I was misled by my vet!

tickytat

tickytat

TCS Member
Thread starter
Alpha Cat
Joined
Jul 5, 2007
Messages
432
Purraise
4
Location
Vermont, USA
(I apologize in advance for the length.) My 4 year old overweight cat Mitties has been suffering with severe constipation for about the last year and a half. Following the vet's advice, we tried increased fiber, lubricant laxatives, stool softeners, and enemas. I even bought her a water fountain to increase her water intake. She definitely drinks plenty, but the stools were still rock hard and large. I was then advised to try a combination of Eukanuba Low Residue prescription food and Lactulose stool softener. This worked fairly well for over a year, then slowly stopped working. Well she was plugged up fairly severely, and I took her in and they gave her two enemas which cleared her out, and sent me home with Science Diet w/d (prescription weight loss and increased fiber food) and a couple more enemas just in case. I had to use the enemas 3 weeks later. Desperate for answers, I found a website and paid to have a vet answer my question. I told her what Mitties was on, and she proceeded to tell me that Eukanuba, Iams, Science Diet are terrible foods, and vets like to push them because they sell them and make good money on them. But they are filled with corn and by-products. I checked the label, and sure enough, it was true! She recommended a natural food. I immediately researched and decided to buy Wellness wet and dry. IMMEDIATE IMPROVEMENT!!!!!
Mitties absolutely loves the new food and has been going great ever since. Once a week I squirt a bit of mineral oil on it just to "keep things moving" and that seems to be great. I'm so glad I discovered this and feel bad for practically poisoning my cat for the last 4 years! YAY NATURAL FOOD! I have since converted a co-worker to feed her 12 year old cat Wellness too, and that has gone well. I would love to hear from other people with similar problems with chronic cat constipation and what worked for them.
 
B

beandip

TCS Member
Top Cat
Joined
Jan 1, 2007
Messages
2,322
Purraise
2
Location
under a pile of cats
Hello and welcome


I'm glad that Mitties is doing so well now. That's great news.

Paisley had some constipation issues. It showed up so early in her life (6-8mos old) that it didn't really get a chance to become "chronic" but when it did happen I know it was frustrating for me and Paisley. Paisley is on an all wet diet of Wellness and Natural Balance mostly. She also eats some Innova/EVO, By Nature, Avoderm and a few other brands. She does real well on the wet food.
 
mschauer

mschauer

TCS Member
Top Cat
Joined
Jun 17, 2007
Messages
6,753
Purraise
2,338
Location
Houston, Tx
I can't understand why vets won't acknowledge that foods high in carbs aren't good for cats. I know everyone says it's because they get monetary incentive from the pet food cos but surely every vet choose their profession out of a love of animals and they would not knowingly recommend foods that are bad despite any incentive.

I don't understand...

Originally Posted by TickyTat

(I apologize in advance for the length.) My 4 year old overweight cat Mitties has been suffering with severe constipation for about the last year and a half. Following the vet's advice, we tried increased fiber, lubricant laxatives, stool softeners, and enemas. I even bought her a water fountain to increase her water intake. She definitely drinks plenty, but the stools were still rock hard and large. I was then advised to try a combination of Eukanuba Low Residue prescription food and Lactulose stool softener. This worked fairly well for over a year, then slowly stopped working. Well she was plugged up fairly severely, and I took her in and they gave her two enemas which cleared her out, and sent me home with Science Diet w/d (prescription weight loss and increased fiber food) and a couple more enemas just in case. I had to use the enemas 3 weeks later. Desperate for answers, I found a site called www.JustAnswer.com and paid to have a vet answer my question. I told her what Mitties was on, and she proceeded to tell me that Eukanuba, Iams, Science Diet are terrible foods, and vets like to push them because they sell them and make good money on them. But they are filled with corn and by-products. I checked the label, and sure enough, it was true! She recommended a natural food. I immediately researched and decided to buy Wellness wet and dry. IMMEDIATE IMPROVEMENT!!!!!
Mitties absolutely loves the new food and has been going great ever since. Once a week I squirt a bit of mineral oil on it just to "keep things moving" and that seems to be great. I'm so glad I discovered this and feel bad for practically poisoning my cat for the last 4 years! YAY NATURAL FOOD! I have since converted a co-worker to feed her 12 year old cat Wellness too, and that has gone well. I would love to hear from other people with similar problems with chronic cat constipation and what worked for them.
Click to expand...
 
M

mrsbrak

TCS Member
Young Cat
Joined
May 6, 2006
Messages
50
Purraise
11
Location
alabama
I hear ya! I'm totally baffled about why my vet dismissed the idea that my cat's problems could be due to food allergy. He wanted to start daily meds right away without my even investigating diet! Argh!

