CKD & Renal Diets

[ukmisfit]

Hi all,

This is my first post so apologies if it's in the wrong place. My cat was just diagnosed with Kidney Disease and a renal diet advised. I'm not sure about Hill's & Royal Canin due to the ingredients and cost (though will happily feed it if it's all she'd eat), and was wondering if Concept for Life is any good? Are there other foods you can regularly get hold of that cats love? I use Zooplus and don't want to try one that's always sold out

My cat will be 6 in June and I previously lost a cat at 18yrs old to CKD too (in 2016)

Been advised to see the Vet again in 2 months for weight, urine and blood testing and then possibly a kidney scan (need to ask more about how necessary this is as my older cat never had one, possibly due to age)

Thanks for any advice x

[fjm]

Frankly, the biggest issue is finding a renal food that your cat will eat, and then finding another when they go off that one! I - like most people with ckd cats - have a stack of food that I stockpiled when it was "the one", and which Tilly now won't eat. The Hills made her vomit; she quite liked the Pro-Plan pouches and cans till I bought them in bulk and then she stopped eating them; I have tried Kattovit, Integra and various others, but not yet Concept for Life - at the moment she quite enjoys the Royal Canin pouches. It is worth shopping around as some online suppliers only sell in cases of 48 pouches of one flavour - a lot to be stuck with if they won't eat it.

[booktigger]

6 is very young to be diagnosed with CKD, I would definitely do the ultrasound and would be asking for it earlier than that. Is she a particular breed of cat?

[Mollycat]

I zeroed in on age too, do you know which kind of kidney disease it is? Chronic, Polycystic, etc?

You'll be hard pushed to get a better resource than http://www.felinecrf.org/index.htm for everything there is to know about kidney diseases.

Dry foods seem to be more palatable than wet foods, but whether it's right to begin a renal diet or to what extent all depends on the numbers. Did the vet give you an IRIS Stage number? SDMA gives a much earlier detection but it's not always helpful to begin making diet changes at early stages.

In 1995 my 8 year old cat was diagnosed with what was then called Chronic Renal Failure, when the test was urine and the only foods were Hills dry and Whiskas wet. With only the Hills and no changes to her treats or lifestyle she had another 8 happy healthy years - young diagnosis doesn't have to be a cause for panic.

[booktigger]

We actually did the opposite Molly - Lucy was 9 when she was diagnosed from an SMDA test and we changed her diet but didn't go down the medication route, she's 14 now, as you know, we are waiting for this years bloods.

[Mollycat]

We actually did the opposite Molly - Lucy was 9 when she was diagnosed from an SMDA test and we changed her diet but didn't go down the medication route, she's 14 now, as you know, we are waiting for this years bloods.

Was it one of the Early Renal diets? We had such limited options when I had Misha and I think because she was such a great success I may be a bit set in her ways sometimes. When Molly was first diagnosed on leaving hospital post RI they said don't and I didn't for 2 years, we only switched to renal one year ago. There hasn't been much change going by the important reliable numbers, her urine output decreased which is important, but she has got so fat on it I'm having to reconsider. The vet who pushed us to put her on renal based on the wrong numbers from a badly done test will not be seeing her again.

[booktigger]

No, that didn't exist when Lucy was diagnosed, she has had a bag, but as it was years after diagnosis, I didn't bother again. We initially just changed her dry food, as she has always preferred dry to wet. She never used to eat 100g pouches, but she happily munched her way through a whole renal pouch! Then when she was diagnosed with hypercalcaemia, we had to change it, as she isn't supposed to have any renal food with that, but vet said her kidneys were more important, so now she has purely renal dry, and her wet was a mix of adult, senior and renal until she went off renal (and I think we had 3 or 4 brands in the house)! I have had success just changing dry food, but that was another cat who preferred dry to wet (50g pouches weren't really a thing then, she barely ate 1 100g pouch a day), so even though I'm not a fan of prescription diets, I do think using renal early is a good idea, I've had two that have had numbers reduce just by changing their dry to renal.

[ukmisfit]

I zeroed in on age too, do you know which kind of kidney disease it is? Chronic, Polycystic, etc?

You'll be hard pushed to get a better resource than http://www.felinecrf.org/index.htm for everything there is to know about kidney diseases.

Dry foods seem to be more palatable than wet foods, but whether it's right to begin a renal diet or to what extent all depends on the numbers. Did the vet give you an IRIS Stage number? SDMA gives a much earlier detection but it's not always helpful to begin making diet changes at early stages.

In 1995 my 8 year old cat was diagnosed with what was then called Chronic Renal Failure, when the test was urine and the only foods were Hills dry and Whiskas wet. With only the Hills and no changes to her treats or lifestyle she had another 8 happy healthy years - young diagnosis doesn't have to be a cause for panic.

Hi, her notes say IRIS Stage 2
Her notes also say CKD
She is 3/4 Moggy & 1/4 Siamese

Any ideas of a rough kidney scan cost in Midlands, UK?

[ukmisfit]

6 is very young to be diagnosed with CKD, I would definitely do the ultrasound and would be asking for it earlier than that. Is she a particular breed of cat?

She is 3/4 moggy & 1/4 siamese, which made me ask the Vet if she thinks it could be caused by PKD. When I said she is part Siamese, the Vet said it's usually persians but we can look at doing an ultrasound scan. Not sure of the cost, I forgot to ask. Hopefully her insurance covers it, no kidney related exclusions but it does say in her old records she had 0.25kg weight loss (but that was me putting her on a diet weight loss as she was 4.47kg!)

She is now 3.66kg, should be around 4

[booktigger]

When I've had kidney scans done, it's been classed as an ultrasound, so about £40-50, depending on if they needed sedation, but that was about 7-8 years ago. I've not heard of CKD in a cat that young, what was the reason for her having blood tests?

[Mollycat]

What was the weight loss diet, was it a formula food or just less of her normal food?

[ukmisfit]

When I've had kidney scans done, it's been classed as an ultrasound, so about £40-50, depending on if they needed sedation, but that was about 7-8 years ago. I've not heard of CKD in a cat that young, what was the reason for her having blood tests?

Hi! She had a routine blood test because she's on Atopica (so maybe this could have caused it, but the Vet doesn't seem to think so and contacted a specialist in Birmingham about it to see if she's safe to still take it, 2x a week)

[ukmisfit]

What was the weight loss diet, was it a formula food or just less of her normal food?

Just her normal food but slightly less, worked great and she remained around 4kg for a long time