Urolithiasis In Your Cat - How To Help And How To Feed

2024 Author: Sebastian Paterson | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 13:47

In memory of wonderful people, excellent diagnosticians and talented teachers Vladimir Nikolaevich Kondratyev, Gennady Sergeevich Dugin and Mikhail Fedorovich Vasiliev.

Diseases of the kidneys and urinary tract are perhaps the most common cause of death in cats, and urolithiasis among them ranks first. I happened to get acquainted with urolithiasis at school. My cat the Marquis died from this terrible disease. Of course, the fall from the ninth floor played its fatal role, but initially it was our own fault. Marquis ate "traditional" oatmeal with pollock. It was years later, at the institute, that I learned that the most common type of urolithiasis is the formation of phosphorus-magnesium stones of tripel phosphates (phosphate ammonia-magnesia, struvites), namely, fish is rich in phosphorus, and oats are rich in magnesium.

Later, as a student, I studied at the SSS at the Department of Clinical Diagnostics, where the employees literally bathed in urine samples from cats with suspected urolithiasis. Unfortunately, these suspicions almost always turned out to be not unfounded. "Look, Katya," Vladimir Sergeevich told me, looking through the eyepiece of a microscope, "do you see these coffin covers? These are tripelephosphates. For cats, they are just coffin covers! Remember this."

After graduation, working in the clinic and in the calling service, I saw a lot of sick cats with my own eyes. Catheterizations had to be done almost every day, sometimes not just once. Often it was not possible to clear the canal and it was necessary to send the cats for a urethrostomy (a boy is made into a girl, and manhood remains for beauty). Sometimes cats were brought in with developed uremia (poisoning with their own urine), and most of them died. And in the pharmacy, they most often ask for drugs for the treatment and prevention of urolithiasis and specialized medicinal feed.

Among the owners of cats, there are many legends associated with "urokamenka". In particular, only castrated and only cats are ill. Complete nonsense! Of course, there are predispositions to the occurrence of ICD, but there are exceptions to any rule.

Sedentary, obese and castrated animals are predisposed to urolithiasis, which is interrelated. Castrates tend to be overweight, because they need to fill the time that non-castrated brothers spend on dates with something. And what, if not gluttony and long sleep? Moreover, the owners, tormented by pangs of conscience (they deprived their son of pleasure!), Are trying to atone for their sins with tasty morsels.

There is a genetic predisposition in ginger animals.

Cats, contrary to popular belief, also suffer from ICD, but they get sick more easily. This is due to the anatomical features of the structure of the urinary duct. In females of all animal species, the urethra is wide, short and straight, and in males it is narrow, long and curved in the form of the Latin S (in the form of a "dollar"), therefore, small grains of sand in males clog the urethra, causing the clinical manifestation of the disease, and in females they pass free, which creates the illusion of health. Well, if it comes to the formation of stones, females also have a hard time.

Untamed cats really get sick with ICD very rarely, but if they get sick, then rarely, but aptly!

There are also age-related features. Most often, phosphorus stones are formed in animals aged from one year to 8-10 years. At this age, cats and cats have a tendency to increase the pH of urine, and alkaline urine is an ideal environment for the formation of triple phosphates (struvites). In older animals, urine becomes slightly acidic or neutral, so they rarely develop ICD, much more often - renal failure.

The Persians "chose" oxalates for themselves, since their urine is slightly acidic. Struvites are almost never formed in them.

There are also legends about feeding.

"All cats were always fed with fish, and everything was fine. What else to feed them?" Well, I don’t know how they “always fed fish”, but in nature no one has seen a cat with a fishing rod. In the villages, the cat also rarely gets fish - not every day the owner goes fishing! In my opinion, feeding with fish is a relic of hungry "coupon" time. If you are a staunch opponent of ready-made feeds, then as an excellent alternative to fish, you can use beef trimmings and any beef offal, except for liver and kidneys, and instead of oatmeal, you can take flakes from different cereals (boiled no longer than Hercules). And as for the allegedly universal health of cats before, when they fed fish, then "the tradition is fresh, but it is hard to believe"! My Marquis is proof of this. And he is not alone, alas. Finally,there are exceptions to any rule. Usually I say to the owners like this: "There are drunks who live to old age, and athletes who die in their prime. This does not mean that you have to drink, smoke and lie on the couch!" Exceptions just confirm the rules.

"There are magic food, give them - and no problem!" And again: "Give me food for castrates!" Advertising is doing its job - ready-made, in particular dry food for animals, are becoming more and more popular. It would be nice if, in addition to describing the wonderful properties of the feed, advertisers also explained the rules of feeding with feed, especially since there is a difference in feed.

