experience with FreshPet Vital food?

Status
Not open for further replies.
Carol & Murphy (GA)

Carol & Murphy (GA)

Member Since 2015
Does anyone have any experience with feeding FreshPet Vital food (in refrigerator section of Pet Stores)?According to the CatInfo site, it's only 4% carbs. But my vet said she thought it raised blood sugar on some cats she has seen - FreshPet makes several different foods, and not sure she was referring to the Vital.
Does any one use this food?
 
Last edited:
I used this food as a transitional food when going from dry food to wet food for my kibble addict. It didn't seem to raise his blood sugar any more than the low carb canned food did. My biggest complaint with this food is due to the very high moisture content, you have to feed a lot to meet calorie requirements, and it ends up being much more expensive than canned. That said, both the cats were CRAZY for it, and it's still my go-to if Max isn't feeling well.
 
Last edited:
Thanks Meya - good to know You don't hear too much about it, but with the 4% carbs, it seems like a good enough deal for kitties that have issues with canned food (as does my IBD guy)
 
Hi Mogs - I gave him freshpet Vital this morning and his numbers were not good, so I probably won't give it to him again or at least watch it very closely
I have so much trouble with Murphy's eating - he has a variety of GI issues (pancreatitis, IBD) and develops food aversions so easily - every time he gets nauseated, he won't eat whatever food he was eating. He has a long history of wet food resulting in a day or two of either IBD flare or pancreatitis - so I just give him wet as a small supplement - I have the following dry which I offer him (in order) Young Again Mature Zero Carb, Waggers, Evo, Epigen 90, Nature's Variety Instinct, Wellness core and Royal Canin glycobalance and DM as backup of last resort. The Young Again and Waggers absolutely don't raise his blood sugars (but he won't eat them all that often) Evo raises it - he doesn't eat Epigen 90 or Nature's Variety Instinct or Wellness often enough to make a judgement. It's a very difficult situation
Critter Mom said:
This caught my eye, Carol. Which foods agree better with him?


Mogs
.
Click to expand...
 
Hi Carol,

Thank you for the information. You're the first person here I've come across who made a connection between wet food and pancreatic inflammation. Saoirse has very similar issues to Murphy (chronic pancreatitis, low grade IBD, slightly enlarged liver and elevated bile acids). And yes, feeding is extremely difficult indeed. (I truly empathise. :bighug:)

I've only found one wet food Saoirse can tolerate but it's high in both sodium and phosphorus (she has early stage II renal insufficiency) and I also think there's something in it that she's mildly allergic. If I try her on anything else it worsens the nausea. I noticed that Eliz has some UK dry foods that are relatively low in carbs and after reading your post I started wondering whether I might try Saoirse on them if I get desperate, so thank you for sharing your experiences with Murphy and what to look out for BG-wise.

I treat Saoirse with ondansetron, Piriton (for allergies), famotidine every other day, and Hepatosyl. The Hepatosyl is similar to Denamarin but it also contains alfalfa extract. The alfalfa seems to be helping Saoirse. Hepatosyl used to be manufactured by Ceva but they recently started offering Hepaticare instead. This does not contain alfalfa and it made Saoirse quite uncomfortable. (Samylin, another SAM-e/milk thistle combo doesn't affect her that way but nor does she seem to do better for it. I had a look online to find out more about alfalfa and discovered it is a traditional treatment for digestive discomfort. Thankfully Ceva sold the licence to VSL so I was able to put Saoirse back on the Hepatosyl and she has improved a lot since its reinstatement into her daily regimen a couple of weeks ago. (She was not good over the Christmas period.) I thought I'd let you know in case it might be worth your investigating it for Murphy.



Mogs
.
 
Critter Mom said:
Hi Carol,

Thank you for the information. You're the first person here I've come across who made a connection between wet food and pancreatic inflammation. Saoirse has very similar issues to Murphy (chronic pancreatitis, low grade IBD, slightly enlarged liver and elevated bile acids). And yes, feeding is extremely difficult indeed. (I truly empathise. :bighug:)

I've only found one wet food Saoirse can tolerate but it's high in both sodium and phosphorus (she has early stage II renal insufficiency) and I also think there's something in it that she's mildly allergic. If I try her on anything else it worsens the nausea. I noticed that Eliz has some UK dry foods that are relatively low in carbs and after reading your post I started wondering whether I might try Saoirse on them if I get desperate, so thank you for sharing your experiences with Murphy and what to look out for BG-wise.

