High protein can cause kidney and liver problem.

[catpopobi]

Hi, I have three cats and I give them raw food and wet canned food.
First of all, sorry for my bad English.

I'm living in South Korea and some vets say something very weird.
"High protein diet is harmful to cat. According to AAFCO, there should be more than 26% protein as dm.
So you don't have to feed them high protein diet(more than 35%)."

So I searched and looked up books such as "canine and feline nutrition" and "applied veterinary clinical nutrition".
Also I did googling but I cannot find any kind of info.
Only I found that unless a cat suffers kidney or liver problem, a cat should be fed high quality and rich protein diet.

Here is my question.
Do american or canadian vets also say that high protein diet(more than 35%) is harmful to cat?
What do you think the most ideal carbrotein:fat ratio for cat?
And what about the maximum of protein?

Thanks for reading!

 

[silent meowlook]

Feeding Your Cat: Know the Basics of Feline Nutrition – Common Sense. Healthy Cats. (catinfo.org)
Try the above link to see if you can find your information there.
Many veterinarians have limited knowledge regarding diet and nutrition for cats.
Much of the veterinary diet information available is written by major manufacturers of veterinary prescription diets, so it is going to be biased. The good thing about that is they have done most of the research that is available, so the diets produced are properly balanced.
Protein is important to cats, but it should be the correct kind of protein.
After looking at the link, if you still have questions, I will try to help, but I think everything is covered on that site.
I think it is great that you are interested in feeding your cat the correct food to maintain proper health.

 

[lisahe]

I'm glad you posted that link, S silent meowlook -- it's one of the very best resources for feline nutrition information. Our vet, who's a big protein advocate, even recommends it!

 

[IndyJones]

It's not protein that damages kidneys It's phosphorus you need to really watch, normal kidneys regulate the phosphorus level but damaged ones can no longer filter it and it builds up in the bloodstream. Protein helps keep muscles from wasting, which is especially important for aging animals.

A reduced phosphorus diet is ideal for kidney failure patients.

The old and dated belief was low Protein but this has since been disproven

Is the protein level too high? | RAWZ

 

[catpopobi]

Feeding Your Cat: Know the Basics of Feline Nutrition – Common Sense. Healthy Cats. (catinfo.org)
Try the above link to see if you can find your information there.
Many veterinarians have limited knowledge regarding diet and nutrition for cats.
Much of the veterinary diet information available is written by major manufacturers of veterinary prescription diets, so it is going to be biased. The good thing about that is they have done most of the research that is available, so the diets produced are properly balanced.
Protein is important to cats, but it should be the correct kind of protein.
After looking at the link, if you still have questions, I will try to help, but I think everything is covered on that site.
I think it is great that you are interested in feeding your cat the correct food to maintain proper health.

Wow, thanks for the link.
I read and I totally agree with the blog.
I do believe cats need high protein and low carb b/c they are carnivore.
So I give my cats wet cat foods and raw foods.
My cats are perfectly healthy enough and even healthier than when they were fed dry kibble.

What I want to know is, the myth "high protein diet is harmful" is global or only spread in Korea.
Honestly, Korean vets who make youtube video, they say
"high protein diet can lead kidney and liver disease.
It is very common fact."

So I asked them, "Then what's the best balance?"
They replied, "AAFCO suggest more than 26%. So it is okay to give cats less than 30%(but more than 26%) protein diet."

They even cannot explain me about high carb.
Well... I guess they even don't understand that low protein is high carb... lol

Thanks for your reply!

 

[catpopobi]

I'm glad you posted that link, S silent meowlook -- it's one of the very best resources for feline nutrition information. Our vet, who's a big protein advocate, even recommends it!

Thanks for your reply!
I knew who is Dr. Pierson but I didn't know her blog!
LOL

 

[catpopobi]

It's not protein that damages kidneys It's phosphorus you need to really watch, normal kidneys regulate the phosphorus level but damaged ones can no longer filter it and it builds up in the bloodstream. Protein helps keep muscles from wasting, which is especially important for aging animals.

A reduced phosphorus diet is ideal for kidney failure patients.

The old and dated belief was low Protein but this has since been disproven

Is the protein level too high? | RAWZ

Yeh, I agree with you.
American vet who makes youtube video said,
"There's no evidence that high protein can cause kidney and liver disease."
So I wonder this myth is spread only in South Korea or globally.

