food allergy testing

[Cremepuff]

Hi all,
I wanted to rule out the possibility of a food allergy in my cat, and I'm not sure what tests to get done and what kind of vet to go to. My general vet recommended a dermatologist in the area. But I'm not sure if I should go because the symptoms that I'm worried about are not primarily skin related?

Symptoms from the past year that I have noticed, but never been able to pinpoint the cause of:

- overproduction of ear wax, history of ear infections ranging from mild to a little severe. She came to us with ear infection in both ears (ear mites ruled out). Vet gave ear drops. At recheck, it seemed to have gotten a bit better, but persisted in left ear. Lots of ear wax still present to this day (I clean it and it comes back within a week). She does scratch at the ear/neck area a few times a day, but not to an obsessive point (i.e. she is not hurting herself trying to scratch it). At her most recent vet visit a few weeks ago, I asked for a recheck of the ear. He said it could be a mild infection, but it had not spread to the inner ear, so he gave a medicated ear wash solution to clean her ears with once a week.
-In April/May, bouts of diarrhea + vomiting. This was quite concerning, it happened about once a week for a month. No cause was suggested. She'd been with us about 5 months before these symptoms presented themselves. It resolved once she was put on a prescription digestive diet (+ probiotic for a short duration). Fine.. but still confused what caused it.
- Vet asked me a few months ago whether she sneezes a lot... I said no not really, I only really notice it when she's eating sometimes... They said it was because food particles might be irritating her nose.. This persisted, but she still tried to eat her food on a regular basis so I thought oh ok makes sense. She usually eats thru the little sneezes. HOWEVER, yesterday I was observing her and I noticed it was quite severe. As soon as she put her face near the food, she would be uncontrollably sneezing.. This bout went on long enough that I grew concerned and tried a few things (moistening the food so it's not just dry kibble, cleaning the bowl, trying different bowls). Nothing worked.. I'm going to order a small bag of the food to see if something went wrong with that particular bag (it's almost finished so it's been around a couple months).

And then I started to wonder, could these things be explained by a food allergy? When these things were happening it seemed like problem after problem and I couldn't figure out why or how to prevent things. I didn't get any clear explanation or diagnosis either.. I was beginning to become resigned.. I wasn't sure I would ever figure out the root of her problems. We're almost certain she has feline herpes virus because of her recurring eye ulcers, but that never explained ALL these other things going wrong. And I could never figure out the "stress factor" that caused the herpes flareups (as I take care to make her environment calm) but could a food allergy explain that as well? she doesn't have the obsessive compulsive itching, but do these symptoms match up? What type of testing should I get request? Should I take her to a dermatologist, or a different type of vet?

 

[daftcat75]

I don't know if there's much value in allergy testing. I haven't done it and don't know much about it. But it sounded like they do skin pricks of potential allergens. That's not the same as ingesting those proteins. So again, I'm not certain how much value those results would have.

If you suspect a food allergy, it's going to come down to a protein ingredient. The immune system doesn't key in on fats or carbs. A protein allergy may not always be the protein on the front label. For example, my Betty just adores the very junky Hills I/D chicken and vegetable stew despite my all my attempts to change her to a higher quality recipe. If I suspected she had a food allergy, it may not be the chicken. It could be the pork liver. It might be the rice. It could be the wheat gluten. It may even be the carrots because carrots have protein--not much but they do. All whole foods have protein. It's probably not the cornstarch or soybean oil since those are carbs and fats, respectively.

Unfortunately, because you are feeding kibble, there's going to be a lot more plant-based protein (more likely to be allergenic) than wet food. It's also going to be harder to find simpler recipes to try to eliminate some of those proteins. Ideally, you want a food that has a single (animal-based) protein and comes in several single protein varieties. That way you could try one for the recommended 13 weeks of a food trial. If the symptoms go away, great! Stick with it. If they don't, move on to the next single protein food and give that 13 weeks. If any of these foods make things worse, you don't have to subject her to 13 weeks of misery.

If she's a kibble kitty, I would start with Dr. Elsey's Clean Protein which now comes in several single animal-based proteins since the last time I looked at it. Kudos to them!
Dr. Elsey’s cleanprotein™ Cat Food - feed protein, not plants

Their wet food recipes don't look too bad either. Except...green lipped mussels and agar-agar are ingredients that don't agree with all cats. There are many many cats who have no trouble with these ingredients (or this food wouldn't sell.) But for those who are sensitive to them or for those conducting food trials, it's a good idea to be aware of mindful of these.

