Hills Pet Foods?

[kittylover23]

I brought home a brochure on Hills pet foods (Ideal Balance, Science Diet, Prescription) and wanted to share some of the info in it:

Hills Pet Nutrition Canada Inc. is one of the pet food companies vet clinics selectively choose to carry, and is one of the highest quality, containing nutritious, highly digestible ingredients that are easy for your pet to absorb and utilize. This means less feeding and less scooping.

Something I found really interesting...

Should meat be the first ingredient in any high quality food? Not necessarily. The right mix of high quality animal and plant protein sources with the other ingredients provides the nutrients your pet can utilize, digest and absorb.

It also says:

Corn is a superior grain, compared to other grains used in pet food, like wheat or rice. It does not mean corn on the cob. Corn provides less digestible protein. Corn is added as an exceptional, completely digestible source of energy boosting carbohydrates. It is also an excellent source of essential fatty acids. Out of all the major grains, corn is the least allergenic.

Honestly, I have nothing against people feeding their pets Hills prescription diets - in most cases, the foods are designed with specific illnesses in mind and have certain levels of vitamins for different conditions. But with Science Diet and Ideal Balance, why do certain vets push these foods on healthy patients? These foods are definitely not the best thing for them...meat should be the first ingredient, and corn should not be included. Whenever we fed Cookie dry food with corn in it, it always caused really really smelly gas. :lol3:

My question is...what do you think of this?

 

[Willowy]

I think all companies market and advertise to make their product sound the best. The problem with Hills is that they brainwash vets into believing it and pushing their food, and charge an exorbitant amount.

 

[kittylover23]

I think all companies market and advertise to make their product sound the best. The problem with Hills is that they brainwash vets into believing it and pushing their food, and charge an exorbitant amount.

Totally agree. Just got back from the vet when I posted this and was fuming because my vet was bugging me to change my cats OFF of high quality canned and commercial raw and put them on Hills Ideal Balance.

As you might think, that was not a happy conversation. :lol3:

 

[melesine]

I think their foods are some of the worst things you can feed an animal. I also think they have a great marketing department and a captive audience with vets that are "educated" by their company and make money on selling their "food". I have 2 animals, one a dog and one a cat that had different medical issues where I was told they needed to be on rx food for the rest of their lives. My dog ended up severely over weight on their crappy rx food and I switched him to grain free and then raw. It's been 8 years since I was told he needed to be on rx food forever and he is in excellent health and has had no further medical problems. He has been exclusively raw fed for over 5 years now. My cat is on a raw diet and doing great. 

 

[emilymaywilcha]

This makes me want to write to the pet food companies just to find out why in the world do they believe this crap. I know I can't make anybody change the recipes, but there must be a reason vets sell Science Diet more than any other brand that Hill's is able to explain.

Of course I understand I might not get any answers, but it can't hurt to ask. The more I learn about feline nutrition, the more I want to get Hill's and other pet food companies to tell me their evil secrets.

 

[kittylover23]

This makes me want to write to the pet food companies just to find out why in the world do they believe this crap. I know I can't make anybody change the recipes, but there must be a reason vets sell Science Diet more than any other brand that Hill's is able to explain.

Of course I understand I might not get any answers, but it can't hurt to ask. The more I learn about feline nutrition, the more I want to get Hill's and other pet food companies to tell me their evil secrets.

I agree. Vets are so uneducated in feline nutrition, it's not funny. Then they have the nerve to tell me that by feeding my cat commercial raw and high quality canned, I'm doing something wrong?

 

[emilymaywilcha]

I agree. Vets are so uneducated in feline nutrition, it's not funny. Then they have the nerve to tell me that by feeding my cat commercial raw and high quality canned, I'm doing something wrong?

I can understand the raw part. Vets obviously have to learn about all those bacteria and worms that get into the digestive tract and treat kitties for all causes of vomiting, constipation, and diarrhea. But why don't they know Science Diet has carrageenan, BHT, corn, soy, cooked bones, 4D animals, and questionable byproducts such as beaks and feathers?

