Feline Lower Urinary Tract Disease

Hi all,
I just came home from the vet, where the vet diagnosed Marquis with FLUTD.:sad2:

After relieving Marquis of his urine, he told me that the most likely reason for this, was a diet too high in magnesium, causing the urine to from into crystals and blocking for the free passage of urine.

He put Marquis on a Science hill diet with a reduced magnesium content and hopefully, this would prevent it from happening again.

During the treatment, I had to use the bathroom, I literally got sick from seeing my dear cat laying there...just can't take it.

Anyway, this has got me thinking, maybe dry food is generally not good for cats?
I have always been feeding my cats dry and wet food.
Admittedly, the dry food was just the cheap stuff from the supermarket, but I had never dreamed that it could lead to this.:sad1:

What else can I do to prevent this from happening again?

Brian

This is a very debatable topic,I have worked at a vets for a lot of years & hardly ever saw this problem until "dried foods"came onto the market,then a lot of them did have high magnesium content.Our vet,who like me is from the old school of thought always says to check magnesium levels & he reckons if it is at the highest 0.08 percent & some are lower, then you are playing as safe as you can,we have some cats where the problem has not gone away until fed only wet foods.A lot of cats don't seem to drink enough which doesn't help but with our cats their love of water is to our advantage because although a lot of time they play with it they do also seem to spend more time drinking than the average cat...

The issue of food has been discussed before on this forum if you do a bit of searching...

Dry cat foods vary greatly in their ingredients and nutritional composition. The cheapest contain relatively large percentages of grain ingredients and thus low protein. The best are primarily good quality meat and have protein percentages of 40% and up. You should read labels of ingredients and nutrition data. Be warned, though, the highest quality dry foods are much more expensive than cheap cat food. The ones we feed are around $25 US for a 7 lb bag.

The one thing that all dry cat foods have in common obviously is low moisture content, and there is no doubt that this could be a problem for some cats. Cats are descended from desert cats, so do not naturally drink as much water as dogs for example, and apparently do not become naturally thirsty just by eating something dry (cats often swallow dry food without chewing a lot of it too). This could clearly lead to more concentrated urine making crystal formation more likely, and it can also lead to constipation and serious problems like mega colon.

Suggestions? Obviously read nutrient labels to find lower magnesium foods. Feed a higher percentage of wet food and buy better quality, higher protein dry food. Encourage your cat to drink more water. Based on my experience and what others say, many MCs like to drink water if it is available in a fun form. Three of our four, for example, heavily use the two fountains we have. Each of them pees at least three times per day, which indicates that they are indeed ingesting good amounts of water. Keep track of yours. If he is peeing only once a day or leaving only small amounts, you should try to get more water into him. Like I said, we have two fountains, water dishes next to every dry food bowl, and bowls in a couple of the sinks (a couple of the cats seem to really like these). We also occasionally put out a large bowl in the kitchen and float ice in it, which attracts some of the cats for water play along with some drinking. The fountains are the most effective, but they are also a pain to keep clean. I would definitely try a fountain, though, because cleaning it will be much better in the end than having a sick cat.

Im so sorry to hear about Marquis :sad2:

Scutter has been on the RC S/O food for years now although he is now on the moderate calorie one now :shy: he also has a Cystaid pil once a day unless he looks like he may be haveing another blockage, then he has two, which fingers crossed he has'nt had for 4 yrs now as the vet dose'nt think he will survive another without an op to give him a perminant tube to pee through & I dont think we could do that to him :sad2:

He only has a small amount of the S/O food for breakfast & tea but has access to wet all day. I do worry about Louie & his MC food but he also eats the wet & drinks plenty of water so hopefully he will be fine :smile:

If Marquis does'nt drink alot perhaps a water fountain :smile:

Just a quick update on Marquis's condition...
He is doing well, passing urine without any problems:satisfied:

While initially, he wasn't too keen on Hill's prescription diet, he is getting used to it.
He drinks a lot, always has, but I'll look into this fountain anyway.

On a side note, the vet thought Marquis was just a wee bit overweight,but at 8.5kg I don't think he is that fat..he's just big:LOL:

All in all, despite the scare he gave me, it turned out well.....except for the nasty bill!:suprised:...

Thanks for all the help!

Sincerely
Brian

Glad to hear he is doing better. If he has always drunk plenty of water then a fountain may not be worthwhile. I still would look at how many times per day he is peeing, though, as maybe he doesn't drink as much you think. Our two boys will often pee 3-4 times per day, with very substantial clumps left in the litter (so quite a bit at one time). I know that one of the adaptations that cats have from their desert heritage is the ability to concentrate their urine, but I would assume this would be very bad for a cat having crystal formation problems.

So glad he's doing better :smile: