrome is not recognized by, you know, mainstream veterinary endocrinology, the reason why is that, you know, it lacks again, peer reviewed studies and that most veterinarians will agree that cortisol binding protein issues are pretty rare and you can't measure them easily. And then some veterinarians don't believe that estrogen plays a role in neutered and spayed animals, which I disagree with. And I think that you can put a lot of these symptoms in other boxes like hypothyroidism and autoimmune conditions and Addison's disease. But it's worth having a conversation about. And the treatment, the holistic treatment would be the same for a lot of this. Okay, so we'll talk about that next time on the podcast.

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Individuals Podcast and I'm going to turn talk to you in our next episode. The content of this show is for educational and informational purposes only. It is not a substitute for veterinary care. This podcast doesn't constitute a provider patient relationship. As always, talk to your doctor, veterinarian or healthcare provider first before starting anything new. And that includes herbs. I'm not a doctor and I don't treat disease or prescribe anything. I'm a traditional herbalist providing herbal support education only. Regarding any products I may suggest the statements made regarding these products have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. The efficacy of these products has not been confirmed by FDA approved research. These products are not intended to diagnose, treat, cure or prevent any disease. All information presented here on the podcast is not meant as a substitute or alternative to information from your vet. Please consult your veterinary professional about potential interactions or other possible complications before using any production.