Firstly, there is no feed for castrates, except for the VetCat series. Digestion of castrates is no different from that of non-castrates, except that they are more prone to obesity (see above). The food, called "neuter food" at the city's flea markets, is food with a loud inscription: "prevention of urolithiasis". They all contain a urine acidifier, but does your cat specifically need it (again, see above)? Moreover, ICD are sick and non-castrates too. In general, "castrated food" is a stupid publicity stunt aimed at an illiterate, gullible consumer.

Secondly, cheap food, no matter how much they are praised on radio and television, is low-nutritional food made from cheap ingredients, mainly vegetable (and cats are carnivores). If the production of a kilogram of feed requires several kilograms of products, plus the costs of manufacturing, packaging, transportation, and also add a trade margin, then what can feed be made of at a price of forty rubles per kilogram ?!

Thirdly, dry food is a concentrate, the dose of "crackers" is several times less than the dose of canned food or porridge with meat. If the cat has never eaten dry food or eats this and that, then there is a great danger of overeating. By inertia, the murka devours not 50, but all 200 grams of feed. That is why it is necessary to accustom the animal to dry food gradually and give them strictly according to the dose.

Fourthly, food must be selected individually, depending on the age, breed, lifestyle, weight of the animal. If you are feeding a fat slicker-Vaska with food for kittens or for cats with ideal weight, expect trouble. And it's not about the poor quality of the feed, but about the wrong choice.

Fifth, feeding a specially selected food (medicated or daily) is effective only when you give only a dose of this food and water. If you use food as "sweets and vitamins", then don't be surprised to get the opposite effect: overweight, pruritus and other delights. And finally, sixthly, having chosen the food that suits your cat, she liked it, and you can afford it, and there is always in the nearest pet store - feed this food constantly until it is time to select a new food for a different age category. … Jumping from feed to feed (even good to good) can lead to food intolerances.

"No dry food! It's poison, how many cats have died from them!" The reverse of the previous legend. Well, to trust or not to trust this or that type of feeding is your right. I can't add anything other than the above, I just repeat that improper feeding with homemade food leads to problems no less often than illiterate feeding with dry food.

But if, nevertheless, misfortune happened, what to do?

First, relieve pain and cramps. To do this, put a warm (not hot!) Heating pad on the lumbar region, give a quarter of no-shpa or other antispasmodic and drink 2-4 milliliters of Cat Erwin. It is not worth giving diuretics before the doctor arrives, because if the urethra is clogged with sand, then they can provoke hyperextension and even rupture of the bladder.

Secondly, take a urine test. Frequent painful urination with blood accompanies not only urolithiasis, but also cystitis and renal failure, and the ICD itself is of different types (phosphorus, calcium or urate stones). Each of these diseases requires its own treatment, and the diagnosis can only be made based on the results of urine analysis. If a doctor boldly prescribes a course of treatment only based on the results of a clinical examination ("Why do an analysis? And so everything is clear!"), Chase him in the neck. It's good if he guesses by chance, otherwise he will prescribe a dozen drugs "for everything" - spend a lot of money, but will there be a result (and whether the result you are expecting) … And even more so, do not demand to prescribe treatment by phone or from a veterinarian at the pharmacy. It is impossible to prescribe a full complex treatment without examination and analysis results. Do not be offended by the doctor who refused you, this is not from ignorance, but from unwillingness to engage in charlatanism. The same applies to medicinal food: medicinal food is the same medicine, the “wrong” food can do a lot of harm. Urine analysis should be done in a reputable organization with laboratory equipment. If they gave you an answer in a small office in five minutes, you were deceived. To study the urine sediment (and this is the most important part of the analysis), it takes several hours to settle or centrifuge the urine sample for several minutes (a centrifuge is not a small thing, it takes up the same space as, for example, a washing machine), and then carefully, meticulously examine the sediment under microscope. Moreover,it is necessary to determine many more biochemical parameters. In small firms, the pH of urine is usually determined using litmus paper and the non-centrifuged sediment is microscoped. Such an analysis is a filkin's letter. Take the time and money (remember that the miser pays twice!), Go to the city veterinary center, to the department of clinical diagnostics of the veterinary academy or to the city veterinary laboratory.

And finally, thirdly, follow the doctor's prescriptions, stick to a healing diet and keep your pet from getting fat and stale. Many neutered elderly animals are alive and well precisely because their owners keep them in excellent shape, sometimes even at the cost of a medical and educational hunger strike. I believe that Brigitte Bardot would have gnawed me alive (I treat her the same way), but I stupidly starved my newly acquired cat Gerund (or rather, he was given the same and the same amount as everyone else, and he escaped as he wanted). But I got him "an old couch potato, with kidney problems," and now he is cheerful and cheerful. When Gera lost weight, for the first time in nine years of his life he remembered that he was a man, and dumped him for exploits, I found him by the ad: "Found a young (about a year) cat." So pity pity strife!Whom do you want to see around you: a well-fed, but fat and sick disabled person or a lean, agile and cheerful cheerful person? The choice is yours!

I wish you and your pets health and long life! Remember, much, if not all, is in our hands!