Food for cat with allergies and UTIs

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naturestee

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Hi, my cat Lily just had her second UTI and this time it didn't respond to the first antibiotic. When they tested her urine after the first antibiotic, she also had crystals that they didn't see or notice the first time, I'm not sure what type of crystals.I just picked up a pet fountain for her, maybe that will help. But I'd like to start looking into dietary changes in case I need that.

Dietary issues: Lily has had numerous health issues since she was a kitten, including a very sensitive tummy requiring low-ingredient diets. After being happy for several years on California Natural Chicken and Rice, she had serious problems with hot spots. Among several different treatments, switching to Natural Balance Duck and Pea seemed to help, so she's been on that for the last 2-3 years. She is on dry food. I know I should feed wet, but we're having money problems (and vet bills aren't helping!)

Any ideas for limited-ingredient diets that are good for preventing urinary problems?
 
just mike

just mike

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Naturestee said:
Hi, my cat Lily just had her second UTI and this time it didn't respond to the first antibiotic. When they tested her urine after the first antibiotic, she also had crystals that they didn't see or notice the first time, I'm not sure what type of crystals.I just picked up a pet fountain for her, maybe that will help. But I'd like to start looking into dietary changes in case I need that.

Dietary issues: Lily has had numerous health issues since she was a kitten, including a very sensitive tummy requiring low-ingredient diets. After being happy for several years on California Natural Chicken and Rice, she had serious problems with hot spots. Among several different treatments, switching to Natural Balance Duck and Pea seemed to help, so she's been on that for the last 2-3 years. She is on dry food. I know I should feed wet, but we're having money problems (and vet bills aren't helping!)

Any ideas for limited-ingredient diets that are good for preventing urinary problems?
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Hmmm...  I might suggest looking into a grain free kibble if you are going to continue to feed a dry diet.  There are many of them out there now but I am not real familiar with all of them and I don't know what is available in your location.  I suggest grain free because of the hot spot issue.  I'm also wondering if you found a wet food that agreed with them that you could afford would you switch them over?  Since I don't know what your budget is I won't make suggestions but there are some lower end of the budget wet foods out there but not sure how they would affect the hot spots.  You could also investigate a raw diet.  There is a raw diet forum here on TCS that you might want to browse through.  There might be suggestions on how you can supplement the kibble diet with a partial raw diet etc.  Best of luck to you!
 
sugarcatmom

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Naturestee said:
 I know I should feed wet, but we're having money problems (and vet bills aren't helping!)
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What if feeding wet helped minimize or eliminate the vet bills? You can feed an awful lot of canned or raw for the cost of a couple of vet visits.

Innova Evo 95% meat canned foods have minimal ingredients and single (even novel) protein sources, and don't cost too terribly much.
 
minka

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Sugarcatmom said:
Naturestee said:
 I know I should feed wet, but we're having money problems (and vet bills aren't helping!)
Click to expand...
What if feeding wet helped minimize or eliminate the vet bills? You can feed an awful lot of canned or raw for the cost of a couple of vet visits.

Innova Evo 95% meat canned foods have minimal ingredients and single (even novel) protein sources, and don't cost too terribly much.
Click to expand...
^ This!!

Even if you could only feed Friskies or something like that, there are a few of them that come in single protein flavors, and that would possibly even be cheaper than what you are feeding now.
(I've also always thought of Natural Balance as a semi-pricey food anyways, I'm pretty sure Before Grain is cheaper and I've used that as a limited ingredient food before I switched to wet)
 
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rafm

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I would agree that switching to wet would be best. Our Claire had cystitis so we switched them all to EVO 95%. She's had no recurrence of the issue since we switched. And, we only feed her wet. She gets a few pieces of dry as a treat, otherwise she is totally on wet. As for cost, I can save a significant amount by buying online. If you are feeding one cat, and get a case of food, that will last you close to a month for around $30. I just checked, I pay $28 for a case, $6 for shipping and no tax. So, total$34 for almost a month worth of food. (well, for me, that's 2 weeks worth).

And, like others have said, there are lower end brands available, the trick is getting more wet into her diet. She's not getting enough fluids. The fountain will certainly help but the best solution is to get her on wet. I'm sorry, I know that's not what you want to hear.
 
emilymaywilcha

emilymaywilcha

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I used to have a cat with more than 30 allergies. His dermatologist told me to give him both the wet and dry d/d, which was rabbit and pea. He had bacteria and crystals in his urine before allergy symptoms started appearing, but the problem actually was behavioral and he just needed to be retrained. (Bacteria and crystals are not always bad for some reason.)
 
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