 

[lisahe]

Thanks for your reply!
I knew who is Dr. Pierson but I didn't know her blog!
LOL

She's great, I love her site. I read it when our previous cat was in her last months: she quite old and had a lot of health problems, including mild kidney disease. I learned from her site and others that low protein isn't really the answer to treating kidney disease, particularly in mild/early cases. This was in 2013 and our vet (not the one we take our current cats to, who recommends Dr. Pierson's site!) recommended prescription food with lowered protein but I refused it. And our cat's kidney numbers did improve. (Kidney disease was not her worst problem, though, and she didn't live much longer.)

We feed our current cats a high-protein, low-carb diet and I do watch their phosphorus levels some. When they were young, our vet said not to worry about phosphorus (which I didn't, not too much) but now I'm starting to think about it more since they're nine years old. Most of their higher-volume foods are fairly low though I should do another bit of work with the data to make sure their other foods aren't raising the overall level too much.

Good luck with your vet, C catpopobi ! And welcome to The Cat Site!

 

[maggie101]

I was talking with the owner of a pet store. His 3 cats have the same problem as my cat peaches. She vomits expensive food like rawz that have protein as the first ingredient. Weruva first ingredient is broth. It's still high protein but not as "rich" . True, there are vetenary specialists that agree a cat needs high protein but needs low protein because kidneys cannot handle it and scientic research done to help confirm if they are stage2+ kidney disease. Other specialist disagree,all cats need a high protein diet. So I guess it depends on who your vet's get their feed back from. It is a wide debate america,canada,korea,India and so on

 

[silent meowlook]

From what I understand, and I am not a vet but have worked for them for 30+ years and almost a decade in specialty and a decade cat only if you combine two of my jobs. Bottom line, I have been around and seen allot of cats

The following is just my opinion:
All animals due better eating what they are honestly supposed to eat. Dogs are a different thing because humans have altered them so much since they were domesticated. Tell me a Daushound looks anything like a wolf. I digress.

Cats have not really changed in the 10,000+ years they have been living with people. I mean there are some breeds that are different looking but they all have the same DNA as they did then.
Cats cannot process carbohydrates like other species can. There are many different schools of thought on this. To me it seems obvious. Feeding dry food is very convenient for people to do. They fill a bowl up with this kibble and don't have to think about the cats food again all day or longer. It is a fact though, that they cannot properly digest the carbohydrates.
There are many veterinarians that will say dry food with all its carbohydrates are fine and that a plant based protein source is fine for a cat. The reason for this is that many veterinarians have no interest in nutrition. They go along with what the major prescription diet food company's say and don't do any research of their own and don't care to because it is easy to follow what the prescription diet food company tells them and most of them don't really care about diet. The major manufacturers of these prescription diets fund allot of veterinary seminars, scholarships, and are an active part of every veterinarians education. So, these veterinarians get started to practice on their own already reaching for the prescription diet.

I am not saying all veterinary diets are bad because sometimes you need the prescription diet, in the case of bladder stones.

Cats need meat based protien and allot of it. Dogs on the other hand should have a somewhat restricted protien diet if they are in kidney failure of have severe kidney disease. Sadly, many veterinarians still care for cats as if they are small dogs and that is a huge problem. Cats and dogs are not the same. I hope that someday these veterinarians will understand that but so far its not happening.
People in vet hospitals still scruff cats as a way to hold them and still restrain them like they are dogs. Even dogs shouldn't be restrained that way. The thing I don't get is that nobody scruffs dogs. They treat cats like dogs but still they scruff cats not dogs.

I apologize, I went on a tangent here and never answered your questions.

Protein is important for all cats. Meat based protein. Canned food is always better for a cat with kidney issues and in my opinion, all cats should eat either raw (if the owners are careful) or canned.
You need to keep an eye on the phosphorus because if ok now it still will rise as the disease progresses.
I do not know the actual percentage of protien for cats because sadly I am not all that interested in nutrition. But, I am sure you can find it on that site.
There are many veterinarian in the USA that I like to call "Vetosaurus" as in a veterinarian that practices prehistoric medicine and has the beliefs and knowledge that they had when they first left school.
It is not just where you live, it is everywhere that you will find these types of vets. This is why I like feline only hospitals. Because at least it shows that the veterinarian is or was at one point interested in cats.

 

[maggie101]

My boss agrees with me,her boss doesn't but she has to do what he says, same concept

 

[Raul-7]

Take what medical authorities and scientists say with a huge grain of salt.

These are the same people who pushed people away from saturated fats like butter into even unhealthier fats like corn, canola and soy oils while at the same time funding [bribing] the American Heart Association. These same oils caused a soar in obesity, Alzheimers, and heart-attacks never seen in American history prior.

See where the money goes is always a good indication of where their motives lie. Raw food can be bought anywhere; whereas their kibble and 'kidney friendly' diets can only be bought from their organizations.