Kidney stone drama

Hi all:

I'm having so much trouble with my cat situation - to get into this whole story... it's just too long. Short version...

Does anyone know what I can feed a cat for oxalate stone prevention other than prescription food? My vets tell me nothing else (because of course they want to sell me this expensive food, that the cats stopped eating, so now I'm basically throwing out stale/sour food at the end of each day)

One girl cat has oxalates, the other boy cat has a history of struvite (but no episodes in over 10 years).

I'm at my wit's end - the girlcat with the oxalate stones is deteriorating because she's not eating. The boy cat that never misses a meal in his life has flatly refused to eat. My schedule does not allow for me to fed them separately. I don't know what to do - neither vet is being any help.

Any advice or support or even magic would be greatly appreciated -- thanks!

I have no idea how to help your cats but I suggest you get other veterinary advice. I'm so sorry about your cats and I hope things get better! It's so sad when a cat refuses to eat, then you know something is wrong. I'm sure things look bad now but your cats will feel better, alright? Just wanted to offer support! Please search around and find some vet care for them!

Yea, both my vets are driving me batty with their vague non-answers.
I want a natural, holistic approach - there has to be a better way than this nasty prescription food. We don't have any holistic vets in my area.
thanks for your support, meminikitty

I'd suggest running this past Sharky - but, to be honest, I'd seriously rethink the opposition to prescription food, if you are getting good results with it. Prescription food is designed for a reason, and vets prescribe it for a reason (and, no, I really don't think vets are simply prescribing just for the fun & profit).

A second opinion wouldn't be a bad idea, of course - but I suspect even the most holistic vet won't discount prescription food for certain conditions.


I just had my boy in for a recheck re possible UTI - I specifically asked my vet if I should do prescription, and made it clear I would do so if she said to. Guess what - she said, pending test results - just to keep the increase of decent wet food up, and keep my water fountain going. She said they'd only suggest prescription if crystals were found in his urine sample.

So, I'd suggest get a second opinion, maybe send an email to one of the vet school consulting services, like Cornell or Tufts, but stay with the prescription food until/unless you get qualified suggestions on what would be safe to switch to. And, keep up with those follow up urine checks.

Hi - I don't mean to sound like I'm being cynical about prescription foods, I was fine with using them because the Royal Canin SO addressed both my concerns with each cat - one struvite and one oxalate stones.

But now they both flat out stopped eating it. They were fine at first, actually loved it and I had them transitioned to canned only. Now there's a feline food boycott in this house, and for the boycat to stop eating (well, he's 25 lbs and a huge fan of anything in his bowl). I tell myself that they won't let themselves starve, but the actively sick girl is down to 6 lbs. She's bones. she wants to eat, I can tell she's hungry and has an appetite but she takes one sniff and walks away.

The vet says that's the only thing I can give her in her condition.

Sorry if I came off sounding cynical, I'm just frustrated and desperate.

Did the boycott start with a new bag/batch of food? I would be concerned about that particular bag/batch being off somehow. Talk to the vet and see if you can take it back for a different bag/batch. If not, my vet will sometimes give a sample of a food to see if the cat will eat it--maybe they do something similar so you can see if they will eat the same food from a different batch.

How long have they been boycotting?

I'm sorry -I didn't understand that they had started boycotting the food. if they're not eating, I'd definitely be talking to the vet about what else to try and not taking no for an answer. It could be the batch as cloud said, and the vet should be happy to let you have a sample from another batch, or to get you another line from another manufacturer to try...and certainly in the short term he should suggest something, anything, else to kick start the appetite...even if it's baby food or just regular wet food or whatever. There are times when it's just necessary to get calories down, and worry about specifics once the cat is eating again. Good luck and best wishes - I hope to hear from my vet tomorrow re my boy's urine tests, and I"m hoping we can just stay on regular wet for a while.

The boycott's been getting progressively worse, really bad maybe the past week or so. It didn't happen suddenly, I did consider that it might be a bad batch of food. They just started eating less and less of it, until the day that I came home to find both piles in both bowls virtually untouched. So, I picked up a bag of the Royal Canin SO dry, just to mix it up a bit - and they woofed on the dry mixed with canned for a couple of days and then gave up on that. she still nibbles at the dry alone, but he wants no part of it.

Just to get them to eat something, I gave them some of their "old" food this morning.