Rawz makes excellent single animal-based protein pates that do not contain these ingredients. Mouser is another clean recipe. Their foods are not single protein because each of their flavors contains mouse plus another protein. If your cat is allergic to mouse protein, though, that's probably a defective cat. I would choose Mouser with its two proteins but no agar agar or green lipped mussels over a single protein food that contained those two questionable ingredients. But then again, maybe your cat is one that doesn't have an issue with them. And that's what makes food trials so long and arduous. There's always some ingredient that seems impossible to avoid. For my Krista, that came down to egg, egg yolk, and dried egg product once we established that her IBD was keyed in on chicken and chicken ingredients.

Mouser:
Search: 8 results found for "mouser"

Rawz:
Search: 51 results found for "rawz"

You can get them elsewhere. I like Incredible Pets because you can buy single cans from them--helpful when you don't know if your cat will even eat the food.

 

[cejhome]

Hello, our cat Buddy is seeing a Dermatologist vet for allergies. According to the vet (he has been practicing Dermatology since the mid 1980's) testing doesn't work for food allergies, only elimination and/or a trial on hypoallergenic/hydrolyzed protein food (which is junk but sometimes the best thing for a short term to help figure out allergies). Testing only does well for environmental allergies such as dust, pollen, dander, fleas, etc.

Our cat Buddy has both types of allergies.

When we adopted Buddy he had ear infection in both ears, and yeast in one, but two weeks of drops clear it up. I think we pretty much have his food allergy issues solved - chicken. He started scratching the back of his ears a few weeks after we adopted him and scratched them bald. (He was also very constipated - but he was also in a very stressful situation - returned to the rescue he was adopted from about 1 yr after he was originally adopted. We adopted him about a month after that.) When we brought him home, he refused to eat any of the food he was eating at his former home or the rescue, so I went with the high quality wet chicken and pumpkin.

Chicken and fish are the most common food allergies (again according to the dermatologist vet). However, it can be one weird item - carrot, peas or one of the thickeners.

His former person and the rescue were feeding junk dry and canned, I was feeding him high quality chicken and pumpkin.

He is on desensitization shots for environmental. He is allergic to a number of pollens and a large amount of grass pollens. He started scratching his chest/cheeks, base of ears (not his ears) and was showing a rash on the inside leg/groin area in one place. We adopted him in mid-July and was fine until late August.

Our back yard borders a nature conservancy area - lots and lots and lots of pollen. My Fall allergies are going right now too. I am hoping we can continue the shots, Buddy is getting worse with them - he hates being restrained (saw a video about how to "counter condition them to things they hate like this). If not, it will be steroids for allergy season each year (oral in his food).

The Dermatologist vet also explained that environmental testing in cats is more difficult, they just don't show the reaction as well as dogs do. He has to use a black light to closely examine each test area for cats, where as for a dog, its plain as day.

Food allergies are usually protein related, but...not always. We seem to luck out on adopting cats with allergies and health issues, but we don't regret it at all, they have all been great and are well worth the extra work! We have had one cat that was allergic to peas - she would scratch her ears. One cat that was allergic to all grain - he would throw up. One cat allergic to anything chicken or fish related - even down to fish oil in food (I had to raw feed her) and she always had more problems with her stomatitis in the fall during ragweed season - would have to increase her steroids at that time every year - her allergies caused stomatitis. One cat allergic to chicken - ear scratching. Now we have Buddy, who is allergic to chicken at the very least (heck, it might be the pumpkin) and has environmental allergies.

He also mentioned that if its flea or dust mite allergies, then working with environmental controls (trying to minimize flea or dust mite exposure) is the best way to handle those two allergies.

If Buddy was an older cat, I would probably go with just the steroid since it appears that his environmental allergies are seasonal (I hope I hope). He is two and I would like to try and eliminate the issue as best we can - its not always successful, sometimes mostly/partial successful and sometimes not at all.

But...I am now facing the fact that he may not let me give him the shots - he is fed up with them even though it is only 2 x per week. We will see if the counter conditioning/desensitizing to receiving shots will work. He is good with at least tuna if not fish in general, so his big treat is Soulistic Lamb/tuna.