Obesity: occurrence, treatment, and prevention.

Obesity is the most common nutritionally related disease of dogs and cats. Several of the important health problems that are inherent with obesity are resolved when the patient's body weight is returned to normal. Proper dietary management is central to successful treatment and prevention. Low-fat, high-fiber diets provide fewer available calories but induce a greater degree of satiety than simple restriction of the obese patient's regular food. Care must be taken to assure that overweight cats are not fasted, because preliminary reports indicate an alarming association between severe caloric restriction and hepatic lipidosis in obese cats. Obesity prevention should ideally be proactive, owing to the predictability of obesity in certain groups of pets. The large number of reduced-energy maintenance type diets that are available for obesity prevention facilitate this goal.