I do have a phone consult with a holistic vet on Tuesday morning. I'd rather take the approach of giving them a high quality canned and a supplement or meds, rather than believing that the "only" thing I can do for my oxalate cat is try to get her to eat food that she won't eat. She's miserable and weak from not eating. I just need to know what to look for in the ingredients, and what to avoid.

I'm not trying to bash traditional veterinary medicine, but the traditional vets that I've talked to won't consider a different approach. *headdesk*
Hopefully this woman on Tuesday can give me some insight.
Will keep posted, thanks!

Oh hi, darlili... no worries! I didn't see your post when I submitted mine. Good luck with your kitty's tests next week - hope everything comes back perfect. Oh, and in regards to trying another prescription food - the issue I have is one cat is prone to struvite and the other oxalate, the Royal Canin addresses both. The other scripts address either one or the other. Unfortunately my schedule doesn't allow for me to try to separate them and feed them different diets. Quandary!

If they're boycotting the RC right now, you could try switching off to whatever other prescription brand is available, and then switch back to the RC in a couple of weeks. Jamie is on prescription food for struvite crystals, and I'm rotating four different brands of dry, and four of canned. That's the only way I can get him to continue to eat the prescription food, and my vets are fine with the rotation. The Hill's c/d Multicare is also for oxalate uroliths.

Good to know, thanks jcat!
Yea, I have a feeling the boycott is coming from boredom - they were all about the RC in the beginning.

My vet just called with the result of my Dante's urinalysis done yesterday - apparently he does have struvite crystals, with the lab result of 2 out of 4 (where I gather 4 is lots and lots of crystals), and his urine is 7, still neutral. She did suggest a diet change to Science Diet CD, which I'm going to pick up tomorrow evening from work - the vet's office closed at noon, and doctor called after hours. I'm so hoping mine won't be quite as stubborn as your guy!

She told me to transition - we're going to go with mostly wet, with some SC CD dry down for nibbling, and I'm taking him in for another check up in a month. She did say she had some other prescription line formulas in mind in case I get a boycott. She also said to hang on to some of my old food, just in case, for the moment...at least Petsmart is great at returns if I need to take anything back down the road! Although I may just donate to a shelter. She told me my girl cat could eat the CD with no harm done, so at least I don't have to go the two foods route at this point.

I hope your consult goes well, and that you can find something the kitty will eat and yet get good results.

Hi darlili: Wondering how the transition is going for you and Dante? Hopefully your kitty is cooperating and eating the food that'll make him all better.

Right now I have my two eating canned only: Half RC SO urinary, and half high quality canned food, that's the best I can do right now. If I try to sway the ratio to more-than-half of the prescription food... boycott in full effect! On my phone consult, the woman was understanding that cats can boycott and she did assure me that at least if I was getting some of the prescription food into them then it was better than none. She's also going to send me some chinese herbal remedy that she said she's had success with dissolving stones.

When I tried enticing them to eat more 'scrip food by adding some RC SO urinary dry... it made my poor boycat so constipated I had to take him to the vet. This is kind of on a side note, but the vet gave him an enema without so much as a tranquilizer - so he's not my vet anymore. The poor thing came home so traumatized.

Oh, gee, I wouldn't be going to that vet anymore either! What was he thinking?

Well, so far the Hills CD (wet and dry) is still a big hit at our house...my girl, who doesn't have any UTI issues that I know of, seems to love it and has been doing well with it. Dante, who is the one who needs the food, seems to love it even more! Forget the transition period - they both kept picking the CD out of the 'regular' food. And, Dante's peeing seems to be doing well...we have a follow-up check in two weeks.

The issue at the moment is that Dante's stool has been soft-ish, but up til this am, he was going in the box. This morning, out of the box, and sort of like pudding consistency. However, he's been perky, tail up, running round, and eating and drinking normally, even this morning post-pudding. Vet's office told me to let it got another 24-36 hours to see if it firms up and then call, assuming he continues to act all healthy & happy otherwise. Right now they said not to withhold food, since that may cause stress, and that may cause crystals. Apparently this 'pudding' is not unheard of in their practice when going to prescription food. And since Dharma hasn't had any issues whatsoever, I'm not leaning right now to something being wrong per se with the food.

I hope your guys start eating up and doing well - I know how worried I get if there's too much left in the bowl.