I treat Saoirse with ondansetron, Piriton (for allergies), famotidine every other day, and Hepatosyl. The Hepatosyl is similar to Denamarin but it also contains alfalfa extract. The alfalfa seems to be helping Saoirse. Hepatosyl used to be manufactured by Ceva but they recently started offering Hepaticare instead. This does not contain alfalfa and it made Saoirse quite uncomfortable. (Samylin, another SAM-e/milk thistle combo doesn't affect her that way but nor does she seem to do better for it. I had a look online to find out more about alfalfa and discovered it is a traditional treatment for digestive discomfort. Thankfully Ceva sold the licence to VSL so I was able to put Saoirse back on the Hepatosyl and she has improved a lot since its reinstatement into her daily regimen a couple of weeks ago. (She was not good over the Christmas period.) I thought I'd let you know in case it might be worth your investigating it for Murphy.



Mogs
.
Click to expand...
@Critter Mom
Hi Mogs - What is the wet food that Saoirse can tolerate? It wasn't that difficult to make the connection between wet food setting off some GI problem. I adopted Murphy 5 years ago, at the age of 5, and immediately tried to feed him canned food (fancy feast pates) This far predates the diabetes by years. After a day or two of even relatively small amounts of the wet (1/4 or 1/2 small can), he started vomiting and wouldn't eat for a day - then I'd give him dry food again for a few weeks - he was fine- , and try another flavor of Fancy feast or another brand of canned food (basically everything on the shelf at Petsmart) and would have the exact same result - over the 5 year period, I tried close to 50 different wet foods, and I had the exact same result with every one of them- even when I would start introducing them very slowly, a teaspoon at a time - when I got up to about 1/2 can of the small cans, he would become ill and stop eating for a day or two. Nothing like this ever happened with dry food. After his diabetes diagnosis, this obviously became a huge problem, I very slowly introduced Royal Canin Venison and he actually ate exclusively for 10days - 2 weeks when he suddenly developed horrible, horrible pancreatitis. So now it is back to mostly kibble and supplements with wet food (a tablespoon or so a day)
Murphy must be Saoirse's relative because he also has allergies for which I have given the US equivalent to Piriton but switched to Zyrtec - I don't have to give in the winter but will start in the Spring through the fall. Have you been using ursodiol? Looking online, I don't think I can get anything like Hepatosyl in the US. Two vets have strongly advocated for daily cerenia (give daily for 5 days then one day off) then repeat - it is both an anti-emetic and apparently also anti-inflammatory. At this point, Murphy's main issues are chronic poor eating, nausea, and wild blood sugar swings due to what food he will or won't eat on any given day -- any other tips for me are greatly appreciated.
 
* * * WARNING: UBER-LONG POST * * *

Hi Carol,

The wet food that Saoirse can tolerate is Sheba Fine Flakes in Jelly Poultry Selection (only the chicken and turkey pouches - she has a sensitivity to duck so the poultry and the duck pouches go to my civvie, Lúnasa). Here's a link to the product nutrition info (a UK supermarket site - there's no nutrition info on the manufacturer's website, which I think is very poor). I give Saoirse a little bit of canned pumpkin with her meals because her GI transit time slowed down a lot when she was off insulin. Also, we went through a patch where she was on Hepaticare and on a different ondansetron generic to her usual one. The constipation made her symptoms much, much worse and we had a fairly rough time of it over Christmas as a consequence. (Saoirse has improved since I was able to get her back onto her regular regimen and the constipation issue has resolved.)

I've had the same food odyssey as yourself. It took me nine months of food trials before I found the Sheba product. When selecting foods I tried to select products with only basic ingredients - meat, a little bit of fibre, and the basic necessary vitamins and minerals - but it is crazy-makingly difficult to find commercial diets that fit that criterion; so many manufacturers put so many nonsensical ingredients into their products. I want a simple, nourishing cat food, not a candidate for a kitty Michelin Star!! :banghead:

Of the foods I've tried for Saoirse, she seemed have less difficulty with poultry-based products which were quite bland. Any foods with a very high concentration of offal meat were a major no-no. If I do find a new food to try I open it and smell it first: if the aroma is strong I don't even attempt to give it to Saoirse. She also can't tolerate anything containing salmon oil or sunflower oil. If I get badly stuck she gets on OK with home-poached chicken and the broth from same, but it's not complete. I tried adding a premix product to it (Felini Complete from Zooplus) but the resultant article upset the tums of both Saoirse and my civvie. I guess the pair of us are in the boat where the 'right foods' are those our little ones can actually eat. Le sigh ... :(

