You're very welcome!
Anybody Suggestions? The food issue has been my biggest struggle. ^^ Did you mean it IS or IS NOT too high?
Yes, his serum phosphorus is too high especially for where his creatinine is. His P level should be lower than 5 but if you can get it lower, say 4.5, you are in a better place to keep him stable longer.
If you look at
Alex's SS, you'll see a tab for low carb/lower P foods. Tanya's also has a
food chart of lower P foods and she also lists the carbs. Keep in mind that the only truly low P foods are the prescription diets but a goal could be to feed foods that are less than 1.00% on a dry matter basis or less than 200 mgP/100 kcal on an as-fed basis. The one caveat to Tanya's is I suspect the values are all Dry matter basis (which is fine for P) but the carbs have not been converted to % calories. You could verify this by looking at Alex's SS or Dr. Lisa's carb tables and co paring a few. Let me know if you need info on how to convert DMB to % calories (which is what we look at for our diabetic kitties).
Sorry...the "reply" function is not working for me on my iPad now so I'll just address the questions sequentially.
I suppose you can use the egg whites in a carton. Remember that it does not bind the P in the food you are giving but it adds food with a low P value to food with a higher one to bring the overall level down. It isn't the best solution but if he has a food he can't part with that the P level is a bit higher, it could help some. I would strive to get as low P foods as you can. You'll have to experiment on how much egg white...and it must be cooked...he will tolerate mixed in his food. There are no formulas that tell how much you are lowering the overall P so it's a bit of a guessing game.
As answered by Wendy and Tricia, you should ask for a senior panel every time. They are cheaper and have the CBC; it's very important to keep an eye on his hematocrit (some labs do packed cell volume of PCV but the range you are looking for is the same) CKD cats can become anemic if you don't stay on top of it. Once the HCT or the PCV gets below 20%, you have to start giving erythropoietin stimulating agents which can be a pain. The closer you can keep it to 30%, the better and there are natural ways to do that.
Creatinine can potentially increase in some cats if they are having pancreatitis. Larger males with more muscle might have higher creatinine. Do you have any baseline labs to tell you what his creatinine ran before CKD? Other things can cause creatinine to jump....( e.g. kidney stones, kidney infection, DKA). Or..sometimes it just jumps. I found that with my CKD kitties (ECID), if I stayed on top of the things like P that I could control early on, it seemed to help them not have these huge jumps but that is anecdotal.
As far as the potassium, any supplementation must be done under the supervision of a vet. Gracie did not have CKD and her K levels would vary...sometimes 3.9, sometimes 4.4. So it's something you need to watch to see the trends. If your vet said to not give him potassium now, I'd listen.