My cat had chronic diarrhea, not constipation though. Still, as soon as I took him off the Science Diet (both SD dry and wet that my vet told me to use), I switched to Wellness grain-free canned, and my cat is so much healthier I can't believe it. He has more energy, is losing weight (he was too fat before), and even his disposition is better.
 
Y

yosemite

TCS Member
Veteran
Joined
Apr 26, 2001
Messages
23,313
Purraise
81
Location
Ingersoll, ON
Originally Posted by mschauer

I can't understand why vets won't acknowledge that foods high in carbs aren't good for cats. I know everyone says it's because they get monetary incentive from the pet food cos but surely every vet choose their profession out of a love of animals and they would not knowingly recommend foods that are bad despite any incentive.

I don't understand...
Click to expand...
The reason is that vets don't actually get much training in food and nutrition at vet school. The courses are more focused on medical training. When the sales reps visit the vets and rave about the good things in their food, vets tend to believe them IMO.

When it comes to nutrition I would prefer to listen to someone like Sharky than any vet. An example - last Saturday Bijou had his yearly checkup and is overweight. The vet wanted me to get Science Diet prescription food for him. I told the vet I didn't think that was a very good quality food and he immediately backed off with a "well, OK".

The vet has also never heard of Merrick's food. Interesting.

Thanks to Sharky's suggestion, I found Orijen and have started feeding them that for a dry food. Naturally it's only been 4 days, so it's too soon to tell how it's working, but it can't be worse than what I was feeding which was a pretty fair quality food.
 
laureen227

laureen227

Darksome Duo!
Top Cat
Joined
Sep 3, 2003
Messages
19,260
Purraise
387
Location
Denton TX
yeah, when Chip has his UTI, he had to eat a 'prescription' food that i hated the ingredients of! i used the one bag, & the peeing issues stopped. then i started adding things to his regular food to counteract his high acidity problems. the vet wanted him to use the other food for 3 MONTHS! he hasn't had that problem since i started adding brewer's yeast & potassium citrate to his canned food.
 
tink80

tink80

TCS Member
Top Cat
Joined
Jun 29, 2007
Messages
1,264
Purraise
3
Location
WA, U.S.A
OMG..i'm apalled at ur vet but so grateful u found a solution from an honest person..this is great information to know and i'm sure ur kitty thanks you for taking matters into your own hands...
 
nekochan

nekochan

TCS Member
Top Cat
Joined
Aug 5, 2006
Messages
2,760
Purraise
22
Location
Chicago, IL
I often wonder why the prescription diets are all so low-quality. If a cat is already having health problems wouldn't you want to feed them higher quality ingredients? I don't get it. An example is the diets for kidney disease. When my cat was diagnosed with kidney disease they wanted to put her on Science Diet k/d or IVD kidney diet. I reluctantly brought home samples of those foods (I had a very picky cat) and then read the ingredients online and was shocked! If a cat with kidney disease is already having trouble processing toxins and things, why would you feed them a food that was full of fillers, chemicals and preservatives?
I asked my vet if there were any other diet options, and he gave me a homemade diet recipe (oddly, it was a recipe put out by Hills pet food company) and I also asked if it would be ok to feed her a regular cat food that had lower protein/phosphorus levels which is what the prescription diets have. He said this would be ok. I researched foods and found several high-quality diets with lower protein/phos. and got samples from the companies. I found one my cat would actually eat and began to feed that-- Wellness Lite. On that food my cat's kidney levels dropped down to normal, and we were able to decrease her sub-q fluids. For the next 2+ years her kidney levels stayed at or near normal. She eventually passed away from an unrelated disease, she developed mammary cancer which spread but she went those 2 years without requiring any extra medications for her kidney disease, and I am pretty sure her good diet is responsible!
 
epona

epona

TCS Member
Top Cat
Joined
Jul 24, 2006
Messages
4,666
Purraise
957
Location
London, England
Originally Posted by Yosemite

The reason is that vets don't actually get much training in food and nutrition at vet school. The courses are more focused on medical training. When the sales reps visit the vets and rave about the good things in their food, vets tend to believe them IMO.
Click to expand...


They just aren't trained in feline nutrition - an expert in feline nutrition isn't called a vet, they are called a feline nutritionist and if you're going through ongoing health problems that may be food related you need to consult one of these experts in addition to your vet


ETA: What you need to remember is that veterinary science came about to care for working animals (back when horses were used for most things) and livestock, and the training still reflects this - veterinary care for cats and other small pet animals is a fairly recent development!
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top