 

[melesine]

I've actually never had a negative reaction from a vet when I told them the animal is raw fed. And we have moved so much that has been 5 vets over the years. One of our dogs sees a specialist also. 

 

[sweetpea24]

I don't think Hills is anymore 'evil'than any other pet food company. Vets don't make kickbacks on selling their.foods. They do learn about the various rx foods because well they have to. Yes these companies may sponsor some courses and what is taught is based on the resear h they conduct. But at least they conduct research so that there are foods that are available to animals with certain illnesses.

I don't like the ingredients nor the marketing that rx companies, especially Hills, partake in. But what pet food company doesn't market to snag its share of pet food profit? Blue Buffalo claims that meat is the first ingredient. That maY be but meat contains a lot of water so after the food is cooked theactual amount of protein from that meat is reduced considerably. How many people were seduced by those ladies discussing pet food in the Blue Buffalo ad? These companies have formulators who calculate how much of whatever ingredient is required to make the food look good but also at the lowest cost.

Apparently, some vet schools are going to offer more in terms of nutrition. Hopefully so. But i wouldnt paint all vets with the same brush. There are some vets who are open to the 'mainstream' diets per se. Some actually prescribe Evo for cats who have diarrhea because its highly digestible. More vets are open to feeding raw if not premium diets.

I'm not saying that I'm an expert in nutrition, not by a longshot. But as people become more savvy, vets need to be more aware of what is out there. They have to start thinking outside the box.

 

[ldg]

I don't know... cranking out vets trained by your company is kind of evil. :dk: http://www.uoguelph.ca/news/2008/06/hills_pet_nutri.html

The Hill's Pet Nutrition Primary Healthcare Centre of the Ontario Veterinary College at The University of Guelph.

 

[carolina]

I don't think Hills is anymore 'evil'than any other pet food company. Vets don't make kickbacks on selling their.foods.

Not sure of what you call kick backs, but anytime they sell Hills, or any other prescription food available in their offices, they are making profit.... and that is a source of income to the clinic, no doubt about it :dk:
Why do you think Hills spends so much money investing on their education? Out of the goodness of their hearts? I don't think so..... They do that as they know when the vets are out in the real World they will be selling their food, and turning in profit. :nod:

 

[southpaw]

Even regardless of ingredients, I have never seen an animal do well on  Science Diet. Greasy, dandruffy coats; big, stinky poops; smelly breath. I guess for a lot of people they think that's normal, if that's all they know, but anyone that has fed a higher quality food can obviously tell that something like Science Diet is doing their pet no favors.

Plus I find it really laughable that they can talk about how great corn, and grains in general are, and how beneficial and necessary they are to a pet's diet... and then they come out with a grain free formula!! Come on, if that is not a company that's just going along with the "trend"....

I can't blame vets for recommending it though. This is what they learn in school, this is what their textbooks tell them about nutrition. Of course they're not going to question it. I'm a vet tech and everything we learned about nutrition was from a Purina website. So, basically we learned how awesome Purina is, and how everything in a Purina product is based on what research says dogs/cats need. Most people accept it as gospel because if we start questioning our nutrition education, then what else are we being taught that is actually inaccurate?
 

 

[sugarcatmom]

But at least they conduct research so that there are foods that are available to animals with certain illnesses.
 

Flawed and heavily biased "research", I'd like to point out. And most of those illnesses they are attempting to treat with diet were created in the first place by other products from those very pet food companies. Give a cat diabetes from one food, and oh hey! we've got another food to "treat" that. Genius really. 

