Wet or Canned for Diarrhea

I have been reading for months on the best foods for cats, wet verses dry or raw etc. I have been slowly moving my cats towards canned but I am beginning to wonder if the canned is a problem. My cats have Tritrichomonas that we can't treat so they have diarrhea and I am trying to help them without nasty meds. I only introduce something new in tiny (1/4 tsp.) for 1-2 weeks at a time. They are currently eating Royal Canin Kitten and California Natural dry & Avoderm chicken or fish canned. Has anyone else found canned to cause more problems with loose stools? They have had all these foods for months and I am slowly giving more canned than dry. Is it better to have easy or hard to digest food for diarrhea? I haven't yet worked up the courage to try raw.
I wish I could get these two to read so they'd know what's good for them.

If your cats have confirmed Tritrichomonas I don't think what you feed is going to matter. They will have diarrhea until the condition is resolved. I guess it isn't out of the question that some foods might help a bit...

Has your vet told you to just let it resolve itself? There are treatments but I've heard conflicting things about their effectiveness.

We had no changes in consistency of their stool when going to wet-feeding from dry. We feed canned twice a day with about 1/3 cup dry for snacking. In fact both of them have very firm stool.

As the above poster said, the food may not make any difference if you've got other things going on.

Originally Posted by mschauer

If your cats have confirmed Tritrichomonas I don't think what you feed is going to matter. They will have diarrhea until the condition is resolved. I guess it isn't out of the question that some foods might help a bit...

Has your vet told you to just let it resolve itself? There are treatments but I've heard conflicting things about their effectiveness.

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Our vet has been working with Dr. Gookin , who confirmed it, in treating the TF and we have tried the medication but both my cats had reactions that made it unsafe to continue. We did complete 2 weeks of the Ronidazole at the lowest possible dose but it was too low to eradicate it so we have no choice but to hope it resolves on it's own. With this who knows. Food is confusing enough but this throws another kink in it.

Originally Posted by twokatz

Our vet has been working with Dr. Gookin , who confirmed it, in treating the TF and we have tried the medication but both my cats had reactions that made it unsafe to continue. We did complete 2 weeks of the Ronidazole at the lowest possible dose but it was too low to eradicate it so we have no choice but to hope it resolves on it's own. With this who knows. Food is confusing enough but this throws another kink in it.

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If I were you I might be tempted to try a high fiber food like Eukanuba hairball formula (dry) or a digestive enzyme supplement. Maybe you could ask your vet if those might be worth trying.

Edit: Until the TF is resolved I wouldn't worry too much about trying to find the optimal food you want to feed them long term. Finding an improvement to the diarrhea in the short term would be more important to me. Diarrhea mean they aren't deriving full nutritional value from their food and could have at least a minor effect on their health.

I've been telling twokatz about my kitty's problems that appear to be coming from canned food so I thought I'd share with this group. My little one has IBD and I've been battling diarrhea off and on for some time. I finally found that feeding her dry (B.G. chicken) and raw meat only completely resolves the diarrhea. When I introduce cans, or at least certain ones, the diarrhea starts back up. I'm in the process of eliminating the cans she can't eat and the ones she can so I can determine what exactly is giving her problems.

I have a theory that it might not just be a certain ingredient in canned food (as I'm feeding grain-free/meat-only cans) but instead with the way the food is processed. I started thinking about this after I heard a few people say that their cats can eat raw chicken/turkey, but the cooked form gives them diarrhea. I'm finding the same thing to be true with mine which leads me to believe that she might have a problem with the processing of the meat in canned foods instead of a particular preservative or thickening agent. Just a thought anyways!

Thank you, hadn't thought about hairball formula. You are right about trying to mange the dirrhea, that is my goal. We did try the enzymes and that did not go well. I do worry about them not getting enough out of the food but fortunately they only get the loose stools about once a week, which is better than some of the TF cats.

Thanks for sharing, this is so frustrating for both of us. My vet keeps telling me canned has to be better but I am beginning to wonder.

Originally Posted by tamgirl99

I have a theory that it might not just be a certain ingredient in canned food (as I'm feeding grain-free/meat-only cans) but instead with the way the food is processed. I started thinking about this after I heard a few people say that their cats can eat raw chicken/turkey, but the cooked form gives them diarrhea. I'm finding the same thing to be true with mine which leads me to believe that she might have a problem with the processing of the meat in canned foods instead of a particular preservative or thickening agent. Just a thought anyways!

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Raw meat contains digestive enzymes that are destroyed by the high heat used in processing foods. As with humans, cats can produce some of the enzymes that are needed for digestion but which aren't in the food. How much capacity cats, and us, have to produce these enzymes can be a factor in how completely food is digested. Some cats may have a lesser capacity to produce the needed enzymes than others. My Coco has to have a digestive enzyme supplement in order to not have loose stools. I'm currently trying to convince her to eat raw and hope that she won't need the supplement if she will eat it.

oat would be a helpful ingrediant .... apple pectin and slippery elm may help ( human health food store ) but Consult the vet prior to any change to ensure none would cause issue with the meds ... Mschauer is right one with digestive enzymes I would also add a pre and pro biotic( many come all in one read the labels ) after treatment ... I would personally never use a high fiber as with my Ibd kids and my own IBS it caused more issues than it helped

Thanks Sharky, I apprecitae the info and suggestions.

I'm not sure if wet would help with your issue but overall it is much healthier than dry, it's as close as you can get to the diet they were designed to eat (without feeding raw). You may get loose stools during the transition but once you've settled into a regular feeding pattern the stools should end up however they are going to, whether that be firm or loose.
Here is some info on diet: http://www.catinfo.org/
http://www.catnutrition.org/index.php

I can't wait until I'm living on my own and can start to feed raw! I'm already giving Willie some for teeth care.