Also here's the nutrition data for Hepatosyl from the VSL website. It includes the amount of alfalfa powder in the capsules. The standard dose is 2 capsules a day (but may be increased - ask vet). The two-capsule dose delivers more SAM-e, silybin, and vitamin E per day than the single dose products Samylin or Denamarin. Perhaps if you're interested in whether the small dose of alfalfa might help Murphy it might be an idea for you to consult your vet, a holistic vet or animal herbalist to see if it's OK or contraindicated for him.

-----
Hepatosyl 50 Ingredients (from the VSL website):

Description: Each capsule contains a comprehensive formula for broader application in hepatic liver support containing S Adenosylmethionine 50MG, Vitamin E (SD) 10MG, Vitamin K1 (PE) 0.05MG, Magnesium Stearate (BP) 2.5MG, Alfalfa Powder 50MG.

http://vsl-labs.co.uk/hepatosyl.html
------

While it is generally recommended that SAM-e supplements are given on their own after a minimum 2-hour fast and at least 1 hour before the next feed the manufacturers advise that it's OK to give Hepatosyl with a little food. I find that if I only give a bare scrap of food it doesn't go down as well as if I give about 1½-2 teaspoonsful. Saoirse finds the supplement very palatable. (She seems to like herbal stuff, including SEB.) I read on a human discussion forum that some people find it easier to tolerate SAM-e supplementation if they take it with a little food. In spite of taking it with food they still profess to notice the effects of the SAM-e so I think that it may be more readily absorbed than some of the veterinary manufacturers indicate on their relevant products.

Thank you for advising on the anti-inflammatory effects of Cerenia; I hadn't heard that before. You can only get Cerenia injections over here (and I'm not sure whether it can be dispensed for home administration). Saoirse gets ondansetron every day and it has to be the Bristol Labs generic, else it constipates her.* (A pharmacist who does a lot of pet prescriptions told me that it seems to be the one that best suits cats. The Cipla generic really disagreed with Saoirse.)

I also give Saoirse famotidine (although I'm looking to switch over to slippery elm bark soon, provided I can properly stabilise her) and this does make a difference to her overall comfort BUT if used too long it can negatively affect normal digestion.

Because Saoirse has been diagnosed with early stage II renal insufficiency and because the Sheba food is high in phosphorus I need to give her a phosphorus binder (currently aluminium hydroxide - Ipakitine and ProNefra both cause her GI problems). It's so frustrating not to be able to switch her to a different food because a recipe lower in phosphorus would be enough to control her phosphorus levels without any binder. I give her Moxxor omega 3 oil BID for its anti-inflammatory benefits (from green-lipped mussels, comes in a tiny softgel capsule that is small enough for a cat to swallow and certainly agrees with her better than fish oils), a vitamin B-complex supplement, and 1/3-1/2 of a Zobaline tablet per day. The B vitamins definitely seem to help her appetite, especially B12 (but because of the renal issues I have to be conservative about B12 supplementation). Have you recently checked Murphy's B12/folate levels? Might be worth doing so.

Saoirse can't tolerate probiotics. When If she has to be treated with an antibiotic I will give her a very tiny amount of live organic natural yoghurt but I keep it to a very bare minimum. I assume you've already found the following site, but but I thought I'd include a link to it just in case since it references a study which concluded that probiotics are contraindicated in humans with pancreatitis (and Tanya's Site also cites the same study):

http://ibdkitties.net/pancreatitis.html

Finally, I give Saoirse a supplement called Nutramed. It contains boswellia, milk thistle and maritime pine bark. All are herbs that are supposed to have anti-inflammatory properties. I've read that boswellia is a popular traditional treatment for humans with IBD on mainland Europe. I don't believe it's available in the States but again it might be something to discuss either with your own vet or a holistic vet/animal herbalist.

I feed Saoirse about 8 small meals a day plus her 2 snacks with her Hepatosyl. I add 2-3 teaspoons of water to each meal. Her food and water bowls are raised and that helped a lot.

Here endeth today's sermon! :rolleyes: Hope it might give you some ideas (and that there aren't any editorial howlers - head's too frelled to proof-read :oops:).



Mogs


* Constipation is a common side effect of ondansetron in humans.
.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top