 

[sweetpea24]

Ok I don't know how to quote multiple quotes but what store or animal hospital doesn't make a profit on selling pet food? Carolina, no pet food company exists without the goal of making a profit. Yes hills has obviously monopolized the industry because they offer rx foods. But they have enough capital to do so. Small companies cannot afford to do the amount of true research as you and others think would be possible to formulate foods to support the various conditions that exist today. Why wouldn't hills sponsor vet education if it meant more profit and a bigger share of the pet food industry? I am not saying I like their foods or their methods but it's business. Biased research or not, Hills and the other companies have been able to grab a piece of the pie other companies would love to have. The piece that produces the most profit. Even though I firmly believe that the invention of kibble has led to.the development of diseases such as kidney disease and diabetes, hills and the others have somehow kept owners (and vets) buying the very foods that led to the diseases that rx food is meant to treat. I hope that made sense but I'm just pointing to the irony (and hypocrisy) of the business. I never said the research hills or other rx companies do is free of bias.

Even ads for mainstream foods try to use research to promote their foods. For example, Purina put out that ad for dog chow which claimed that it made lge live an average of two years longer. A 14 year study sure sounded like it must be reliable. What the ad didn't say was that the study was comparing two groups of labs;one group was free fed and the other group fed restricted meals (both groups ate equivalent amount of calories). Both groups ate dog chow;just the methods of feeding differed. So what they found was the meal-fed dogs were slimmer and lived two years longer than the group being free-fed. What you have to pay attention to in the ad is "lived two years longer." Longer than what?

The premium foods that are around today were developed because of the market. As pets become more and more a part of the family and as we become more concerned with the origin, and purity of the foods we and our pets eat, the pet food industry responded by formulating foods with meat as the first ingredient or as nature intended. They can charge more because they know we will pay for the supposed higher level of quality. The cheaper grocery store brands still exist because there is still a market for it.

All I am trying to say is that pet food manufacturers, rx or not, premium or not, are driven by.the market. Don't get me wrong, I don't like the rx foods or the tactics that the rx companies use to make their profit. I think there are some decent foods out there but to me, the best food for our pets is unadulterated, pure, species-appropriate food. But it doesn't mean it's possible for me to feed my cats this way. For one, my cats won't touch real food per se. I don't have time or the knowledge to make them food. So I have to partake in this supply and demand game. I just try to pick the least evil. Unfortunately, due to having a picky certain cat, I have to feed some rx foods too. JMHO.

 

[sweetpea24]

I also don't know how to edit my post but I didn't mean to say "due to my picky certain cat" but "due to my picky crf cat". Sorry my thumbs are not text-worthy....I'm using my phone. I really hope I havent offended anyone, not my intention. I am offended however at the huge increase in price of one of the cat foods I feed my healthy cat. So this could explain my cynicism toward the pet food industry as a whole.

 

[cinderflower]

This makes me want to write to the pet food companies just to find out why in the world do they believe this crap. I know I can't make anybody change the recipes, but there must be a reason vets sell Science Diet more than any other brand that Hill's is able to explain.

Of course I understand I might not get any answers, but it can't hurt to ask. The more I learn about feline nutrition, the more I want to get Hill's and other pet food companies to tell me their evil secrets.

i agree with all the people who said it's just marketing.  Colgate-Palmolive (they own hills--there is a table that shows which major conglomerates own which pet food companies) knows better--they just don't care.  and poor quality food = higher vet bills.  unscrupulous?  yes.  unethical?  yes again.  illegal?  no.  read, "food pets die for," by ann n. martin and you will find the answers to a lot more than you want to know.  it also tells you how to start petitions and write to your local representatives.  and the best weapon against this kind of crap:  don't buy it and urge others not to as well.  denting them in the wallet is the best way to get their attention.

 

[prettygrrrl]

My hyperthyroid cat Pretty went on Y/D wet food back in November.  Her thyroid is not as low as it should be, but the vet says she is doing better, and it's evident that she is.  I don't know the overall answer, and while there is a great amount of conjecture around what cats eat on these posts, I just know it has helped bring her thyroid back down.  Fortunately her kidneys are in good shape so we haven't seen any issues there as yet.  The medication cost as much as the food every month - and it is so much easier for us to not be dosing her twice a day.  

