Renal problems, please help!

[Danezul]

Hi! I'm the foster mama of Dulcinea, a 6 years old kitty from Romania. Last week she had her blood chemistry done because she didn't want to eat anymore. It showed high values for liver and kidney: Alanine Aminotransferase 170 UI/L, Aspartate Aminotransferase 55 UI/L, Creatinine 4,52 mg/dL, Urea 81 mg/dL, Blood Urea Nitrogen (BUN) 37,75 mg/dL.
Her blood sugar levels are great, in fact she is in clinical remission and off insulin since 8th May this year.
She is on intravenous fluids for 6 days and she barely has eaten some wet food. She isn't lethargic, she moves and uses the litter tray. I also give her one pill of Azodyl daily.
The vet said that she might be related to her diabetes, but the exact cause is unknown. Dulcinea is around 6 years old (perhaps more), she is a little overweight and I fed her Mac's wet food (low carbs diet). She's been through some stressful situations lately and she doesn't react too well when being put through this.
The vet recommended Royal Canin Renal dry and wet food, but she doesn't like it, so now I'm trying different kinds of food just to see her eating something. And I'm not a big fan of this kind of diet food.
I just need some advice from you, as you always helped me so much whenever I was desperate. Dulcinea is my first diabetic cat and she is off insulin now due to your great advice regarding dietary change. Please help us, any advice would be highly appreciated! Thank you!

 

[Red & Rover (GA)]

I'm not good reading labs. But one thing comes to mind.

Is she showing signs of wanting to eat? but not eating? Cats with higher kidney values can also have stomach acid problems.

There is a great site for kidney cats. It's an encyclopedia of knowledge. There are also links to a CKD forum. http://www.felinecrf.org

You might want to start by checking out this page: http://www.felinecrf.org/nausea_vomiting_stomach_acid.htm

Are you checking for dehydration?

And congratulations on the OTJ.

 

[manxcat419]

Do you have a full copy of the labs at all? While it's OK to look at specific numbers off a report like that, seeing the full list can really help - sometimes vets miss something or see it as not too serious when it's actually something that could help Dulcinea feel a whole lot better if it was fixed.

 

[Larry and Kitties]

How high is the phosphorous level? If high it can make the cat not want to eat.
Also for all values can you also specify the normal range?

 

[Anitafrnhamer]

Ditto Larry, high phosphorus and/or anemia can throw off the appetite. Renal kitties can also have nausea, stomach acid, and a host of other issues that make them lethargic and not want to eat. The "best" food is whatever they will eat, issues such as phosphorus content can be controlled with binders. Renal cats can also suffer from constipation ( affects appetite), UTI's, and pancreatitis.

To encourage eating, based on my experience, I would suggest baby food meat ( no onion or garlic; and it is also rather low in phosphorus). If that doesn't work, sprinkle with grated parmesan cheese or mix with tuna water.

 

[PJ Brown]

I would definitely recommend (as the others have above) addressing the stomach acid issues by adding 1/4 tab of Pepcid or 1/8 tab of Zantac (75 mg, not the 150mg). I feed our CKD kitty the Weruva canned food brand "Cats in the Kitchen" and he loves it. You can look up on the Weruva website the carb, phos, and protein content under Dry Matter Analysis. The prescription renal food has complete crap in their ingredients and its not cheap, so feeding the healthy canned food is so much better.

If you join the felinecrf.org group, you will find that some kitties do not tolerate Azodyl very well. I haven't tried it with our kitty for that reason.

I hope this helps.
Patti