Urinary crystals?

Question

I have several male cats and I want to prevent them from getting crystals in their urithra's. I've read that most dry foods made today are made with high acids to help prevent the so called "old kind of crystals" but new kinds are present in modern breeds that have little to do with acid intake. Does anyone know what I can do to prevent this from happening to my other cats?

I recently had to put a cat down that was in the final throws of a battle with urinary crystals, his surgeries failed to prevent further flare-ups and he had to suffer a lot before he died. Many people on here were telling a recent asker that she shouldn't have her cat put to sleep for this condition because it's cruel, but I say just the opposite. I really don't want to put my wife and family through another situation like that again.

Answer 1

I have a male cat who loved the dry cat food. I watched as he battled TWO bouts of UTI blockages and it was upsetting!

You're right, the vet said crystals are in the dry food. I also read the 20 worst things to feed pets are Milk & TUNA. My vet said ONLY feed him canned food/s. With the recent scares on poisonous cat foods, I was glad I did this. He has been on Friskies Mixed Grill and Salmon Sr. since I also have an 8 year old female who's food he loves to eat, for 2007. I tried the Urinary formula canned Friskies but he's a picky little stinker in the food department. Therefore I stick with the two aforementioned flavors and he's a hap, hap, happy little camper.

The cost of canned food is greater, but my vet bills virtually disappeared!

Answer 2

You may have heard that about dry foods but dry food is the most likely reason a cat gets crystals in the first place due to the lack of moisture content. The system needs water

Nutrition since there are so many bad things out there is very important to your cat’s health
Contrary to what you may have heard, dry foods are not a great thing to feed a cat.
Dry foods are the number 1 cause of diabetes in cats as well as being a huge contributing factor to kidney disease, obesity, crystals, u.t.i’s and a host of other problems. The problems with it are that they are loaded with carbohydrates which many cats (carnivores) cannot process. Most of the moisture a cat needs is gotten
out of the food and 95% of it is zapped out of dry foods in the processing. Also, most use horrible ingredients and don't use a muscle meat as the primary ingredient and use vegetable based protein versus animal. Not good for an animal that has to eat meat to survive.
You want to pick a canned food w/o gravy (gravy=carbs) that uses a muscle meat as the first ingredient and doesn't have corn at least in the first 3 ingredients if at all. Fancy feast is a middle grade food with 9lives, friskies whiskas lower grade canned and wellness and merrick upper grade human quality foods.Also, dry food is not proven to be better for teeth. Please read about cat nutrition.

http://www.newdestiny.us/nutritionbasics.html

Answer 3

It would depend on the type of crystals that are causing the problem, since there are two or more different kinds. Treatment is different on some, though both types are painful for the cat.

I've had males go through the blockages (you recognize the hunched over body language right away), and a female who had 'grit' in her bladder, so it's happened to several of my cats, who are ALL on different diets.

Best you can do is keep updated on the newest info. Each case needs to be looked at as an individual decision.

Answer 4

Skip the dry food and feed only canned. Or you could still provide a small amount of dry, but I wouldn't let it be more than 25% of their total meal.

For the average cat, this is all that would be required.

Those prescription dry diets are not appropriate. Why add chemicals to your cat when keeping it hydrated would have the same effect and would be healthier in the long run?

Answer 5

The best thing you can do is to avoid dry foods all together. Canned is better. Cats don't drink enough water and canned food has a lot of moisture in it. You can also encourage your cats to drink water by offering them a pet fountain.