 

[kittylover23]

Not arguing with the prescription diets, here - those do have certain benefits when it comes to illnesses. My problem is the vets forcing Hills Science Diet onto healthy patients when It isn't any good.

 

[cinderflower]

My hyperthyroid cat Pretty went on Y/D wet food back in November.  Her thyroid is not as low as it should be, but the vet says she is doing better, and it's evident that she is.  I don't know the overall answer, and while there is a great amount of conjecture around what cats eat on these posts, I just know it has helped bring her thyroid back down.  Fortunately her kidneys are in good shape so we haven't seen any issues there as yet.  The medication cost as much as the food every month - and it is so much easier for us to not be dosing her twice a day.  

it's your cat, so don't think i'm telling you what to do, but my cat has hyperthyroidism and i give her the transdermal methimazole in her ears twice a day.  she doesn't mind, but i don't know how your cat would respond.  hers was 13.2 and went down to 2.6 a month after she started on it.

hill's food has a lot of carbs and other things that cats really don't need, so if you want more technical information, look at dr. pierson's cat info site.  she goes into great detail.  my cat also started vomiting if she ate more than a tbsp. at a time and my vet said since her thyroid is well controlled, it might be ibd.  i read up on it, and food allergies seemed like a good place to start.  i started feeding her grain-free canned food only and she can eat as much as she needs and doesn't vomit.  my vet wanted me to try science diet z/d but i had already bought a couple of cases of other foods because i have three cats so i tried what i had first.  (and i really didn't want to go with hill's unless i had to.)  but he also told me there is no other "novel protein" you can buy, and there is.  it's probably really expensive but addiction cat food has nz brushtail (possum) and other things that a cat has probably never eaten.  i've had the same vet for 20 years, and i like him, but any time there's a hill's suggestion i always try something else first and it usually works.

i've not heard of food with thyroid medication in it but that doesn't mean there isn't and it doesn't work, but maybe your cat's levels weren't that high?  normal is about .8 to 4.0.  it's pretty serious too, because it masks kidney and liver damage if it goes unchecked too long.  my cat is 15 so i try to keep all of her systems in as good a shape as i can.  (i'm sure you do too   the methimazole is only 34.00 a month, actually i think the food costs more, but i'm trying to feed my other cats healthy and there doesn't seem to be a very inexpensive way to do that.

 

[casti]

I SO wish I could find a vet that knew something about nutrition and wouldn't try to push Hill's on my cats *every* time I take them to the vet. I learned the hard way how crappy Hill's is when my vet convinced me to give it to my dog. She was on Hill's T/D for 2 years, during which she would often get sick and they would always blame it on something she "must have picked up outside". She would often shake while sleeping, she started getting more aggressive with other dogs... And it was when I was searching for help with her behaviour that I stumbled upon a lovely forum back in 2003 devoted to pet behaviour. As many of you may know, often behaviourists train in nutrition since the two are often linked. That's when I discovered that I was feeding my poor dog one of the worst foods possible. At her next appointment we found out she had a spot on her liver and that her liver levels were out of wack. I was able to manage her condition through a much better, partly homemade, diet until she died at age 10. I still believe that her liver condition was caused by Hill's but of course I cannot prove it which is why food companies get away with feeding us and our animals all kinds of crap. So when I decided to get a cat, I did a LOT of research on cat nutrition. I wanted to go raw right away but wasn't ready for it when they were kittens. I fet them the occasional quail or chicken neck or gizzards but their main diet was of a high quality canned food. Six months ago one of my cat had to get his teeth cleaned and lost 4 of them He was only 2 years old!! Both him and his brother seem to be predisposed to dental disease so I've been trying everything to manage it - I brush their teeth daily now, give them Plaque-Off, probiotics, and switched them 100% raw. I think it has helped by only time will tell. I still feel badly every time I have to go to the vet and they offer me Hill's T/D.