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Lisa and Witn (GA)

Lisa and Witn (GA)

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I recently rescued a stray who is severely malnourished and dehydrated. I took him to the vet and had bloodwork done. Surprisingly almost all of his bloodwork came back normal except his kidney values are a little elevated. The vet said this could be due to malnourishment or possibly early kidney disease.

The vet prescribed fluids and Hills K/D. I know there is nothing about this food that "prescription" other than it is lower in phosphorus according to the food charts. The important thing is that the cat is eating it.

I make my own food for my other cats. I thought there was a recipe for making your own food on Tanya's CKD website but could not find it. Do I have the wrong site? If so, does anyone have the link to the recipe? I want to switch him over to home made but need to see if I need to make any adjustments to my current recipe.

In addition to the stray, I recently rescued a kitten who is now 8 weeks old. My house is now exploding with 7 1/4 cats plus a dog. :joyful:
 
Both dehydration and malnutrition can affect his kidney values and he's lucky that only the kidneys were out of whack. Feeding k/d seem a little premature as a starved cat needs more protein, not less. I would first get him in better condition and then recheck bloodwork if needed. Unless he's really old, it shouldn't take long to see improvement. He's a lucky boy to have landed with you!
 
Lisa and Witn (GA) said:
My house is now exploding with 7 1/4 cats plus a dog. :joyful:
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Does that mean one of the cats is pregnant?
I agree it is premature to feed KD.
Feeding a lower phosphorus diet is a much better idea. Can you source a supplement that caters for low phosphorus? And then you can just add the muscle meat. I used to give 1/2 a cooked egg white every day as part of the food. It is high protein and low phosphorus. Things like egg yoke, liver kidney and heart are high phosphorus so go easy on those.
After some care and good nutrition you might find the kidney levels are ok.
 
I agree, no need to give him Hills KD, too low in protein and too high in carbs.

You could eventually give him your regular homemade and add a phosphorus binder named aluminum hydroxide.
Some argue that it's not needed if the serum phosphorus isn't on the higher end of normal values, but I think it's better to start now with some sort of phosphorus control.
From Tanya's website: "You should not normally need to use binders if your cat is eating a therapeutic kidney diet, at least in the early stages of CKD, because the therapeutic diet should be sufficient to control your cat's phosphorus levels." (http://felinecrf.org/phosphorus_binders.htm)

Tanya's website actually does not provide recipes. It provides all sorts of information about CKD and any related illnesses (and also some not related), and it also gives an overview of kidney-friendly commercial foods (http://felinecrf.org/dry_food_usa.htm)

Another alternative would be to select a protein source that isn't high in phosphorus. Typically, lean meat (rabbit, kangaroo, chicken breast) is pretty high in phosphorus, and the more fatty the meat is, the less phosphorus it contains.

Ideally of course you would talk to a certified nutritionist.

And of course, as Deborah says, it is premature to jump to the conclusion that he has CKD. Let him first stabilize, get food and fluids in himself, and retest in 2-3 months. No need to rush, and no need to feed KD.
One thing that you can easily do that won't harm him or any of the others would be to provide some good omega 3 in the form of fish oil - mackerel, sardine, krill, tuna… NOT cod liver oil!

I truly admire people like yourself, rescuing kitties!!!
 
Deborah & Muffy(GA) & Wendall said:
Both dehydration and malnutrition can affect his kidney values and he's lucky that only the kidneys were out of whack. Feeding k/d seem a little premature as a starved cat needs more protein, not less. I would first get him in better condition and then recheck bloodwork if needed. Unless he's really old, it shouldn't take long to see improvement. He's a lucky boy to have landed with you!
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We have a follow up appointment in a month. So far he is doing really good. The first couple days I had to syringe feed him. But since then he has been eating on his own and has been getting fluids to get rehydrated. He is so sweet.
 
Chris & China (GA) said:
Do you mean Dr. Lisa's recipe from catinfo.org? https://catinfo.org/making-cat-food/
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I think that was the site. Her recipe is almost the same as I am using. But she also states it is not good for CKD cats. I did find out from one of the FB sites for CKD that a home made diet should use eggshell powder instead of bone for the calcium because it has less phosphorus. This is great since my recipe already uses that in it.
 
I used egg shell powder for Sheba … I forgot to mention that.
I also use it now for one of my cats who had most of her teeth removed when she was very young due to severe gingivitis and she can’t eat bones. I feed my other cat bones for calcium. I make the egg shell powder myself.
 
Lisa and Witn (GA) said:
I think that was the site. Her recipe is almost the same as I am using. But she also states it is not good for CKD cats. I did find out from one of the FB sites for CKD that a home made diet should use eggshell powder instead of bone for the calcium because it has less phosphorus. This is great since my recipe already uses that in it.
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I also think it's best if you give him food high in protein ( and low in carbs )to help him get back on his feet and recheck him later on if his kidneys are still not ok then you start switching him to a kidney friendly diet, and yes those do not include bones since bones are really high in phosphorus and you want low phosphorus food but as they mentioned before you could use some substitutes, like the egg shell powder or calcium carbonate ( this is what I use in Babu's diet) what I wouldn't use is the kidney prescription diet unless his kidneys are really bad which is not the case
 
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