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The most important thing to do is to add water. They often avoid water, so you must syringe water into them a few times a day.
Dilute urine will flush out any forming crystals rapidly. Dilute urine will soothe the tissues. Concentrated urine will irritate and inflame the stiteches and the whole urethra.
My vet wants our cat on only wet food. She said she would prefer if he never has dry food again. She did not care what brand of canned food as long as its wet. We also mix water in if its the kind without "gravy"
My vet says that canned food except for CD and SD cause the struvite crystals. So I can't give Peanut anything but CD or SD which he hates. I give syringes of water. Peanut has cystitis is what the vet said and I am waiting to see what more we can do. He is on antibiotics. This is soooooooo frustrating. I don't know what to do!
When we were dealing with crystals my vet recommended Wellness brand food, mixed with extra water. If he is not eating there has to be something else your vet will go to.
Lynne, you still should try a few cans of the Purina UR. Even my cats with no urinary problems love it. It works on struvite crystals too.
We call it the "pee food" and all I have to do is yell "Peee Foood!" and they all come running. My guy with the crystal problem and PU surgery loves it and now all the brothers and sisters do too.
Also, I had this other stuff once that you sprinkle on cat food to make it taste better. I'll look it up.
If you can't get the Purina UR, try one of these flavor enhancers:
I think we used the salmon one for our one recused cat when she was new and wouldn't eat anything.
Also, the anti-inflammatory medicine my guy was on after the PU surgery was Metacam. They said it was to reduce the swelling that could make him re-block.
Remember, vets sell "prescription" foods and profit greatly from them. The only higher profit is vaccinations--70% of veterinarians' income is from vaccinations. Ever wonder why they push them so much?
Anyway, please remember that dry food is full of chemicals and corn, and try to stay away from them. I cannot emphasize enough the importance of syringing water in post PU-patients.
Below is some information you might find helpful. I've excerpted a bit of it to pique your interest. Lisa Pierson is a great resource
With regard to overall kidney and bladder health, I cannot stress strongly enough how important WATER, WATER, WATER is in both the prevention and treatment of diseases involving this organ system.
When a cat is on a diet of water-depleted dry food, they produce a more highly concentrated urine (higher urine specific gravity - USG) and they produce a lower volume of urine which means that a higher concentration of crystals will be present in the urine. This increases the chance of these crystals forming life-threatening stones. The concentrated urine and the lack of volume production can also be very irritating to the lining of the bladder wall predisposing them to painful cystitis.
Please keep in mind that a cat has a very low thirst drive and is designed to get water with their food. A diet of canned food will keep a proper amount of water flowing through the urinary tract system and help maintain its health.
If leaves keep falling on your driveway and you don’t regularly hose down or sweep your driveway, those leaves will build up and cause a problem. If you picture crystals as the leaves in this analogy, it is easy to see how canned food does a better job of ‘hosing down’ your cat’s bladder than dry food does
.
Urine pH is also often considered when discussing urinary tract problems but we really need to stop focusing on pH. Again, a proper amount of water in the diet is the important issue here - not urine pH. Many of the so-called feline lower urinary tract diets are formulated to make the urine acidic but it is thought that these low magnesium, acidifying diets may actually exacerbate painful cystitis. Also, these acidifying diets, which are so often prescribed, may end up promoting calcium oxylate stones and hypokalemia (low potassium in the blood).
It is also important to note - for those people still stuck on worrying about the urine pH - that there are many factors which determine the pH of urine and only one of them is diet.
With regard to dry food and urinary tract health, aside from the lack of water in this type of diet, there is also a correlation between the consumption of a high carbohydrate diet and the formation of struvite crystals as shown by this study.
Veterinarians often prescribe Science Diet dry c/d and x/d for urinary tract problems but again, these diets are only ten percent water and contain a high level of species-inappropriate ingredients and questionable preservatives. They are also very high in carbohydrates with dry c/d containing 42 percent of its weight as carbohydrates. Please note the first few ingredients in c/d while remembering that your cat is a carnivore.
Hope this helps!
Last edited by quackducker; 11-06-2009 at 03:35 PM..
Reason: remove all the crazy html codes this site added <g>
Thanks for this info. It helps a lot. I have 13 cats so changing anything will be very difficult. Peanut and Casper eat in a separate room so I need to try to change their food. I have been doing the water thing and the CD canned, hand feed, still only a walnut size urine output. The vet was supposed to call me Friday but I guess he'll get to me Monday. They told me to take him off the antibiotic because he was having diarhhea(?spell).This is very frustrating but it seems that Peanut is at least feeling OK. It's hard to tell with him because he is a sweetheart and doesn't really complain about anything that has happened to him. I need to find out where they sell the Purina UR. Our Petsmart has the Avoderm so I will try a can of that. It's got to be better than that CD. Thanks again for that article. It had lots of info and I will need to read and reread.
BTW, you want a larger than antibiotic sized syringe. I used to give 15cc at a time and probably a total of 60cc.
Walnut size is better than nothing but it's important not to be inflamed. Poor kitties. My heart goes out to them. It's such a rough time for cat AND owners.
See if your vet will get the Purina UR. As least a little to see if your cat likes it.
Contrary to what the other poster said, many vets are not looking to make huge profits on selling Rx food. We get bags of Purina UR from our vet and he only charges us one dollar above cost. I found it a few dollars cheaper on the internet, but the shipping charges were astronomical (pet food is heavy). So by getting it at my vet, I don't worry about shipping costs.
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